I am not going to talk about the lavish opening ceremony, other than to mention that it took seven years to master the choreography and it cost about $40 billion.

Interesting are the other aspects surrounding this year Summer Olympic Games. After the terrorist attack happened last week, an extra 100,000 security and police troops have been deployed to Beijing and Tiananmen Square was closed off.
An Air China flight bound for Beijing from Tokyo was forced to turn back after an Olympic-related bomb threat was received.
Buddhist monks continue to protest wherever they can along with exiled Tibetans. It’s an understatement to say that they are unhappy with the Chinese ruling.
Pollution remains a key concern for the Games and on the morning of the opening ceremony, fog obscured the Beijing skyline. Naturally, the official point of view is that people confuse ‘haze’ with ‘pollution’ Yeah, right.
I wonder if the food prepared for athletes is coming from irradiated seeds or not.
Some time ago, Chinese scientists boasted about the huge size of the crops made with seeds irradiated in space, assuring at the same time that they are not going to be used to feed the Olympians. But what about the rest of the people?

In any way, the Olympic Games are very important to the Chinese officials. They are to show that China emerged from being a poor country, occupied in the past by Western power players and Japan and morphed into a power to be taken into account.
The idealistic image has been unfortunately tarnished by some events, like the resignation of Steven Spielberg as artistic director of the Olympic Games in February, over Chinese relation with Sudan.
Following month, March, has been plagued by riots and demonstrations in Tibetan areas culminating with angry reception of the Olympic torch in many international capitals.

The oil control proxy war
While China is busy hosting the Olympic Games, Russia is busy staging a war with Georgia.

What if the problem actually is related to the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline? The pipeline feeds Caspian oil to the West, without passing into Russian territory (hence no Russian control… at least not directly; some terrorist acts only)

It looks like there are some forces trying to control the oil reserve in Central Asia. Russia wants the pipeline to go through Russia (duh!), the USA wants to go through Georgia and Turkey and Iran wants to see it go through … Iran (where else??)
Coincidentally or not, the Americans have sent a huge naval task-force to the Persian Gulf to blockade Iran. Throw into the equation another player: Israel, and remember the recent reports of a massive IAF exercise over the Mediterranean.

For some time now, Georgia has been fighting separatists with ties to Russia in order to regain control of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, which voted for independence in 2006, in unofficial referendum. The separatist administration in South Ossetia has been trying to gain formal independence since breaking away in a civil war in the 1990s.
The majority of its 70,000 population are ethnically distinct from Georgians, speaking a dialect related to Farsi. The Ossetians claim that they have been forcibly absorbed into Georgia under Soviet Rule.
Now, South Ossetians want to join up with their ethnic cousins in North Ossetia, which is an autonomous republic within the Russian Federation.

In April 2008, Russia steps up ties with the other Georgian’s breakaway republic, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, in retaliation to NATO’s position of allowing Georgia to join the alliance at some point.

In July Russia admitted flying jets over South Ossetia to ‘cool hot heads in Tbilisi’ and at the same time Georgia and Russia accused each other of military build-up.

August 8, 2008 marks the start of heavy fighting between Georgia and Russia.
Photo of Georgian shells fired at separatist rebels in South Ossetia, August 8, 2008

Hundreds of fighters from Russia and Abkhazia were reportedly heading to aid the separatist troops.
Some people believe that Georgia’s president tries to draw NATO into the conflict, but chances are that it’s not going to happen. After trying to avoid a military conflict with Russia for so many years, would NATO be foolish to get into one at this point?

Let’s move on to a more serious and much anticipated issue: Angelina Jolie’s newborns
Here are some pictures of the happy family. Shiloh is a sweetheart and I must admit that the twins are beautiful. Considering that Hello! Magazine paid $11 million for the first pictures, they should have better been gorgeous.
Jolie Pitt Twins

Shiloh and one baby

Jolie Pitt family

Angelina, Shiloh and the newborns

What a slap on Jennifer Lopez’s face! Her twins were worth only half the money.

Now if you want to see a picture of Nicole Kidman’s baby… there is only a very fuzzy one not worth uploading. I guess it’s just a typical baby, looking like her father (as per Nicole’s statements) with a reddish blond hair.

Now the house is in foreclosure and the idiots should go and work as volunteers on other Extreme Makeover projects. To gain experience construction related if nothing else.

Second example: Winner of $3.6 million jackpot kept the secret for almost a year
We have to be proud with our local celebrities, so, drum roll please: introducing the young realtor who won $3.6 million on 6/49 and kept it secret for 49 weeks…. Ladies and gentlemen… here is Peter Dushop.

Seriously, what was in his freaking mind? He signed the winning ticket and left it in safe deposit box at the bank because he could not make up his mind about what to do with the money. Duh!!!!! This guy does not seem to be very bright if it took him almost a year to figure out something. And the supreme ‘duh moment’: he decided to leave the money in the bank!!!

That mucho intelligent idea needed almost a year to navigate through the emptiness of his skull. In the mean time he lost about $100,000 in interest.

I found as well some pretty disturbing comments congratulating the guys for not making his mind for almost a year.
Seriously? Congratulating him for being an idiot? Definitely the idiots outnumber us.

I am getting dizzy already rolling my eyes and shaking my head.

If the above quote is really coming from Einstein or not, it does not matter. What matters is that the silent cataclysm is happening.
According to reports and studies, in the U.S and Canada the losses of domesticated bees are up to 90% and in U.K and the Netherlands wild bee population have declined 80%. Losses were reported as well in Germany, Switzerland, Poland, Austria and Spain.
In many cases no bees were found dead, just gone from the hive. It’s called: Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD).

Searching for nectar, bees travel from blossom to blossom transferring pollen from plant to plant, thus fertilizing and enabling them to bear fruit.
Hence: no bee, no pollination of crops, orchards or home gardens. Affected will be: apples, blueberries, cantaloupes, cranberries, cucumbers, sunflowers, beans, peas, strawberries and many other crops.

According to a study from Cornell University, the direct value of honey bee pollination to U.S. agriculture is more than $14.6 billion.

What is the cause of the death of bees?

- Some people came up with the theory that bees were being affected by the increased electromagnetic activity from mobile phones and wireless internet access, interfering with the bees ability to navigate.
- Others say it’s because of various pathogens, old and new
- The most popular hypothesis seem to blame it on Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO) in combination with various insecticides
- Or all of the above

Genetically modified seeds seem to be the root of all evils. Watch the movie ‘We feed the world’ and you are going to discover lots of frightening aspects, not so well known, related to our food. The way I see it, our future is doomed.
It makes lots of sense.
Genetically modified seeds are produced and distributed by powerful biotech conglomerates (Monsanto being one of them), capable to manipulate government agricultural policy to support their agenda.
They came up with the modified seeds that must be used with their brand of fertilizers and pesticides in order to gain the maximum yield.
But the genetic modification of the plant leads to genetic modification of the flower pollen and the bees would potentially die of illness due to the lack of nutrients.
Another disturbing aspect related to modified seeds is that they are infertile meaning that the farmers can not replant.
Infertile seeds can not be good news for bees, don’t you think?

Of course you are going to find lots of studies (founded by whom I wonder) showing that there is no link between GMO and the death of the bees.
Personally, I trust these studies as much as I trust the TV commercials.

My beef with our government politics is a double whammy so to speak:
- Outsourcing to India and China- that causes loss of jobs in Canada, decrease of quality of life, increase of cost of living. In the mean time their economies are booming, increasing the demand for fuel. So we are fucked in every possible way: no jobs for us, increase in fuel cost making commuting (when we have a freaking job) more and more expensive, along with the fuel increase all the other essential things become more and more expensive. In my opinion, the government should penalize the companies which are outsourcing jobs to India, China and Pakistan. I don’t want cheap stuff from China; I want good quality, reasonable priced stuff from Canada. Yep, that means the dead of the freaking unions negotiating ridiculously high incomes. But that’s a different subject.
- Pollution in China and India goes unregulated
What about imposing sanctions and forcing India and China to follow Kyoto protocol or any other good-for-nothing- protocols that will make them reduce their pollution? What about the level of pollution in China, where Beijing is always wrapped in huge smog, they can’t even see the light. He, he… they can’t anyway.

A fast analysis – data from CIA World Factbook- shows a clear picture:

Country -Surface[million square km]- Population
China- 9.5- 1.3 billion
India- 3 -1.1 billion
EU- 4- 493 million
Russia- 17 -140 million
USA -9.8 -303 million
Canada- 9.9 -33 million

How ridiculous is that? Canada has the lowest population, spread over a territory bigger than China, and still has to accept Kyoto?
What the heck could be such a big pollutant in Canada, to make our government squeeze the last penny from us?

Ah, I forgot!! China and India won’t give a shit about global warming. We are left to clean their mess. Companies in Canada go tits up because they can’t afford extra money spent on making everything ‘green’. The heck, they can hardly stay afloat even without all the ridiculous ‘targets’ established by irresponsible politicians, too busy to kiss our neighbour ass, to take a closer look at our lives.

So, based on the above data, I would say that China, India, EU and USA should nicely work together on reducing the pollution, because to me, they are responsible, not Canada. I know, I know… we are blamed for loving big cars, the so called ‘gas-guzzlers’ and the Chinese and the Indians are using (for how long??) bicycles, ricsas, tuk-tuk and some other transportation gizmos.

But they eat. In the past fifty years, global meat consumption has increased fivefold and is still on the rise. Why does it matter? One word: methane.

Methane is twenty-five times more potent than carbon dioxide and although not as abundant as carbon dioxide, is better at trapping heat in the Earth’s atmosphere.
Almost half of all global methane emissions come from belching livestock.
Did you know that a single cow can belch out anywhere from 25 to 130 gallons of methane a day?
There are around 1.5 billion cattle on our planet, over a billion sheep and some 800 million goats, meaning that the methane emissions must be pretty high.
Actually, according to the U.N. livestock are responsible for 18% of greenhouse-gas emissions worldwide, more than all the planes, trains and automobiles on the planet.

True, the Indians won’t eat beef but they consume dairy products, and the Chinese and other emerging nations eat anything with four legs (except probably the table)

In conclusion: the booming economies in China and India will increase the need for fuel and food, because people will have money to buy both of them. And we are screwed, unless some dramatic changes happen.

Fresh news: WTO talks collapse over farm trade between the USA and emerging powers including China, India and Indonesia. China and India have been acused for not opening their market to imports (is it such a big surprise, seriously?)

I like Lee Pace in Pushing Daisies, I could not care less about the rest of the comedy actors or shows and definitely I am not interested in lead or supporting actresses in a comedy series. I guess I would take lots of washroom time during the ceremony. Maybe finish dinner, do the dishes, sort the wash-loads, etc when the boring categories are up.
Different story when we talk about drama series. I love Holly Hunter in Saving Grace, I like Kyra Sedgwick in The Closer. Mariska should be let go… really, I am already tired of her. Hmmm… I still have to find ‘Damages’ someplace, since it’s got nominations for lead actress (Glenn Close) and supporting actor (2 nominations actually). Yeah, I know, just because it’s been nominated should not mean too much. But hey, Saving Grace and The Closer are really good shows, so maybe this time they got it right.

I would like to see Burn Notice getting a nomination. And why not? Why is Monk so much better? Tony Shalhoub should join Mariska Hargitay and take a hike.

Outstanding Comedy Series
• 30 Rock
• Curb Your Enthusiasm
• Entourage
• The Office
• Two and a Half Men
Outstanding Lead Actor In A Comedy Series
• Alec Baldwin, 30 Rock
• Lee Pace, Pushing Daisies
• Tony Shalhoub, Monk
• Steve Carell, The Office
• Charlie Sheen, Two and a Half Men
Outstanding Lead Actress In A Comedy Series
• Tina Fey, 30 Rock
• Christina Applegate, Samantha Who?
• Julia Louis-Dreyfus, The New Adventures of Old Christine
• America Ferrera, Ugly Betty
• Mary-Louise Parker, Weeds
Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Comedy Series
• Kevin Dillon, Entourage
• Jeremy Piven, Entourage
• Neil Patrick Harris, How I Met Your Mother
• Rainn Wilson, The Office
• Jon Cryer, Two and a Half Men
Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Comedy Series
• Kristin Chenoweth, Pushing Daisies
• Amy Poehler, Saturday Night Live
• Jean Smart, Samantha Who?
• Holland Taylor, Two and a Half Men
• Vanessa Williams, Ugly Betty
Outstanding Drama Series
• Mad Men
• Boston Legal
• Damages
• House
• Dexter
• Lost
Outstanding Lead Actor In A Drama Series
• James Spader, Boston Legal
• Jon Hamm, Mad Men
• Gabriel Byrne, In Treatment
• Bryan Cranston, Breaking Bad
• Michael C. Hall, Dexter
Outstanding Lead Actress In A Drama Series
• Kyra Sedgwick, The Closer
• Sally Field, Brothers & Sisters
• Glenn Close, Damages
• Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
• Holly Hunter, Saving Grace
Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series
• Michael Emerson, Lost
• William Shatner, Boston Legal
• John Slattery, Mad Men
• Zeljko Ivanek, Damages
• Ted Danson, Damages
Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Drama Series
• Rachel Griffiths, Brothers & Sisters
• Candice Bergen, Boston Legal
• Sandra Oh, Grey’s Anatomy
• Chandra Wilson, Grey’s Anatomy
• Dianne Wiest, In Treatment
Outstanding Reality-competition Program
• Project Runway
• Top Chef
• The Amazing Race
• American Idol
• Dancing With The Stars

The Claim

Apple cider vinegar is an old folk remedy that allegedly could cure arthritis, guard against osteoporosis, lower blood pressure and cholesterol, prevent cancer, destroy infection, assist in digestion and weight control, maintain memory, and protect the mind from aging.

Here is the school of thoughts regarding the miraculous properties of apple cider vinegar:
- Abundance of nutrients
- Presence of trace minerals, bacteria and enzymes
- Presence of pectin, beta-carotene, potassium, amino acids
- Complex carbohydrates and dietary fiber

The Truth

There is no scientific evidence that apple cider vinegar has any medicinal properties.
A nutritional analysis of one tablespoon of apple cider vinegar reveals that the liquid contains less than a gram of carbohydrate, minuscule amounts of calcium, iron, magnesium, sodium. copper, manganese, and phosphorus; and a mere 15 mg of potassium. The fiber, vitamin, and amino acid content is zero.
As for the presence of any beneficial enzymes in apple cider vinegar, food scientists doubt that any could thrive in the acid environment of the vinegar and more probable they would be destroyed in the acid of the stomach when consumed and be of no use to the body.

The bad news:
On July 3rd, Google had been ordered to provide personal details of millions of YouTube users to help Viacom (which owns MTV and Paramount Pictures) prepare its case on alleged copyright infringement ($1 bn). Viacom stated that it had identified about 160,000 unauthorized clips of its programs on the website, which had been viewed more than 1.5 billion times.
Steps in digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) which called the US court ruling a “set-back to privacy rights”. The viewing log, which will be handed to Viacom, contains the log-in ID of users, the computer IP address (online identifier) and video clip details.
How wonderful is that… NOT!! Effing you Viacom along with your MTV and Paramount Pictures… is it not you guys rejecting the artists’ request to be paid royalties from web-content? Talking about double standards.
The good news:
Viacom has backed off and now Google (owners of YouTube) will hand over the database but without data that could identify users.
Still…. Effing you Viacom!

Andrey Melnickenko’s super-yacht

While most of the people are worried about fuel and food cost increase and see their cost of living skyrocketing, Roman Abramovich’s yacht has been overshadowed by his rival’s super-yacht.

Andrey Melnichenko’s futuristic yacht dubbed ‘A’ and evaluated at over $400 million, took its maiden voyage to Norway to pick up three Monet paintings.

Two best friends: China and Sudan

While some people are in a pissing contest over the size of their yachts or the number of paintings or modern art purchased from Christi’s auctions, other are worried over the crushing stock market and others decided to attacked the International Criminal Court prosecutor’s decision to seek an arrest warrant for Sudan’s president on charges of genocide in the Darfur region. According to the United Nations, more than 300,000 people have died and over 2. 5 million have been driven from their homes.
The BBC has found the first evidence that China is currently helping Sudan’s government militarily in Darfur. The BBC has found the first evidence that China is currently helping Sudan’s government militarily in Darfur because it believes that what Sudan needs is good business partners, help with development and a solid peace process in Darfur, instead of confrontation and sanctions from the West.
How do they achieve all of that (especially the solid peace process)?
First of all by buying two-thirds of Sudan’s petroleum exports, then by providing Fantan jets and training pilots to help the military interventions of the government , writing off million of dollars worth of debt and giving interest free loans.
How nice it is to see such good friends loving and respecting each other. Mostly… deserving each other.

Russia is sending warships to patrol Arctic waters

For the first time since the break-up of the Soviet Unions, Russia is sending warships- A submarine destroyer and a missile cruiser- to patrol Arctic waters. This is the latest move to increase Russia’s global military presence.
According to Navy spokesman, Igor Dygalo, one aim of the patrols is to protect the Russian fishermen which are blocked from seas around the island of Spitsbergen because of the Norway’s claims of exclusive fishing rights.

I took the liberty to extract some lines from the article and just comment them.

“Sandbanks is said to be the fourth most expensive place to live in the world. Seafront mansions sell for up to £10million and homeowners often fly in and out in helicopters”

I guess they may have to reevaluate the value of the proprieties.

Sandbanks

The new additions brought up some ethnic touch:
“Cavalcade of lorries towed the caravans into place in the genteel village of Canford Cliffs on the outskirts of Poole, Dorset.
And within hours the new arrivals had tethered a pony to the main road and strung up several lines of washing. Residents living near the car park say dogs are running freely around the caravans and motor homes which have been parked near to the mansions of the super rich”

A pic for all animal lovers:

Ignorance is bliss … but only sometimes. In this case it’s plain idiotic. How dilusional these Brits can be?

“’Our officers have visited the site and will continue checks to ensure the area is kept clean and tidy. It is our policy that unauthorised encampments will be tolerated as long as there is no significant impact on the local community”

Other residents are a little bit less politically correct:

“’It is utterly outrageous. These people are allowed to just show up, set up home and make a mess with the taxpayers picking up the bill when they move on.”

The lady still believes that they are going to move on… told you the Brits were dilusional.

Hey, maybe the gipsies are just sport lovers and want to be part of the sand polo championship about to begin.

The skeptics would say ‘yeah, yeah, … another guys looking for 15 minutes of fame’ while the guys from the other team, the one believing that there is somebody out there keeping an eye on us, would say ‘told you so’.
It’s hard to believe that some police officers would risk being ridiculed and put their careers on risk, to report a hoax.

Pregnancy pact to have babies
If I needed another reason for being happy and grateful that I have a boy, here it is: 17 schoolgirls pregnant as a result of a pact made to have babies.
The ones who succeeded celebrated with high-fives and the ‘unlucky’ ones were in distress.
How idiotic is this pact? As soon as ‘Juno’ hit the theaters I knew it will generate troubles and it will send the wrong message about pregnancy and having babies.
The religion card is going to be played, no doubt about it. Parents, teachers will be blamed for not handing out contraceptives and not having a non-glamorous approach to the unwed teenager mothers. But I believe that a 16 year old will be strong minded enough and not take into consideration anything told, especially by the parents.
Let’s face it: babies are cute, but demanding. And you can’t throw them away if next year they are running out of fashion. Jeez!!

Bill Gates pledges his $58 billion fortune to charity… great, I guess his kids are so thrilled… NOT. It’s about the charity he and his wife set up ‘The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’ which funds health and education projects around the world.

EU Treaty mess: Sarkozy blames Peter Mandelson for Ireland’s NO vote and called the Irish ‘bloody fools’, even indicating that Ireland will be forced to hold a second referendum. Issues that contributed to the Irish No vote included their concerns over euthanasia, abortion, world trade talks and future country representation in EU Commission.
France takes over EU presidency next month and it’s not going to be an easy ride, considering that the Czech Republic may not be able to ratify the Lisbon Treaty, following on the Ireland’s steps. The treaty must be ratified by all 27 members states to take effect and it’s been approved by 19 so far.
This is the status of the Lisbon treaty:

Approved by parliament: Austria, Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, UK
Defeated by referendum: Irish Republic
Challenges: Legal objections in Czech Republic
No firm date: Belgium, Cyprus, Netherlands (held up by referendum proposal), Italy (new government), Spain (new government), Sweden
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7464879.stm

Israel and ‘Iran nuclear attack drill’- U.S officials told the New York Times that more than 100 Israeli F-16 and F-15 warplanes staged a ‘Iran nuclear attack drill’ over Greece and the eastern Mediterranean, the first week of June. So far the drill has not been either acknowledged or debunked.

EU is to lift sanctions, including a freeze on high level diplomatic visits, against Cuba.
Last night, the EU’s 27 foreign ministers agreed to permanently remove them in a bid to encourage reforms.

Google and Yahoo’s senior managers and other executives, jumping ship to other companies.
It looks like both companies are suffering from unadmitted ‘brain drain’.
But where is everybody going? To Facebook, or to other new venues like Zillow, FriendFeed, Twitter and Xobni.
Why do they leave? Well, that is something I would like to know. I guess it’s not the money, unless all these guys are ridiculously greedy. I would rather say it’s the job itself or the working environment. Maybe some of them got bored doing the same old things and wanted new challenges to keep them young at heart and brain.

- Lucian Freud

Lucian Freud

Intrigued by the huge selling price of Freud’s painting I wanted to find out a little bit more about this artist and mostly, I wanted to see if all his work is as dysfunctional as the ‘Benefits Supervisor Sleeping’

Painting: IB and her husband

Painted in 1992 and sold for $11.4 million by Christie’s New York in November 2007, presents Freud’s daughter Isobel Boyt in her husband’s arms, sprawled on a grim bed, appearing to be asleep.
This is an interesting painting with a sense of emotional presence and intimacy.

‘Bruce Bernard’ is another painting sold by the Christie’s London in June 2007 for $15.5 million.

Bernard was the picture editor of the Sunday Times magazine from 1972 to 1980 and later became the visual arts editor of the Saturday Independent Magazine.
Friends with Freud since 1942 he declined to sit for his portrait for many years and only changed his mind upon hearing that Freud’s “working speed had appreciably increased.”

After Cézanne- Painted between 1999 and 2000 was sold for $7.4 million to the National Gallery of Australia.

After Cézanne is a variation on the theme of Paul Cézanne’s Afternoon in Naples.
Freud worked the painting on canvas first in charcoal, then in paint.

It looks like contemporary art may be pretty lucrative market after all.