Chamblee54

The curiously named “Home Office” of the British Government released a list of 16 names. The people on this list are banned from entering the U.K. This has something to do with stirring up hatred.
In addition to the 16 listed, 6 names were not made public. This has something to do with “public interest”.
Only three names on this list are familiar to PG. This would be Fred Phelps, Shirley Phelps-Roper, and Michael Savage. Margie Phelps may be one of the 6 whose names were not released.
The 16 who made the cut are:
ABDULLAH QADRI AL AHDAL…YUNIS AL ASTAL…STEPHEN DONALD BLACK… WADGY ABD EL HAMIED MOHAMED GHONEIM…ERIC GLIEBE…MIKE GUZOVSKY… SAFWAT HIJAZI…NASR JAVED… ABDUL ALI MUSA…FRED WALDRON PHELPS… SHIRLEY PHELPS-ROPER… SAMIR AL QUNTAR…ARTUR RYNO… RAVEL SKACHEVSKY…AMIR SIDDIQUE… MICHAEL ALAN WEINER (ALSO KNOWN AS MICHAEL SAVAGE)

PG is running out of things to say. Never mind having something good to say about anyone, he doesn’t have anything to say, good or bad. Fortunately, the computer he reads the internet with has this feature called copy and paste.
For the amusement of the reader(s) of this blog, Chamblee 54 presents this list. It is found at the ever entertaining EddyWu. Mr. Wu borrowed it from Discover Magazine.
1) The practice of burying the dead may date back 350,000 years, as evidenced by a 45-foot-deep pit in Atapuerca, Spain, filled with the fossils of 27 hominids of the species Homo heidelbergensis, a possible ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans. 2)Never say die: There are at least 200 euphemisms for death, including “to be in Abraham’s bosom,” “just add maggots,” and “sleep with the Tribbles” (a Star Trek favorite). 3) No American has died of old age since 1951. 4) That was the year the government eliminated that classification on death certificates. 5) The trigger of death, in all cases, is lack of oxygen. Its decline may prompt muscle spasms, or the “agonal phase,” from the Greek word agon, or contest. 6) Within three days of death, the enzymes that once digested your dinner begin to eat you. Ruptured cells become food for living bacteria in the gut, which release enough noxious gas to bloat the body and force the eyes to bulge outward. 7) So much for recycling: Burials in America deposit 827,060 gallons of embalming fluid—formaldehyde, methanol, and ethanol—into the soil each year. Cremation pumps dioxins, hydrochloric acid, sulfur dioxide, and carbon dioxide into the air.8) Alternatively . . . A Swedish company, Promessa, will freeze-dry your body in liquid nitrogen, pulverize it with high-frequency vibrations, and seal the resulting powder in a cornstarch coffin. They claim this “ecological burial” will decompose in 6 to 12 months.9) Zoroastrians in India leave out the bodies of the dead to be consumed by vultures. 10) The vultures are now dying off after eating cattle carcasses dosed with diclofenac, an anti-inflammatory used to relieve fever in livestock. 11) Queen Victoria insisted on being buried with the bathrobe of her long-dead husband, Prince Albert, and a plaster cast of his hand. 12) If this doesn’t work, we’re trying in vitro! In Madagascar, families dig up the bones of dead relatives and parade them around the village in a ceremony called famadihana. The remains are then wrapped in a new shroud and reburied. The old shroud is given to a newly married, childless couple to cover the connubial bed. 13) During a railway expansion in Egypt in the 19th century, construction companies unearthed so many mummies that they used them as fuel for locomotives. 14) Well, yeah, there’s a slight chance this could backfire: English philosopher Francis Bacon, a founder of the scientific method, died in 1626 of pneumonia after stuffing a chicken with snow to see if cold would preserve it. 15) For organs to form during embryonic development, some cells must commit suicide. Without such programmed cell death, we would all be born with webbed feet, like ducks.
16) Waiting to exhale: In 1907 a Massachusetts doctor conducted an experiment with a specially designed deathbed and reported that the human body lost 21 grams upon dying. This has been widely held as fact ever since. It’s not. 17) Buried alive: In 19th-century Europe there was so much anecdotal evidence that living people were mistakenly declared dead that cadavers were laid out in “hospitals for the dead” while attendants awaited signs of putrefaction. 18) Eighty percent of people in the United States die in a hospital. 19) If you can’t make it here . . . More people commit suicide in New York City than are murdered. 20) It is estimated that 100 billion people have died since humans began.

What is a snob?
PG always thought it was someone who thought he was better than others. This is one of the “sins” that most people denounce, and then practice. Who doesn’t see someone that is just a few notches below you on the scale of human coolness? Or, who doesn’t see someone that is just a bit chillier.
A trip to the dictionary yields this:
1-a person who imitates, cultivates, or slavishly admires social superiors and is condescending or overbearing to others.
2-a person who believes himself or herself an expert or connoisseur in a given field and is condescending toward or disdainful of those who hold other opinions or have different tastes regarding this field: a musical snob
The origin of the word is amusing. Snob was a nickname for a cobbler, or someone who makes shoes.
This is a working class occupation, but one that is needed by all people. How this would become a label for someone who “puts on airs” is a mystery.
There are snobs in a book PG is reading, “The city of falling angels” by John Berendt. An American writer goes to live in Venice, and has tales to tell. At one point, there is a dispute in an organization devoted to restoring stuff in Venice, and some of the players are labeled snobs. On page 318, there is a definition of a snob. You can be a snob upwards, by working the people on a level above you. Or, you can be a snob downwards, by being rude to those on a level below you.
PG used to work in an architect’s office downtown. A man there had a sign above his desk. The sign said ” I have never met a snob who was not a born liar”. Beside that sign was a plastic case. Inside the plastic case was a white shirt, with an ink stain in the bottom of the front pocket.
The architect whose office PG worked in is famous. Some might be impressed. However, PG worked for a blueprint company, and was placed in the printroom there. It was nothing to brag about.
The reader may have figured out by now that this post is going to ramble for a few paragraphs and not really go anywhere. The practice of “uppity”, or “putting on airs”, is hard wired into the consciousness of almost everyone. Like telling the truth and lying, no one wants to admit to being a snob, and yet almost everyone plays the game on some level. Maybe the sign should have read “ I have never met a human being who was not a born liar“.

Back when PG was working at Shakey Blueprints, he had this running conversation. “PG you should write a book”. “No one would believe it”.
Now we fast forward to the blogosphere of 2009. You can write a post, and no sane person would believe it. The only problem is that it is the truth…at least part of the story is real.
The story in question is Carrie Prejean and Perez Hilton. As you probably know by now, Miss Prejean is Miss California, and was a finalist in the Miss USA pageant. Perez Hilton asked her whether the other states should follow the lead of Vermont, and legalize same sex marriage. Miss Cali gave a rambling answer. The bottom line was, her religion taught her that marriage was between a man and a woman.
The story went downhill from there. Mr. Hilton ( whose “real” name is Mario Lavandeira, which is spanish for laundromat) had a hissy fit, and insulted mama dogs. Miss Prejean opened her mouth, and has not shut it. It takes talent to make Perez Hilton look smart, but Carrie Prejean has done it.
Then reports came out that Miss Prejean had breast implants. There was a public statement by the Co Executive director of the Miss California Organization, speaking under the poetic handle Shanna Moakler. It turns out that the Miss California Organization paid for the breast implants.
You can’t make this stuff up.