This Sums it Up

Great Pyramid of Giza

The Great Pyramid of Giza is the last remaining artefact in the seven wonders of the ancient world, a fascinating emblem of the ancient civilization that once ruled over Egypt. Along with the surrounding pyramids in the Giza complex, the Great Pyramid is remarkably well preserved, and has become a UNESCO World Heritage site which is under extensive protection. 

Built over 4,000 years ago, it is the largest pyramid in the world, and remained the tallest structure made by human hands for over 3,000 years, until the Eiffel Tower was constructed in Paris in 1889.

How, exactly, such a colossal structure was built has been a subject of fascination for centuries. The purpose of the Great Pyramid of Giza has also been a source of extensive study and research. Below we outline some of the most widely accepted purposes of the Great Pyramid that attracts millions of tourists every year.

Historians believe the primary role of the Great Pyramid of Giza was to act as a tomb for the great Egyptian King Khufu. Egyptians believed that their pharaohs would go on to become gods in the afterlife, but in order to prepare for a safe transition into the next world, they had to have the right burial chamber. 

King Khufu spent 27 years planning the construction of his pyramid with his cousin and vizier, the architect Hemiunu.

In its day it was the most impressive structure in the world, unlike anything anyone had seen, and its sheer scale and ingenuity seemed to represent the almighty power of the man who once ruled over the ancient kingdom, although it was more likely a demonstration of his kingdom’s wealth, which waned in subsequent generations. 

When Khufu died, his sarcophagus was placed inside the king’s chamber, deep inside the pyramid, although his remains were never found. However, his pyramid was surrounded by several satellite pyramids built for his wife and family.              TO READ MORE...

Climate

 

Our Mobile Society

Before the 1900s, large families were commonplace in the US of A.  These families were largely composed of males who worked on the family farm and as they grew older and got married and had families of their own, their homes were close by and they continued to work on the family farm.  The only time they traveled was into town to get supplies.

After the 1900s and with the advent of the railroad and automobile, family size decreased and when children got old enough to leave home, they could not wait to leave and went to the nearest big city to make their fortune.  Women soon followed the lead of the males and when they were old enough to marry, they oftentimes moved to another state with their husbands.

As a result of this natural evolution, Americans had the ability to be raised on the east coast and move to the west coast for work and vice versa.  Americans raised in the north just south of Canada had the ability to relocate to the south and vice versa.  Large cities like Philadelphia, New York, Chicago, Las Angeles, Maimi, Dallas, Atlanta, Detroit, and Baltimore were like magnets drawing the people to them mainly because of work and adventure.

Today, the family unit hardly ever remains together once the children graduate from high school.  Some go into the military, some go to college, and some just go to work somewhere.  These interstate highways on which automobiles travel are also used by 18-wheelers moving all sorts of items from one state to another state.  What is not transported by truck, is transported by railroad or by commercial airlines.

It is difficult to imagine like without the automobile, trucks, the railroad, buses, and aircraft.  One Hundred years ago there were none of these...  and, now we are exploring ways to travel into outer space.

 

Grandchildren

 

This Could Be Our Coolest Summer

Surprise! This summer is extremely hot.

How hot? July 4 was the hottest day on Earth since record-keeping began more than 40 years ago, according to scientists at the University of Maine’s Climate Reanalyzer project. As Americans grilled burgers and set off fireworks, the global average temperature reached 62.9 degrees Fahrenheit (17.2 degrees Celsius). The month of June, meanwhile, was the warmest on record, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts reported Thursday.

The heat index neared 100 degrees this week in New York City. That’s nothing compared to the 120-degree temperatures that baked parts of Texas in late June, smashing dozens of records, straining the power grid, and sending thousands of Texans to the emergency room with heat-related ailments. More than a dozen people in the state have died.

On just one day at the end of June, more than 120 million Americans were under some form of heat advisory, according to the National Weather Service. That’s more than one in every three people.

Regions outside the US have also been blasted by spring and summer heat. In April, temperatures in Spain were already breaking 100 degrees; they’ve since exceeded 110 in some places. The heat in Beijing and other regions of China broke records in June, and warm weather is fueling unprecedented wildfires in Canada.

All this, and we’re only a few weeks into summer.  READ MORE...

Time to Change

 

Classic Sunday Morning Newspaper Cartoons

 

Not Knowing What We Don't Know

I believe in a Creator.  I believe that extraterrestrials visited earth thousands of years ago and MESSED with our DNA creating the human being that we are today.  They then created a religion around the concept that God created humans in his own image.  There are two sides to a human being and not just male and female but good and bad, so to speak...  what some may call YING and YANG.  Therefore, God must have a good and bad side just like we do.  And, if that is the case, then another story was created about the snake in the garden of Eden and the Tree of Knowledge to cover up the fact that God gave us a bad side as well as a good side.

What bothers me more about these stories is not the fact that they came from extraterrestrials but that if you believe in the religion (God) then you give up your FREE WILL...  now, why would a God give us free will and then create a situation where we give up our free will to believe in them?

If Jesus exercised his free will then h would not have allowed himself to be crucified on the cross...  yet, that is exactly what he did.

Adam and Eve did not have free will (choice) because they only had good and good to choose from until they took a bite of the apple.  That bite gave them the ability to see evil and start making choices...  that God wanted to later take away if you agree to believe in him.

"MY KINGDOM IS NOT OF THIS WORLD..."  said Jesus.

If his kingdom was not of this world then of what world was it?

No one, in my experience, has ever asked that question...

"IN MY FATHER'S HOUSE THERE ARE MANY ROOMS..."  said  Jesus.

To what does this refer?   THE UNIVERSE?

However, there is another explanation about Jesus and God and that is that they are MULTI-DIMENSIONAL CREATURES...

Several scientists believe that there are multiple dimensions, not just the dimension in which we live...  but, parallel universes so to speak.  

If that is the case is that why God appeared as a lightening storm or a thunder cloud?

When it comes to this, WE DON'T KNOW WHAT WE DON'T KNOW...

The only way to know that truth is for us to DIE...  and then there is no guarantees, that in death we will become AWARE.

Gardens By The Bay - Singapore

 

Singapore

Singapore, city-state located at the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, about 85 miles (137 kilometres) north of the Equator. It consists of the diamond-shaped Singapore Island and some 60 small islets; the main island occupies all but about 18 square miles of this combined area. The main island is separated from Peninsular Malaysia to the north by Johor Strait, a narrow channel crossed by a road and rail causeway that is more than half a mile long. The southern limits of the state run through Singapore Strait, where outliers of the Riau-Lingga Archipelago—which forms a part of Indonesia—extend to within 10 miles of the main island.


Singapore



Take a tour of Singapore, a city with a multicultural heritage     See all videos for this article

A sculpture of the Merlion, Singapore.

Singapore is the largest port in Southeast Asia and one of the busiest in the world. It owes its growth and prosperity to its focal position at the southern extremity of the Malay Peninsula, where it dominates the Strait of Malacca, which connects the Indian Ocean to the South China Sea. Once a British colony and now a member of the Commonwealth, Singapore first joined the Federation of Malaysia on its formation in 1963 but seceded to become an independent state on August 9, 1965.     READ MORE...

Singapore

 

Cocaine House

 

SCOTUS

 

Starting a Business

When I moved over to TN from NC, I created a company called Quest Training, Inc. because my employer was willing to let me consult when I was not working for them as long as I always gave first priority to them.  I willingly agreed to that trade-off.  I also agreed to take vacation time but never sick leave for my consulting jobs.

My company was official from 1990 until 2015 when I retired.

One of the benefits of having a sub chapter S corporation is that I could flow all my income through my company, including expenses and that enabled me to substantially reduce my taxes.  The reason I was able to reduce my taxes was that every 3 out of 5 years, I showed a loss and that loss transferred over to my personal taxes by reducing them.

However, in order to play that game, I had to pay a CPA $2,000 each year to file my company and personal taxes as well as quarterly income and expense statements.

I never really calculated how much money I saw but my CPA during those 25 years that I only went in the hole on my taxes twice.  The rest of the time I was able to pay less taxes that I would have paid had I not had the company.  And, there were a half dozen years or more where I got money back because of company losses.

All I had to do was show at least one consulting contract each year in order to make my company a viable option for taxes.

For about 10 years, I worked for NIIT in New Delhi, India writing courses in business and project management for American Schools.  NIIT paid me directly and required that I maintain a home office as well.  All those expenses were deductible, including any and all computer devices, cell phones, and internet connections.

My company would lease a car and after 3 years, I would buy that car and lease it to my company.  Whenever we went on vacation, I would check out a couple of places for potential consulting work and reserve a meeting room at the resort to hold an annual meeting for my company, allowing the entire vacation to be written off as a business expense.

For those of you interested in starting a business, I thought you might enjoy reading my story.  I never did get a business license.  But, it cost me $500 in attorney fees to incorporate.

Good Luck!!!

Getting Ready

 

CIA's Experiments with Mind Control

ON APRIL 10, 1953, ALLEN DULLES, THE NEWLY APPOINTED DIRECTOR OF THE CIA, delivered a speech to a gathering of Princeton alumni. Though the event was mundane, global tensions were running high. The Korean War was coming to an end, and earlier that week, The New York Times had published a startling story asserting that American POWs returning from the country may have been “converted” by “Communist brain-washers.”


Some GI’s were confessing to war crimes, like carrying out germ warfare against the Communists–a charge the U.S. categorically denied. Others were reportedly so brainwashed that they had refused to return to the United States at all. As if that weren’t enough, the U.S. was weeks away from secretly sponsoring the overthrow of a democratically elected leader in Iran.

WATCH: FULL EPISODES OF AMERICA'S BOOK OF SECRETS ONLINE NOW.

Dulles had just become the first civilian director of an agency growing more powerful by the day, and the speech provided an early glimpse into his priorities for the CIA. “In the past few years we have become accustomed to hearing much about the battle for men’s minds–the war of ideologies,” he told the attendees. “I wonder, however, whether we clearly perceive the magnitude of the problem, whether we realize how sinister the battle for men’s minds has become in Soviet hands,” he continued. “We might call it, in its new form, ‘brain warfare.’”

Dulles proceeded to describe the “Soviet brain perversion techniques” as effective, but “abhorrent” and “nefarious.” He gestured to the American POWs returning from Korea, shells of the men they once were, parroting the Communist propaganda they had heard cycled for weeks on end. He expressed fears and uncertainty–were they using chemical agents? Hypnosis? Something else entirely? “We in the West,” the CIA Director conceded, “are somewhat handicapped in brain warfare.” This sort of non-consensual experiment, even on one’s enemies, was antithetical to American values, Dulles insisted, as well as antithetical to what should be human values.  READ MORE...

Flying Car

 

Lucky Man

 

Worthless