Is the sun going to sleep?

The video:
  

• Composer: Tuomas Holopainen
• Lyrics by: Tuomas Holopainen

"Sleeping Sun"
The sun is sleeping quietly
Once upon a century
Wistful oceans calm and red
Ardent caresses laid to rest
For my dreams I hold my life
For wishes I behold my night
The truth at the end of time
Losing faith makes a crime
I wish for this night-time
to last for a lifetime
The darkness around me
Shores of a solar sea
Oh how I wish to go down with the sun
Sleeping
Weeping
With you
Sorrow has a human heart
From my god it will depart
I'd sail before a thousand moons
Never finding where to go
Two hundred twenty-two days of light
Will be desired by a night
A moment for the poet's play
Until there's nothing left to say
I wish for this night-time...
I wish for this night-time...

The science:

The pictures show very few sunspots for what should be the most active part of the sunspot cycle, many scientists now believe that this is cooling our planet due to lower levels of radiaton from the sun.

We should not let politicians jump to conclusions...

"As a species, we human beings have become so blind with conceit and self-love that we genuinely believe that the fate of the planet is in our hands — when the reality is that everything, or almost everything, depends on the behavior and caprice of the gigantic thermonuclear fireball around which we revolve."  Boris Johnson

9:54PM GMT 20 Jan 2013

When you see a big flash in the sky...

duck... wait for the boom... then take a look outside.
Rule #1 from the Meteor Strike Survival Guide, adapted from the "How to survive a nuclear strike handbook.". 
Jokes aside it must have been an awesome and somewhat frightening experience to have been in the Ural mountains Friday last week.
This all happened while MD and I were on our way to a real Boeretroue in Hoopstad. For those that have not attended one and wish to maintain some form of diet... do not accept the invitation!
It was virtually non stop eating from the moment we arrived on the farm until we left on Sunday morning late. Biltong by the bucket load and other delights, then at the reception even more followed by salads and bykosse to die for and enough braai to feed a small army.


Coming back to the meteor... it reminds me of this passage from Matthew 24;
36 “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,[f] but only the Father. 37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 40 Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. 41 Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left. 

Let us therefore be prepared and live our lives as if each day is the day we will meet Jesus face to face.

Well now!

Is this not what we skeptics have been saying all along! 
Global warming stopped 16 years ago, reveals Met Office report quietly released... and here is the chart to prove it

• The figures reveal that from the beginning of 1997 until August 2012 there was no discernible rise in aggregate global temperatures
• This means that the ‘pause’ in global warming has now lasted for about the same time as the previous period when temperatures rose, 1980 to 1996

The article is a resounding blow for all proponents of "Globull Warming" and should cause us to question governments legislation and taxes that have led to increases in energy bills for all citizens of earth. One could say that all this hot air is one of the causes for the global financial crisis. 
Loved this gem... "But the evidence is beginning to suggest that it may be happening much slower than the catastrophists have claimed – a conclusion with enormous policy implications." What that implies is that we have been scammed all this time, both by scientists using faulty data and models and the politicians that feed them!

Good grief what is Al Gore going to do now!

Volcanoes under the artic

and somehow the "experts" discount the influence on the ice sheet? Pull the other one please. The Gakkel Ridge is dotted with volcanoes and hot water vents and since the discovery in the 1950's there seems to have been an increase in the activity of the geothermal sources, my common sense tells me this is the overlying reason for the increased loss of ice cover and not climate cahnge per se. Especially when one looks at the map... it lies in the centre of the artic se and one can compare it to the element inside an electric kettle, sooner or later it will heat up the water above it and disturb the existing thermoclines which would have shieded the ice from the warm water. Heat will eventually find a way to rise to the top of a thermal system... basic physics! This of course has been kept rather quite in the media as it does not fit in well with the popular scenario of Climate Change. Tectonic activity is also why part of the Antartic ice shelf is melting while the rest of the continent is recoding record ice levels. 
Yes, we are living in changing climatic conditions but there are bigger influences from earth and space than the puny species homo sapiens can ever imagine. Having said that we should be guardians over our little patch in any case but to presume that we can influence the winds is taking things out of perspective. Bear in mind that we should always remember who is really in control...
Psalm 8:4 "What is man, that you are mindful of him? and the son of man, that you visit him?"

Nothing new...

about bugs extracting gold... we have been doing so fo many years in fact... just Google "bacteria used in south african gold refining" and let the lesson begin...

I hate journalist that are sloppy in fact checking... especially when it comes from a favorite on line read like Gizimodo. Let us then remember this quote...

[Bacteria are the] dark matter of the biological world [with 4 million mostly unknown species in a ton of soil]. Edward O. Wilson

Google "DNA is a language" and be astounded.

Perry Marshal challenges Atheists with this amazing statement.“If You Can Read This, I Can Prove God Exists”
And He is not alone when one reads many of the articles found doing that Google search. 
This proves to me that what the Bible states in Job 31 to 41 where God reveals himself through the natural world around us, from the Cosmic to the Microscopic. Now even the stuff that makes us who we are is telling us that God is the author of it all...


"The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork."

Psalm 19 King James Version (KJV)

Cracking the shell on Climate Change

Global Warming Cracked Open

"Consensus is not scientific proof"

We are not stupid sheep

One of the most common statements in the Christian vs Aethiest argument is that Christians follow a Bronze Age faith believed by goat herders, very derogatory and of course totally untrue when one sees the lists of scientists that believe in Jesus and his Gospel. I should know... I am involved with one!.
Lists that show this is a fallacy can be found all over the Internet such as the following;
Famous Scientists Who Believed in God
List of Christian thinkers in science
So to denigrate and stereotype us Christians as stupid sheep is an insult but at the same time a compliment as we follow the Greatest Shepherd of all time!
"In comparing religious belief to science, I try to remember that science is belief also." ~Robert Brault

Junk Science

Seems as if NASA blew it again... so much for alien life forms.
When I read about their "discovery" I had a small smidgen of doubt, mainly because I know that South African gold mines use a arsenic tolerant bug developed by the Microbiology Dept of Stellenbosh University under Prof. Douglas E. Rawlings, this bug has been un use for many years in fact in the gold extraction process. Australia also developed similar technology. Something did not ring true... I suppose the NASA team never used Google...
I have a feeling NASA was using this to garner favor for more funding.
This is not the only junk science NASA has had a part of... the AGW scandal has used false data from faulty satellites to try an prop up their failing cause among others.
A real shame that an organization that managed to put a footprint on the moon is now stooping to cheap sensationalism to stay afloat. Just like the Global Warming Fanatics...
In fact organisms that thrive on Arsenic are more commonplace than we think. Life has a way of finding the strangest places to thrive in it seems.
"Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool." Richard Feynman

Cloud Cuckoo?

So... Mr Microsoft wants to add a dollar or two to advance the idea of enhancing cloud formation.
" Even if that goes well, the technology has a long way to go before it can significantly alter the climate — a recent study showed that it would it take 1,900 ships at a cost of over $7 billion to stop Earth’s temperature from rising."
Bully for him... I just have some doubts, because we all know how well his Software works... Blue Screen of Death comes to mind, plus those ships look top heavy... I wonder what will happen with them during hurricane season?
I say leave nature to do what nature does best... at present it seems to be cooling down the earth quite well, the past summer here in SA has been cloudier and wetter than normal... I wonder why?
"My bounce-around life had taught me that dreams were dangerous things - they look solid in your mind, but you just try to reach for them. It's like gathering clouds." Kirby Larson, Hattie Big Sky, 2006

Iguaçu Starry Night

We saw it by day... it is always amazing when I see something about Argentina on the news or other media... that feeling of "Yes... We were there!"

Thank you Moondancer for sharing that trip, it was worth it, enjoy the Girls Weekend!

The stars are bright tonight
And I am walking nowhere

Guess I will be alright
Desire gets you nowhere

And you are always right
I thought you were so perfect

Take you as you were
Have you as you were
Take you as you were

I love you just the way you are
I love you just the way you are
I'll take you just the way you are
Does anybody love the way you are?
Aaa aaa aaa

The stars are bright tonight
A distance is between us
And I will be ok
The worst I've ever seen us

And still I have my weaknesses
And still I have my strength
And still I have my ugliness

But i, i, i
I love you just the way you are
I love you just the way you are
I'll take you just the way you are
Does anybody love the way you are?

Aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaaa

I love you just the way you are
I love you just the way you are
I'll take you just the way you are
Does anybody love the way you are?

Aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa aaaa

Star, star
“The most beautiful things in the universe are the starry heavens above us and the feeling of duty within us.” Indian Proverb

VPOW!

As an armchair vulcanologist this website is just amazing! From now on VPOW is bookmarked just like APOD!
The power displayed by nature just makes me stand in awe at the glory of God's creation.
"Nature is trying very hard to make us succeed, but nature does not depend on us. We are not the only experiment." R. Buckminster Fuller (1895 - 1983), Interview, April 30, 1978

Wake up to the sleeping sun

This is a picture of Sol (25 Nov. 2009), our closest star in sleepy mode showing no sunspots at all. This is unusual because according to the past records the sun should have arisen from it's slumber of 11 yearly sunspot cycles. At the same time the earth and other planets in the Solar System have shown a downward trend in surface temperature, something that did not match the information from the Global Warming proponents. Then all hell broke loose this week when the Internet was abuzz with the leaked data from Hadley CRU which seems to support what many skeptics have been saying all along. The Hockey Stick was a lie!
Al Gore is a charlatan together with all the scientists that climbed on the gravy train this farce created.
Now scientists in New Zealand have gotten hold of their GW Experts data and cannot find the upward curve he shows in his graphs... I wonder why?
Science is supposed to be pure and unsullied by politics, financial gain and seeking prestige, it seems when it comes to Climate Science just the opposite is true, fudging of facts to meet an agenda, lies and false representation are just the tip of the Iceberg it seems.
What the good science does show is that Earth is warming in general since the last Ice Age but having a bunch of scientists misleading us with bad science has not helped the credibility of scientists in general. It is time science woke up and tossed the junk scientists out together with their political partners in crime.
"No one should approach the temple of science with the soul of a money changer." ~Thomas Browne

Invisible but not hidden

Technology seems to be catching up to SciFi at a rapid pace these days...
That got me thinking that no matter what you do... God always knows. There is no Invisibility Cloak to hide under, unless of course you confess your sins and ask for them to be washed away.
That and the teachings of a few Sundays got me thinking of how we see the Blood of Jesus and the Holy Spirit that is compared to living water... in fact when you think of it they are the same... when we let the Holy Spirit fill us every day we get washed by His blood as well. Amazing!
Of course at the same time we put on the Armour of God and become His soldiers, not to fight a physical enemy but the ones in the heavens... the Holy Spirit is then like an Invisibility Cloak to protect us from the attacks that will come our way.
"Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places."

The Universe is a zoo.

Today's APOD is amazing! This is now being named Hanny's Voorwerp. At the moment no one is very sure what it is, some think a cloud of energized gas, wich is of galactic proportions by the way, or a Green Dragon? It shows that there are still many things to be discovered in the Universe. Every time something like this happens I am reminded who created it all and how AWESOME God is.
If you think you have the eye and the time, register at the Galaxy Zoo and do some identification. I have...
I leave you with these thoughts on the Universe...
There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what
the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be
replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another
theory which states that this has already happened.
Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001)

The creator of the universe works in mysterious ways. But he uses a base ten
counting system and likes round numbers.
Scott Adams (1957 - )

If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the
universe.
Carl Sagan (1934 - 1996)

Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we
can imagine.
Sir Arthur Eddington (1882 - 1944)

Miracles are out there

Awesome! I am so glad something is being done to assist all those brave "rough men" that have stood in harm's way for freedom. I salute you all on Memorial day.
"We honor our heroic and patriotic dead by being true men, as true men by faithfully fighting the battles of our day as they fought the battles of their day." David Gregg

Elemental Creation

The Iron Sun Credit: SOHO - EIT Consortium, ESA, NASA
Explanation: The ultraviolet light emitted by eleven times ionized iron at temperatures over 2 million degrees Fahrenheit was used to record the above picture of the Sun on September 22, 2001, the date of that year's autumnal equinox. The image was made by the EIT camera on board the SOHO spacecraft, a space observatory which can continuously observe the Sun. Eleven times ionized iron is atomic iron with eleven of its electrons stripped away. Here the electrons are stripped by the frantic collisions with other atoms and electrons which occur at the extreme temperatures in the Solar Corona. Since electrons are negatively charged, the resulting ionized iron atom is highly positively charged. Astronomer's "shorthand" for eleven times ionized iron is written "Fe XII", the chemical symbol for iron followed by a Roman numeral 12 (Fe I is neutral iron).
After reading the above article it struck me as being a great title for a blog about science, as I am interested in Science I have decided to make this my science blog... not a daily one but as I find something worth writing or commenting about. So here goes the first for FeXII...
Update 4/12/2007: Moved back to RfaBD!

Chilly August Night

As a counterpoint to Neil Diamond's concert and album, today was a miserable windy day and the weather forecast is even bleaker... thank goodness the bad weather has lifted somewhat in our lives though. I believe that it is partly due to the fact that I will not let bad things bring me down and make me start worrying, I hand the worry part over to my Problem Solver. He has a way of sorting things out in amazing ways.
We on Earth should also be thankful we do not have Martian weather, at present there are planet wide dust storms raging, I cannot imagine that here, we are blessed to have this Blue Dot to call our home. We should learn to look after it better but also keep in mind that a lot we see these days is not caused by our hand, sometimes that big old glowing ball in the sky gets a bit brighter... and heats up the whole Solar system...
Enough of that... I am so glad the KatieB's friend M was only shaken up in the crash that totalled his bakkie today, I really believe that a Guardian Angel had a hand in that close shave as well, another thing to say thank you for today!
Coming back to the title, my favourite song from Neil's album Hot August Night is Sweet Caroline, here are the words...
Sweet Caroline - Neil Diamond
Where it began, I can't begin to know when
But then I know it's growing strong
Oh, wasn't the spring, whooo
And spring became the summer
Who'd believe you'd come along

Hands, touching hands, reaching out
Touching me, touching you
Oh, sweet Caroline
Good times never seem so good
I've been inclined to believe it never would

And now I, I look at the night, whooo
And it don't seem so lonely
We fill it up with only two, oh
And when I hurt
Hurting runs off my shoulder
How can I hurt when holding you

Oh, one, touching one, reaching out
Touching me, touching you
Oh, sweet Caroline
Good times never seem so good
Oh I've been inclined to believe it never would

Ohhh, sweet Caroline, good times never seem so good
Funny how some of this songs words are sort of relevant to my current friendship, KatieB has been around in my motocross life circle since more or less when I started this blog but we have only recently really connected, sometimes you miss the tree for the woods I suppose but sooner or later you notice the one that has always been there like an Oak, dependable and strong. Sorry... that is not a good analogy at all for the lady in question! But I think she will understand what I mean. She has the knack to read my mind...
Oh the life circle idea? That is the circle of friends and acquaintances one has in one's life at work and play... Someting I may blog about one day, I have added it as a label so I suppose I am commited to do so some time?
"One of the things about being a grown-up is learning how to act right even when you feel wrong." Sean Stewart, Perfect Circle, 2004

Now one can see the WWW

This is a view of the Real Time Web Monitor, showing the web traffic. Just one of six views of the Internet and the traffic around the globe. Thanks Akamai!

Great to see corporations letting us mere mortals see what the Net Techies see, it gives one an idea of how the traffic is generated and what amazed me was to see America waking up on the Net, when this was snapped China was asleep, earlier the day the country was a bright white!

Freezing Curtain

This was taken just outside town in Bainsvlei earlier this week and it is still cold! The weatherman expects it to remain so until after the weekend as well. Records for low temperatures have been broken all over the country, so much for Global Warming! But this amazing time lapse of an Orange Sun Oozing will hopefully warm you up after that chilly curtain.
The chilly weather made me come up with this freezing playlist for the Screaming Tangerines although Orange Sun Oozing would also make a good title for some warm songs...
So I call my playlist Freezing Curtain;
26 tracks in playlist, average track length: 4:02
Estimated playlist length: 1 hour 45 minutes 9 seconds

1. The White Stripes - In the cold cold night (2:58)
2. Matchbox 20 - Cold (3:15)
3. Gregorian - Out of the cold (3:48)
4. Arnold Palmer Vs. Moti Special - Cold Days (2-4 Grooves Remix Edit) (3:29)
5. Brainstorm - Colder (3:50)
6. Breaking benjamin -So cold (4:33)
7. Bush - Coldcontagious (5:55)
8. Def Leppard - Blood Runs Cold (4:26)
9. Foo Fighters - Cold Day In The Sun (3:20)
10. Metallica - The Ecstasy Of Cold (2:30) Update - The Ecstasy of Gold (thanks Steve!)
11. Metallica - Stone Cold Crazy (2:16)
12. No Angels - Cold as Ice (4:06)
13. Travis - Colder (4:07)
14. York ft. Angelina - Iceflowers (7:08)
15. Hooverphonic - Frosted flake wood (3:17)
16. Jennifer Rush - Ring of ice (3:45)
17. Metallica - Trapped Under Ice (4:04)
18. Milla Jovovich - Beat on ice (3:57)
19. The Darkness - Love on the Rocks With No Ice (6:07)
20. Joe dolan - Frozen rivers
21. Madonna - Frozen
22. Velvet girl - Velvet chiller twist rmx
23. Cliff Richard - Snowfall on the sahara.mp3
24. Enigma ft Angun - Snow of the sahara
25. Evanescence - Snow white queen
26. Sytem of a down - snowblind
I never knew Metallica was so cold fixated though? Steve pointed out that one of the titles was ermmm... wrong and not cold but gold related. Blame today's kids and textspeak! I should check the CD before committing to rip...
For the lyrics of the day I have chosen Ring of Ice sung by Jennifer Rush...

Ring Of Ice

We lay awake silent in the dark.
You don't have to hide the trace
emptyness left it's mark.
Ring of ice
ring of ice 'round your heart.
Ring of ice
ring of ice break apart.
We are lonely people wearin' a ring of ice
Dancin' in the night
tryin' to disguise all the lies behind.
Countless empty lies wearing a ring of ice.
I walk alone searchin' for a sign
Someoneelse must be alive with warmth behind their eyes.
Ring of ice
ring of ice 'round your heart. . . .
All the lonely people wearing a ring of ice
. . .
All the lonely people wearin' a ring of ice
Dancin' in the night
tryin' to disguise
All the lies behind surrounded by a ring of ice.
Dancin' in the night
tryin' to disguise
All the lies behind surrounded by a ring of ice.
Dancin' in the night
tryin' to disguise . ..
Dancin' in the night
tryin' to disguise . . .

"Time for the weather report. It's cold out folks. Bone crushing cold. The kind of cold which will wrench the spirit out of a young man, or forge it into steel." Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider, Northern Exposure, Lost and Found, 1992