Philippine Trivia

Arroyo and Sukarnoputri Share Similarities
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo of the Philippines and Megawati Sukarnoputri of Indonesia have remarkable similarities. Both are 54-year-old women who had been vice-presidents before becoming presidents in place of their predecessors who were ousted in the year 2001. Both of them were daughters of former presidents of the world's two largest archipelagos who lost the presidency in 1965 to dictators. Both women have three children and their husbands were being pursued by controversy. Both visited Washington in their first year as presidents and met US President George W. Bush, another offspring of a former president who also assumed power in 2001. Arroyo and Sukarnoputri are not entirely similar though. The former is a Catholic Christian from the world's fifth largest Christian country while the latter is a Muslim from the country with the world's largest Muslim population.

Bulacan Produced Queens
Marcelo del Pilar, the father of Philippine journalism; Francisco Balagtas, the father of Philippine literature; Jose Corazon de Jesus, father of balagtasan; Nicanor Abelardo, father of kundiman; Francisca Reyes-Aquino, mother of Philippine dances; Gerry de Leon, a father of Philippine movies; Guillermo Tolentino, one of the fathers of Philippine arts; Jose Reyes, a father of Philippine medicine; and Dely Magpayo, a mother of Philippine broadcasting, were all born in Bulacan province. Atang dela Rama, the mother of Philippine theater, lived in Bulacan. Aside from national fathers and mothers, Bulacan also produced queens, namely: Lydia de Vega, Asia's former sprint queen; Regine Velasquez, Asia's song bird; and Michelle Aldana, Miss Asia-Pacific beauty queen.

Babe Ruth Scored Homeruns in RP
Babe Ruth, the American baseball legend who had over 200 homeruns in his professional career, once played in the baseball field of the Rizal Memorial Sports Complex. In 1934, Ruth and another baseball great, Lou Gehrig, selected an All-Star team that toured Asia where they played 18 games. The All-Star selection stopped in the Philippines and played at the Rizal Memorial Sports Complex from December 2 to December 9. Gehrig beat Ruth when he scored the first recorded homerun at the Rizal complex on December 2. Ruth scored the 2nd homerun on the same day and 4th homerun on December 9. The other players of the same selection who also scored homeruns at the Rizal complex were Earl Averill and C. Gehringer.

7 Cabinet Officials Were from Harvard
In a speech before an American delegation early in 2002, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has claimed that her Cabinet officials include seven Harvard graduates and three Wharton alumni. The 54-year-old president added that four of her economic managers had been top executives on Wall Street prior to joining government service in the Philippines. President Arroyo, herself, has a Ph. D. in Economics, which she earned from the University of the Philippines (UP). Before this, she had studied for two years at the Georgetown University where she had former US President Bill Clinton as a classmate.

Coconut Workers Own San Miguel Corp.
There are 3 million hectares planted to coconut trees, the second largest agricultural area after rice fields (4 million hectares). The coconut industry employs about 3.4 million Filipinos. Some 18 to 20 million more Filipinos depend on the industry for their livelihood, according to the United Coconut Associations of the Philippines (UCAP). About 90 percent of those employed in the coconut industry are small farmers, who earn P10,000 a year or P25 a day.

Coconut farmers are among the most exploited segments of Philippine society. Driven to squalor by Marcos cronies who thrived on the so-called coconut levies, the coconut farmers represent the oldest sector of the domestic economy. In 1642, the Spanish colonial government forced each Filipino to plant 200 coconut trees, because Spanish shipbuilders had a large need for charcoaled coconut shells and coconut husks. Coconut products have gradually become the country's top export, accounting for 35 percent of all exports in the 1950s and 1960s. In the 1970s, coconut products were the country's leading exports of raw materials. New economic policies initiated under the Aquino administration led to a slow-phased shift to industries, which eventually put the coconut industry at the tailend of government priorities. In 2001, coconut exports represented only 1.6 percent of the country's total exports.

In 1971, the dictatorial government of the late President Ferdinand Marcos established the Coconut Investment Fund (Cocofund) by imposing a levy of P15 per 100 kilograms of copra for nine years between 1973 and 1982. Supposedly, the fund should serve as subsidy to coconut products for domestic consumption. However, the cocofund, which amounted to a total of P9.695 billion by August 1982, was turned into a private fund used to finance three financial institutions, including the United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB). The cocofund was also used to acquire the majority shares of San Miguel Corporation, the country's largest food and beverage conglomerate. A known Marcos crony, Danding Cojuangco, still retains the chairmanship of both UCPB and San Miguel until today. The fund, which is estimated at over P100 billion today, has yet to be transferred to the accounts of the coconut farmers.

A Filipino Spread Love Bug Virus
In May 2000, the so-called "love bug" computer virus spread worldwide and infected millions of computer files. The virus, quickly infiltrated government and corporate computer systems around the world. Described as the worst computer virus ever created, the "love bug" wrought damages amounting to US$10 billion. It could not have been big news in the Philippines, if not for the fact that the suspected creator of the virus is a Filipino. He was identified as Onel de Guzman, a student of AMA Computer College in Quezon City.

Orchids Breeds Were from RP
Waling-waling or Vanda sanderiana, is described as the "Queen of Philippine Orchids". One of the largest species in the world, waling-waling was discovered by German Taxonomist Heinrich Gustav Reicheinback in Mindanao in 1882. Since then, it has become the most sought-after flower in Mindanao and helped in the flourishing of the world's multibillion-dollar orchid and cutflower industry. The massive deforestation in Mindanao threatens the region's wildlife, including waling-waling which used to abound in the tropical forest of Mount Apo and its surrounding areas. Today, it is believed that Waling-Waling has more species abroad, particularly in Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong and Hawaii. Of the 9,000 flowering plants in the world, about 3,500 are endemic to the Philippines. Human activities, however, pose a great threat to their existence.

Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson wanted to become a singer because his mom used to sing to him as a child. He believed he got his talent from his mother Katherine and God.

When Michael and his brothers were signed to Motown as the Jackson 5, he and his brother Marlon lived with Diana Ross until their father Joseph bought their house in Los Angeles. I always thought it was just Michael that lived with Diana. I didn’t realize that Marlon lived with her too.

Michael and his siblings used to dance around the house in their socks when they were kids. I think that is cute that they were able to do that together.

Despite how great a dancer Michael was, he never had a formal training. He was naturally able to dance. It took Michael a short period of time to learn the dance steps he performed in his video “Thriller”.

Speaking of Michael’s dancing, he learned the moonwalk from breakdancer Michael “Boogaloo Shrimp” Chambers from the 80s movies Breakin’ and Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo. Michael learned the dances he performed on the Motown 25th Anniversary Special in less than a year.

Did you know that Michael used to love to read? I have that in common with Michael because I love to read too. He and his mother used to go to bookstores all of the time and pick up books to read.

Michael wasn’t the first artist to write “We Are The World”. Quincy Jones wanted Stevie Wonder to write the song, but Stevie ended up not doing the song. Michael was Quincy’s second choice to write it. That was a good decision because the song is one of the biggest singles of all time.

Have you heard that Michael was the closest to his sister Janet Jackson? When he was growing up, he was closest to his brother Marlon. When they got older, Michael was closest to Janet. I think that might be because she didn’t need anything from him the way his other siblings did. They had things in common since they were both successful.

Michael thought that Janet was a fierce performer. He knew that they had similar styles, but he really enjoyed her work.

Speaking of Janet, Michael wanted to do another track with her before they did “Scream”. She turned him down because she didn’t want people to think that she was riding on his coattails. She did do backing vocals for him on his “Thriller” cd. She sings in “P.Y.T.”

If you can believe it, Michael considered his cd “Bad” a flop. It didn’t sell as many copies as “Thriller” which is why he considered the cd a flop. It wasn’t a flop by any means. The cd sold over 25 million copies in the United States alone. Singers can’t sell that many cds now. He was only competing against himself for record sales.

Michael’s cd “Dangerous” was his second highest selling cd.

Michael considered “Childhood” his most honest song. I’m not surprised since he was robbed of a childhood thanks to Joe Jackson.

In case you didn’t hear, “Billie Jean” was allegedly written about Paula Abdul’s relationship with his older brother Jackie. There were reports that Paula and Jackie were having an affair and she was pregnant. Jackie was married to his first wife at the time that he was allegedly having an affair with Paula. In related trivia: Michael wrote “Billie Jean” in five minutes. He also wrote the song in his car while he was traveling with his brother Marlon.

Paul McCartney wrote “Girlfriend” from the “Off The Wall” cd specifically for Michael. They went on to do two other songs together. I knew that they did “The Girl is Mine” and “Say, Say, Say”, but I didn’t know he wrote “Girlfriend”.

In the movie The Wiz, Michael was originally only supposed to sing in one song, but another song was added in for him to sing.

unusual facts about human body

1. Don’t stick out your tongue if you want to hide your identity. Similar to fingerprints, everyone also has a unique tongue print!


2. Your pet isn’t the only one in the house with a shedding problem. Humans shed about 600,000 particles of skin every hour. That works out to about 1.5 pounds each year, so the average person will lose around 105 pounds of skin by age 70.


3. An adult has fewer bones than a baby. We start off life with 350 bones, but because bones fuse together during growth, we end up with only 206 as adults.


4. Did you know that you get a new stomach lining every three to four days? If you didn’t, the strong acids your stomach uses to digest food would also digest your stomach.


5. Your nose is not as sensitive as a dog’s, but it can remember 50,000 different scents.


6. The small intestine is about four times as long as the average adult is tall. If it weren’t looped back and forth upon itself, its length of 18 to 23 feet wouldn’t fit into the abdominal cavity, making things rather messy.


7. This will really make your skin crawl: Every square inch of skin on the human body has about 32 million bacteria on it, but fortunately, the vast majority of them are harmless.


8. The source of smelly feet, like smelly armpits, is sweat. And people sweat buckets from their feet. A pair of feet have 500,000 sweat glands and can produce more than a pint of sweat a day.


9. The air from a human sneeze can travel at speeds of 100 miles per hour or more — another good reason to cover your nose and mouth when you sneeze — or duck when you hear one coming your way.


10. Blood has a long road to travel: Laid end to end, there are about 60,000 miles of blood vessels in the human body. And the hard-working heart pumps about 2,000 gallons of blood through those vessels every day.


11. You may not want to swim in your spit, but if you saved it all up, you could. In a lifetime, the average person produces about 25,000 quarts of saliva — enough to fill two swimming pools!


12. By 60 years of age, 60-percent of men and 40-percent of women will snore. But the sound of a snore can seem deafening. While snores average around 60 decibels, the noise level of normal speech, they can reach more than 80 decibels. Eighty decibels is as loud as the sound of a pneumatic drill breaking up concrete. Noise levels over 85 decibels are considered hazardous to the human ear.


13. Blondes may or may not have more fun, but they definitely have more hair. Hair color helps determine how dense the hair on your head is, and blondes (only natural ones, of course), top the list. The average human head has 100,000 hair follicles, each of which is capable of producing 20 individual hairs during a person’s lifetime. Blondes average 146,000 follicles. People with black hair tend to have about 110,000 follicles, while those with brown hair are right on target with 100,000 follicles. Redheads have the least dense hair, averaging about 86,000 follicles.


14. If you’re clipping your fingernails more often than your toenails, that’s only natural. The nails that get the most exposure and are used most frequently grow the fastest. Fingernails grow fastest on the hand that you write with and on the longest fingers. On average, nails grow about one-tenth of an inch each month.


15. No wonder babies have such a hard time holding up their heads: The human head is one-quarter of our total length at birth but only one-eighth of our total length by the time we reach adulthood.


16. If you say that you’re dying to get a good night’s sleep, you could mean that literally. You can go without eating for weeks without succumbing, but eleven days is tops for going without sleep. After eleven days, you’ll be asleep — forever!

CatStuff

• Both humans and cats have identical regions in the brain responsible for emotion.
• A cat's brain is more similar to a man's brain than that of a dog.
• A cat has more bones than a human; humans have 206, but the cat has 230 (some cites list 245 bones, and state that bones may fuse together as the cat ages).
• Cats have 30 vertebrae (humans have 33 vertebrae during early development; 26 after the sacral and coccygeal regions fuse)
• The cat's clavicle, or collarbone, does not connect with other bones but is buried in the muscles of the shoulder region. This lack of a functioning collarbone allows them to fit through any opening the size of their head.
• The cat has 500 skeletal muscles (humans have 650).
• Cats have 32 muscles that control the outer ear (compared to human's 6 muscles each). A cat can rotate its ears independently 180 degrees, and can turn in the direction of sound 10 times faster than those of the best watchdog.
• Cats' hearing is much more sensitive than humans and dogs.
• Cats' hearing stops at 65 khz (kilohertz); humans' hearing stops at 20 khz.
• A cat sees about 6 times better than a human at night, and needs 1/6 the amount of of light that a human does - it has a layer of extra reflecting cells which absorb light.
• Recent studies have shown that cats can see blue and green. There is disagreement as to whether they can see red.
• A cat's field of vision is about 185 degrees.
• Blue-eyed, pure white cats are frequently deaf.
• It may take as long as 2 weeks for a kitten to be able to hear well. Their eyes usually open between 7 and 10 days, but sometimes it happens in as little as 2 days.
• A cat has approximately 60 to 80 million olfactory cells (a human has between 5 and 20 million).
• Cats have a special scent organ located in the roof of their mouth, called the Jacobson's organ. It analyzes smells - and is the reason why you will sometimes see your cat "sneer" (called the flehmen response or flehming) when they encounter a strong odor.
• A cat has a total of 24 whiskers, 4 rows of whiskers on each side. The upper two rows can move independently of the bottom two rows. A cat uses its whiskers for measuring distances.
• Cats have 30 teeth (12 incisors, 10 premolars, 4 canines, and 4 molars), while dogs have 42. Kittens have baby teeth, which are replaced by permanent teeth around the age of 7 months.
• A cat's jaw has only up and down motion; it does not have any lateral, side to side motion, like dogs and humans. For this reason, don't rely on feeding dry food as a dental care program - cats need to have their teeth cleaned by a vet.
• When a cat drinks, its tongue - which has tiny barbs on it - scoops the liquid up backwards.
• Cats purr at the same frequency as an idling diesel engine, about 26 cycles per second.
• Domestic cats purr both when inhaling and when exhaling.
• The cat's front paw has 5 toes, but the back paws have 4. Some cats are born with as many as 7 front toes and extra back toes (polydactl).
• Cats step with both left legs, then both right legs when they walk or run.
• Cats walk on their toes.
• A domestic cat can sprint at about 31 miles per hour.
• The heaviest cat on record weighed 46 lbs.
• A kitten will typically weigh about 3 ounces at birth. The typical male housecat will weigh between 7 and 9 pounds, slightly less for female housecats.
• Cats take between 20-40 breaths per minute.
• Normal body temperature for a cat is 102 degrees F.
• A cat's normal pulse is 140-240 beats per minute, with an average of 195.
• Cat's urine glows under a black light.
• Cats lose almost as much fluid in the saliva while grooming themselves as they do through urination.
• Almost 10% of a cat's bones are in its tail, and the tail is used to maintain balance.
• The domestic cat is the only species able to hold its tail vertically while walking. You can also learn about your cat's present state of mind by observing the posture of his tail.
• If a cat is frightened, the hair stands up fairly evenly all over the body; when the cat threatens or is ready to attack, the hair stands up only in a narrow band along the spine and tail

unusual facts on the net

"Almost" is the longest commonly used word in the English language with all the letters in alphabetical order.

"Flushable" toilets were in use in ancient Rome.

"Billie Jean" by Michael Jackson was the first video to air on MTV by a black artist.

"Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".

"Duff" is the decaying organic matter found on a forest floor.

"Fickleheaded" and "fiddledeedee" are the longest words consisting only of letters in the first half of the alphabet.

"Asthma" and "isthmi" are the only six-letter words that begin and end with a vowel and have no other vowels between.

"Fortnight" is a contraction of "fourteen nights." In the US "two weeks" is more commonly used.

"Forty" is the only number which has its letters in alphabetical order.

"One" is the only number with its letters in reverse alphabetical order.

"Four" is the only number whose number of letters in the name equals the number.

"Hang on Sloopy" is the official rock song of Ohio.

"Happy Birthday" was the first song to be performed in outer space, sung by the Apollo IX astronauts on March 8, 1969.

"Kemo Sabe", meaning an all knowing one, is actually a mispronunciation by Native American of the Spanish phrase, Quien lo Sabe, meaning one who knows."

The lunula is the half-moon shaped pale area at the bottom of finger nails.

"Ma is as selfless as I am" can be read the same way backwards. If you take away all the spaces you can see that all the letters can be spelled out both ways.

"Mad About You" star Paul Reiser plays the piano on the show's theme song.

"One thousand" contains the letter A, but none of the words from one to nine hundred ninety-nine has an A.

"THEREIN" is a seven-letter word that contains thirteen words spelled using consecutive letters: the, he, her, er, here, I, there, ere, rein, re, in, therein, and herein.

"Underground" is the only word in the English language that begins and ends with the letters "und." $203,000,000 is spent on barbed wire each year in the U.S.

1 and 2 are the only numbers where they are values of the numbers of the factors they have.
1 in 5,000 north Atlantic lobsters are born bright blue.

1 kg (2.2 pounds) of lemons contain more sugar than 1 kg of strawberries.

1,525,000,000 miles of telephone wire are strung across the Unites States.

1.7 litres of saliva is produced each day. In Discovery Channel, its a quart.

10 percent of all human beings ever born are alive at this very moment.

10% of human dry weight comes from bacteria

11% of the world is left-handed.

111, 111, 111 X 111, 111, 111 = 12, 345, 678, 987, 654, 321

1200 equals 1 pound (72 rupees).

The Incorruptible Saints!

Saint Bernadette, who was born into a poor family in 1844. She suffered greatly from sicknesses and diseases throughout her life. (In photo, best example of Incorruptibles)
The incorruptibles are a handful of Catholic Saints who have died throughout
the years, yet their bodies, or parts of their dead bodies, will not decay or surrender to decomposition as a normal body would. One human relic even dates back to the year 1381, the head of Saint Catherine of Siena. These bodies had not gone through any embalming or mummification methods to prevent them from decomposition, yet their bodies, or some parts of their bodies, remain intact.
It is said that many of the incorruptibles bodies died from violent matters or harsh diseases. A lot of the bodies had been buried regularly within damp conditions, to be exhumed on a far later date. When these bodies were finally exhumed, a lot of them had their clothes disintegrated from bad burial conditions, yet their bodies remained the same, and sometimes looked as if they were still alive, or had just passed on.
A lot of these saints or blessed people had harsh lives as well. For example, the "Blessed Margaret of Castello" was born a blind, crippled dwarf. After being born she was disowned by her parents who happened to be the Lords in a small village in Italy. Due to her limbs not being the same length, she developed a limp, which later advanced her into a hunchback. Margaret was allowed to roam the castle where her parents lived under the care of the servants, but she could not make contact with her parents. Later in life she was thrown in a custom made cell by her parents for years

To Sleep and Dream...

Sleep...
Everybody needs sleep, but as people get older they need less sleep. Newborn babies sleep 17 to 18 hours a day. Dogs sleep, cats sleep, and you sleep. All mammals and birds sleep. Scientists are not sure if fish, reptiles, and insects sleep. Big animals sleep less, and small animals sleep more. Elephants and giraffes sleep only 2 to 4 hours a day. Bats, opossums, and armadillos sleep 18 hours a day or more! Even kids need more sleep than grownups. A newborn baby sleeps 17 to 18 hours a day. A 10-year-old needs about 10 hours of sleep a night. Grownups need between six and nine hours of sleep a night. Some people need more sleep than others.

WHY DO WE HAVE TO SLEEP?

Scientists do not know for sure why you sleep. They do have some ideas. Safety could be one reason for sleep. People and other animals might sleep because it keeps them safe at night. It’s hard to see in the dark. Enemies could sneak up and attack animals that are wandering in the darkness. Most mammals and birds go to trees, underground dens, or nests at night. Prehistoric people went into caves or other shelters. They covered up with furs and fell asleep. You go into your home at night and snuggle up in bed. Sleep might also help your body work better. Things go wrong if you do not get enough sleep. It is hard to think and work and play unless you get plenty of sleep.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE FALL ASLEEP?

Scientists have learned a lot about what happens when you lie down, close your eyes, and fall asleep. They study people in sleep labs. Sometimes your eyeballs move back and forth while you’re asleep. They move fast. Scientists call this kind of sleep REM sleep. REM stands for rapid eye movement. Your body may twitch during REM sleep. Your brain is also very busy during REM sleep. It is almost as busy as when you are awake. What do you think your brain is doing? Here’s a clue: You dream during REM sleep. There is another kind of sleep. Your eyeballs do not move. Scientists call this NREM sleep. NREM stands for nonrapid eye movement. Your brain is not very busy during NREM sleep. You go back and forth between REM and NREM sleep all night long.

WHY DO WE DREAM?

Scientists have done many studies on dreams. They think your senses may have a lot to do with dreams. In dreams, you see and hear things. Dreaming is not like thinking about things. You have feelings during dreams. You may feel happy or angry. You feel fear if you have a nightmare. Your memories may have something to do with your dreams. Dreams are often like stories that stop before they are finished.

DO DREAMS MEAN ANYTHING?

People in ancient times looked for meaning in dreams. The ancient Egyptians believed dreams could tell the future. Some psychologists think that dreams show what people feel deep inside. They ask people to talk about their dreams. Some scientists think that dreams have no meaning. They think that dreams just come from nerve signals in your brain. Other scientists think that dreams are important for memory. They may help your brain sort out what to remember and what to forget.

courtesy of : http://onlineroom.blogspot.com

Useless Trivia

• A snail can sleep for three months.
• The electric chair was invented by a dentist.
• All polar bears, despite being near the North Pole, are southpaws. (ooh, bad pun)
• "Go" is the shortest complete sentence in the English language.
• Americans eat on average 18 acres worth of pizza every day.
• Elephants are the only land mammals that can't jump.
• More about elephants: If you add up the circumference of two feet, you get exactly the elephant's height. (?!)
• Your foot is nearly the same length as your forearm as measured from the inside of the elbow to the wrist. (On me, it's nearly exact. :) )
• In 10 minutes, a hurricane expends more energy than all of the nuclear weapons in the world combined.
• On average, 100 people choke to death on ballpoint pens every year.
• Paul McCartney's real first name is James - Paul is his middle name. Thus, all the Beatles (including Ringo, whose first name is Richard) were named after kings.
• The hole inside a CD is exactly the same size as an old Dutch 10 cent coin, called the "dubbeltje". (?!) Of course, all the European countries (save a few) have gone Euro now.
• It is physically impossible for pigs to look up into the sky.
• A pregnant goldfish is called a twerp.
• More than 50% of the people in the world have never made or received a telephone call.
• Rats and horses can't vomit.
• Almost everyone who reads this site will end up trying to lick their elbow. :)

Trivia Corner

• Venus is the only planet in our solar system that rotates clockwise.
• Apples are more efficient than caffeine in waking you up in the morning.
• Mosquito repellents only block the insect's sensors so they don't recognize you. They don't repel.
• The hair of intelligent people have more Zinc and Copper.
• The longest name for a place in the world is a hill in New Zealand called (Taumawhaka) Taumatawhakatangihangakoauotamateatuirpukakapikimaungahoronnukupokaiwhenuakitanataha
• 50,000 words an average wooden pencil can write before running out of lead.
• When a person tells a lie, the tissue in the nose swells, making it itch. So scratching or rubbing the nose is a sign that the person is not telling the truth.
• All months that begin in Sunday has a 13th Friday.
• People who are right hande live an average on nine years longer than the left handed individuals.
• the longest word in the English dictionary without a vowel is the word Rhythm.

The weirdest Little stories

Revenge of the Rats

Norberto Conde of Hagdang Bato, Mandaluyong, Manila came home one evening and found an eight inch rat gorging on their dinner. He beat the rodent with a stick but it managed to escape. Next day, he found his one year old son Karl, dead with several bite marks on his body. The rat had apparently exacted revenge on the young Conde. The night before, Imelda, Karl's mother, heard him crying but she ignored him completely.

They had a Bad day

Two security guards and a supervisor of Merison Enterprises of Malacca, Malaysia, were held up by robbers inside the company warehouse. After tying them up, the thieves took off with a truckload of cigarettes. Managing to escape, the three went to a nearby road for help. Unfortunately, the first car that passed contained four of the robbers, who immediately tied them up again. The unlucky trio were later rescued by co - workers who showed up for work.

Weird suicide

Vergel of Pasay City was found dead by his mother at 10 pm of February 10. Although his penis was found dismembered and his eyes plucked out with a knife, police immediately ruled it as an obvious case of suicide. Lacson's mother did said that prior to the incident, his son was on drugs.

coincidence : facts or fiction II

Fraternal Tragedy

Two brothers in Bermuda were victims of incredibly similar tragedies. Erskine Lawrence Ebbin and his brother Neville were both (accidentally?) killed by the same taxi and driver, carrying the same passengers, while they were riding the same moped on the same street. But the events occurred exactly a year apart. Curiously, however, they were both 17 years old when they died.

Uncanny Parallelism

It is said that the coming of Halley's comet is coincidental with some events in the life of American writer Samuel Langhorne Clemens and Italian astronomer Giovanni Virginio Schiaparelli. In 1835, the year Clemens and Schiaparelli were born, the comet appeared, and the comet reappeared in 1910, the year both of them died.

The Titan and The Titanic

The sinking of Titanic was predicted 14 years before it happened. Novelist Morgan Robertson vividly wrote the incident with incredible precision in his book entitled The Wreck of The Titan. He did not know during that time he was making one of the greatest predictions of all time. Comparing Robertson's fictional story of the Titan and the actual tragedy of the Titanic in 1912 reveals startling similarities.

• both the fictional Titan and the real - life Titanic were on their voyage when they encountered the disaster.
• both were British made luxury liners.
• both were regarded as the largest ship ever built.
• both were supposedly unsinkable and the safest ship afloat.
• both ships collided with an iceberg in the North Atlantic.
• both disasters happened in April
• the length of the Titan was 800 ft. while the Titanic was 882.5 ft.
• both ships have some VIPs on board.
• the Titan had 24 lifeboats while the Titanic had 22.
• there were 3000 persons aboard the Titan while the Titanic had 2,224 passengers.
• both disasters resulted to great loss of life and property.
  

coincidence :Fact or Fiction

Some coincidences and incidents in life are just so bizarre it beggars belief!
However such strange coincidences do occur, but still you cannot help but shake your head and wonder. Coincidence is the remarkable occurence of two or more events, having uncanny similarities and apparent circumstantial, numerical or chronographic interrelation, but without logical or reasonable casual connection between them.

One such example is that of the ship The Mermaid.

In 1829, The Mermaid was 4 days out from Sydney Harbour, Australia when an intense storm struck. Between high winds and heavy rains, the ship was finally dumped onto a reef where it began breaking apart. The crew managed to swim towards a rocky outcrop where they were rescued three days later by the crew of another passing vessel. The Swiftsure then encountered an extremely strong current that the crew were unable to counter. The ship was therefore swept on to rocks and also wrecked. The crew of The Mermaid found themselves abandoning ship for a second time.
Eight hours later the schooner Governor Ready already carrying thirty-two people and a full cargo of timber saw their plight and was able to squeeze the survivors from both the Mermaid and Swiftsure on board.
Three hours later, Governor Ready caught fire! The fire spread rapidly thanks to all the added timber on board. The ship was abandoned once more with the aid of longboats.
The Comet, a government ship then appeared unexpectedly, and all were rescued....again!
The crew of the Comet heard the story and considered that the crew of The Mermaid were in fact jinxed, but having passed three shipwrecks without trouble, they decided that good luck was on their side.
But just 5 days later a sudden squall sprang up. With her mast lost, sails in tatters, and rudder gone, the crew of the Comet took to their longboats, abandoning the jinxed crewmen to their own resources.
Clinging to broken up pieces of the ship, the survivors weary and having to fight off sharks were again picked up from their soggy situation by the crew of the Jupiter,
Just 12 hours later, yes, you guessed it, the Jupiter sank!
All were eventually picked up by another ship, The City of Leeds.
Four days later, the City Of Leeds, docked in Sydney Harbour!
But there was one final coincidence to come. On board one of the final vessels, the Jupiter was an elderly lady from Yorkshire, Sarah Richey, who had come to Australia to search for her son Peter who had been missing for over fifteen years. As it turned out, Peter was one of the original crew of the Mermaid.

A case of Retribution?

The case of Henry Ziegland of Honey Grove, Texas is an ultimate puzzler. He jilted his sweetheart who then committed suicide. Her brother triad to avenge her by shooting Ziegland, but the bullet only gazed his face and buried itself in a tree. The brother in believing he had killed Ziegland then took his own life. In 1913(30 years after the incident), Ziegland was cutting down the same tree. It was quite a difficult job, so he used dynamites. The explosion sent the old bullet through Ziegland's head entering the grazed mark on his face, the spot where it failed to kill him before. This time the bullet killed him.

Attraction on falling babies

In the spring of 1975, Joseph Figlock was walking down a street in Detroit when a baby fell on him from a high window. By a stroke of coincidence, it happened again exactly a year after. Mr. Figlock and both babies survived.

(More Story on my next post!)

Think Big in the future!

• "Computers in the future may weigh no more than 15 tons." -- Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949

• "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." -- Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM,1943

• "I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked with the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad that won't last out the year." -- The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall,1957

• "But what ... is it good for?" -- Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM, 1968, commenting on the microchip.

• "There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home," -- Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977

• "This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." -- Western Union internal memo, 1876.

• "The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" -- David Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s.

• "The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a C, the idea must be feasible." -- A Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. (Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp.)

• Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" -- Harry M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927.

• "I'm just glad it'll be Clark Gable who's falling on his face and not Gary Cooper." -- Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the leading role in "Gone With The Wind."

• "A cookie store is a bad idea. Besides, the market research reports say America likes crispy cookies, not soft and chewy cookies like you make." -- Response to Debbi Fields' idea of starting her company, Mrs. Fields' Cookies.

• "We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." -- Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962.

• "Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." -- Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895.

• "If I had thought about it, I wouldn't have done the experiment The literature was full of examples that said you can't do this." -- Spencer Silver on the work that led to the unique adhesives or 3-M "Post-It" Notepads.

• "So we went to Atari and said, 'Hey, we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you.' And they said, 'No.' So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, 'Hey, we don't need you; you haven't got through college yet.'" -- Apple Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and H-P interested in his and Steve Wozniak's personal computer.

• "Professor Goddard does not know the relation between action and reaction and the need to have something better than a vacuum against which to react. He seems to lack the basic knowledge ladled out daily in high schools." -- 1921 New York Times editorial about Robert Goddard's revolutionary rocket work.

• "You want to have consistent and uniform muscle development across all of your muscles? It can't be done. It's just a fact of life. You just have to accept inconsistent muscle development as an unalterable condition of weight training." -- Response to Arthur Jones, who solved the "unsolvable" problem by inventing Nautilus.

• "Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy." -- Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project to drill for oil in 1859.

• "Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." -- Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929.

• "Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." -- Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre.

• "Everything that can be invented has been invented." -- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.

• "Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction". -- Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

• "The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon". -- Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon, appointed Surgeon-Extraordinary to Queen Victoria, 1873.

• "640K ought to be enough for anybody." -- Bill Gates, 1981

Products with humble beginning

do you know the origin of some of the important products that we use today?

here are some of them:

Did you know:

• that the Slinky toy was the result of a failed attempt by engineer Richard James to produce an antivibration device for ship instruments? His goal was to develop a spring that would instantaneously counterbalance the wave motion that rocks a ship at sea. Instead, he developed the Slinky.

• that Kleenex tissue was originally designed to be a gas mask filter? It was developed at the beginning of World War I to replace cotton, which was then in short supply as a surgical dressing.

• that in 1800 ether was first used by partyers as a fun diversion? Sniffing the gas led to hilarious and raucous laughter as people watched each other become more and more intoxicated and silly. Several doctors independently realized the value ether would have to anesthetize surgery patients. Of those who claimed rights to the "discovery," none had a happy ending. One had a seizure and died defending his rights. Another spent his life in an asylum because he had been denied acclaim. A third became addicted to chloroform and, in a New York City jail, he soaked a cloth in the drug, severed an artery and bled to death.

• that the x-ray was discovered purely by accident? When German physicist Wilhelm Konrad von Roentgen was experimenting with cathode rays in 1895, he put an activated Crookes tube in a book and went out to lunch. When he returned, he discovered that a key that had also been placed in the book showed up as an image on the developed film!

• that in the early 1940s GE engineer James Wright was charged with a task of utmost importance to the war effort: develop a cheap substitute for rubber that could be used to produce tires, gas masks and a whole host of military gear. Wright tackled the task diligently -- and wound up inventing Silly Putty. (Good thing he didn't work on the artificial heart!)

• that the first match was accidentally discovered in 1826 when chemist John Walker, mixing potash and antimony with a stick, scraped the stick against the stone floor to remove the blob on the end and it burst into flames?

• that while attempting to develop a super strong glue, 3M employee Spencer Silver accidentally developed a glue that was so weak it would barely hold two pieces of paper together? However, his colleague Art Fry needed the glue. Fry sang with his church choir and marked the pages of his hymnal with small scraps of paper that often fell out. He used Silver's glue to hold the papers in place. Today we call this invention Post-it Notes.

• that Coca-Cola's original color was green and Seven-Up was first named "Lithiated Lemon"?

• that when IBM conducted a market study of Chester Carlson's invention in 1959, the company concluded that it would take only 5000 units of his new product to saturate the market? IBM therefore declined to be part of the new product introduction. Too bad for IBM. Carlson's invention was the xerography process, and his new product was the beginning of the Xerox Corporation. It is estimated that every day, worldwide, 3,000,000,000 copies are made!!

• that the Eveready Battery began as an invention called the "electric flowerpot," which was a tube with a battery and light bulb inside? The idea was to fasten this gizmo to the side of a flowerpot so it would illuminate the flowers from the bottom. The idea died on the vine and the businessman who licensed the flower pot, Conrad Huber, was left with a pile of useless tubes -- until he found a way to market them as batteries to light the world!

History of TV Remote Control

The TV remote control as we know it today was invented by Robert Adler, a US inventor with 180 patents for electronics devices. His widow said the remote was not his favourite invention, as he rarely watched television and was "more of a reader".

One of the earliest examples of remote control was developed in 1893 by Nikola Tesla. He called his patent Method of an Apparatus for Controlling Mechanism of Moving Vehicle or Vehicles.

Remote control mechanisms were used by the Germans for motorboats during WWI, and the Soviet Red Army for their teletanks during 1930s in the war against Finland and the early stages of the Great Patriotic War.

The first TV remote control attached to the TV with a cord was produced by Zenith Radio Corporation in 1950. It was called "Lazy Bones". The founder-president of corporation yarned for a device that could be used to mute the sound of commercials.

The next generation of TV remote controls operated by flashing at photo cells in the TV. However, it had its disadvantages too: if the TV sat in an area where the sun shone directly on it, the remote’s tuner might start rotating.

Trivia Tidbits

Did you know...?

1 A rat can go longer without water than a camel?

2 Beaver teeth are so sharp than native americans used them as knife blades?

3 A cockroch without its head can live for nine days?

4 When coffee beans are roasted they release 700 chemical substances that produce aromas

5 Canada banned beauty contests in 1992.

6 American and Russian space flights always include chocolate.

7 Captain Cook lost 41 of his 98 crew due to lack of Vitamin C on his first voyage to the south Pacific in 1768.

Unusual Death

Some people over the years have had unusual deaths. Here are just of few:

1 SHERWOOD ANDERSON (writer)1941 He died after swallowing a toothpick on an ocean liner that was bound for Brazil.

2 ATTILA THE HUN.453 AD Poor Atilla died from a nosebleed on his wedding night.

3 THOMAS A. BECKET Murdered at Canterbury cathedral in England by four knights

4 AMANDA BLAKE (actress) (Miss Kitty in the cowboy series "Gunsmoke" )She died from AIDS contracted from her bisexual husband.

5 BONO (Husband of singer Cher) He died after crashing into a tree while skiing.

6 DAVY CROCKETT (1836) He died defending the Alamo.

7 ELVIS PRESLEY (1977) The King died sitting on a tiolet seat.

8 MARVIN GAYE (singer) Murdered by his father on his birthday.

9 FRANK HAYES (Jockey) 1923 He had a heart attack during a race. His horse Sweet Kiss won the race.Hayes is the only deceased jockey to WIN a race.

The softer side of a Diamond

A diamond is the hardest natural substance on earth, but if it is placed in an oven and the temperature is raised to about 763 degrees Celsius (1405 degrees Fahrenheit), it will simply vanish, without even ash remaining. Only a little carbon dioxide will have been released.

Diamonds are formed over a period of a billion or more years deep within earth's crust - about 150km (90 miles) deep - and is pushed to the surface by volcanoes. Most diamonds are found in volcanic rock, called Kimberlite, or in the sea after having been carried away by rivers when they were pushed to the surface.

A diamond is 58 times harder than the next hardest mineral on earth, corundum, from which rubies and sapphires are formed. It was only during the 15th century that it was discovered that the only way to cut diamonds was with other diamonds. Yet, diamonds are brittle. If you hit one hard with a hammer, it will shatter.

The largest diamond
The world's largest diamond was the Cullinan, found in South Africa in 1905. It weighed 3,106.75 carats uncut. It was cut into the Great Star of Africa, weighing 530.2 carats, the Lesser Star of Africa, which weighs 317.40 carats, and 104 other diamonds of nearly flawless colour and clarity. They now form part of the British crown jewels.

The Cullinan was three times the size of the next largest diamond, the Excelsior, which was also found in South Africa. The world's largest documented polished diamond - unearthed in 1986, also in South Africa - is called Unnamed Brown. It weighs 545 carats and was cut down from a 700 carat rough diamond. It took an international team of expert cutters 3 years to complete the masterpiece. Another impressive diamond that also took 3 years to cut, and also is part of the British crown jewels, is the Centenary Diamond. It weighs 273.85 carats and is the world's largest flawless diamond.

Not all diamonds are white. Impurities lend diamonds a shade of blue, red, orange, yellow, green and even black. A green diamond is the rarest. It is not the rarest gemstone, however. That title goes to a pure red ruby. Diamonds actually are found in fair abundance; thousands are mined every year. 80% of them are not suitable for jewellery - they are used in industry. Only diamonds of higher clarity are sourced to the jewellery stores.

Synthetic diamonds
Late in the 19th century, Scottish scientist James Ballantyne mixed lithium with bone oil and paraffin, sealed it in iron tubes and heated it to red hot. He claimed the resultant stones were diamonds. They were stored away and only many years later they were found to be diamonds, although synthetic.

Top 3 Longest Word

these are the top three(3) longest English word...

1. pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis (45 letters)

2. supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (34 letters)

3. pseudopseudohypoparathyroidism (30 letters)

The original Father's Day

Father's Day exists almost all over the world to honor and commemorate fathers or forefathers. In the Roman Catholic tradition, Father's Day is celebrated on Saint Joseph's Day, though in most countries Father's Day is a secular celebration.

In the United States, the driving force behind the establishment of the celebration of Father's Day was Mrs. Sonora Smart Dodd. Her father, the Civil War veteran William Jackson Smart, as a single parent raised his six children in Spokane, Washington. She was inspired by Anna Jarvis's efforts to establish Mother's Day. Although she initially suggested June 5, the anniversary of her father's death, she did not provide the organizers with enough time to make arrangements, and the celebration was deferred to the third Sunday in June. The first Father's Day was celebrated on June 19, 1910, in Spokane, Washington.