E = MC2 ? Yes, It’s Quiz Day.

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Don’t worry, I’m not asking you to prove the theory of relativity or anything like that, although the ‘E’ does crop up in one of the questions.

But there are a few easy ones mixed in as well, so why not have a go?

If you get stuck you can, as always, find the answers waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down below, but please NO cheating!

Enjoy and good luck.

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Q.  1:  Was 1998 a leap year?

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Q.  2:  What (domestic) animal gives us the most by-products?

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Q.  3:  What city is known as the Paris of South America?

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Q.  4:  What does an ‘oologist’ (pronounced oo-all-o-gist) collect or study?

           a) shoe laces          b) stamps          c) bird eggs          d) rare coins

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Q.  5:  What’s the term for water induction process in plants?

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Q.  6:  In which American state is Cape Canaveral, a launching site for space travel?

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Q.  7:  This metal is the main element in Bronze and constitutes approximately 10% of Yellow Gold, what is it?

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Q.  8:  What does the ‘E’ represent in the equation  E = MC2?

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Q.  9:  Which bird turns its head upside down to eat?

    a) the stork        b) the albatross        c) the flamingo        d) the swan

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Q. 10:  LOT is the national airline of which country?

            a) Peru          b) Lithuania          c) Poland          d) Latvia

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Q. 11:  What are the two major groups of islands off the north-east coast of Scotland?

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Q. 12:  ‘Richard Hannay’ is the chief protagonist in what John Buchan novel?

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Q. 13:  What is the name of Caractacus Potts’ 12- cylinder, eight-litre, supercharged Paragon Panther?

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Q. 14:  As well as being the first woman mayor in England, Elizabeth Garrett Anderson was the first woman to qualify in which profession?

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Q. 15:  What general name is given to a female donkey?

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Q. 16:  What name is given to the natural grassland area of southern Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay?

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Q. 17:  According to legend, which creatures did Saint Patrick banish from Ireland?

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Q. 18:  What is an estate, large farm or ranch called in Spanish-speaking countries?

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Q. 19:  Who is the wizard in The Hobbit?

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Q. 20:  From which country does Samba dancing come?

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ANSWERS

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Q.  1:  Was 1998 a leap year?

A.  1:  No.

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Q.  2:  What (domestic) animal gives us the most by-products?

A.  2:  The Pig.

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Q.  3:  What city is known as the Paris of South America?

A.  3:  Buenos Aires In Argentina.

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Q.  4:  What does an ‘oologist’ (pronounced oo-all-o-gist) collect or study?

           a) shoe laces          b) stamps          c) bird eggs          d) rare coins

A.  4:  The correct answer is c) bird eggs.

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Q.  5:  What’s the term for water induction process in plants

A.  5:  Osmosis.

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Q.  6:  In which American state is Cape Canaveral, a launching site for space travel?

A.  6:  It is in Florida.

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Q.  7:  This metal is the main element in Bronze and constitutes approximately 10% of Yellow Gold, what is it?

A.  7:  It is Copper.

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Q.  8:  What does the ‘E’ represent in the equation  E = MC2?

A.  8:  The ‘E’ represents ‘Energy’.

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Q.  9:  Which bird turns its head upside down to eat?

    a) the stork        b) the albatross        c) the flamingo        d) the swan

A.  9:  The correct answer is c) the flamingo.

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Q. 10:  LOT is the national airline of which country?

            a) Peru          b) Lithuania          c) Poland          d) Latvia

A. 10:  The correct answer is c) Poland.

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Q. 11:  What are the two major groups of islands off the north-east coast of Scotland?

A. 11:  They are the Orkney Islands and the Shetland Islands.

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Q. 12:  ‘Richard Hannay’ is the chief protagonist in what John Buchan novel?

A. 12:  The 39 Steps.

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Q. 13:  What is the name of Caractacus Potts’ 12- cylinder, eight-litre, supercharged Paragon Panther?

A. 13:  It is Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

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Q. 14:  As well as being the first woman mayor in England, Elizabeth Garrett Anderson was the first woman to qualify in which profession?

A. 14:  As a doctor.

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Q. 15:  What general name is given to a female donkey?

A. 15:  A Jenny.

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Q. 16:  What name is given to the natural grassland area of southern Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay?

A. 16:  The Pampas.

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Q. 17:  According to legend, which creatures did Saint Patrick banish from Ireland?

A. 17:  Snakes.

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Q. 18:  What is an estate, large farm or ranch called in Spanish-speaking countries?

A. 18:  It is called a Hacienda.

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Q. 19:  Who is the wizard in The Hobbit?

A. 19:  Gandalf.

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Q. 20:  From which country does Samba dancing come?

A. 20:  Brazil.

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Did You Know? Lots More Fabulous Facts Folks!

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Welcome to another fasab fact day.

Diamonds and chocolate are just two of the delicious facts today.

Enjoy.

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There is a diamond floating in our galaxy

that is bigger than Earth

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Besides Wales, Argentina is the only other country

where Welsh is spoken by a significant minority

thanks to settlers who inhabited Patagonia nearly 200 years ago.

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Your brain was just about as big as it is now when you were born.

That’s one reason that babies have disproportionately large heads.

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Count the capt Jack Sparrows on The Pirates of the Caribbean.

There are usually three.

If you see four, you might actually have seen Johnny Depp

who sometimes hangs out in the ride in full costume for fun

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Malaria comes from the Latin phrase “mal aria” meaning “bad air”

and was used to describe the atmosphere around the swamps of Rome.

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Chocolate was included in WWII soldier rations.

According to army specification, it was designed

to taste just “a little better than a boiled potato”

so soldiers would not eat it too quickly.

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Oliver Cromwell was hanged and decapitated

two years after he had died.

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American playwright Tennessee Williams died in 1983

after he choked on a bottle cap in his hotel room.

Apparently he had been drinking.

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Kaffeklubben Island Belonging to Greenland,

is officially considered to be the northernmost point of land on Earth.

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The first Eagle Scout west of the Mississippi

is buried in San Marcos, Texas.

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In ancient Egypt, when a ruler would die all of his

servants and animals were buried alive with him.

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In 1985, New Orleans lifeguards decided to throw a pool party

celebrating their first drowning free season ever.

Ironically, after a party filled with hundreds of lifeguards,

local Jerome Moody was found dead at the bottom of the pool.

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The silhouette on the Major League Baseball logo

is Harmon Killebrew.

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The word ‘pound’ is abbreviated ‘lb.’

after the constellation ‘libra’ 

because it means ‘pound’ in Latin, and also ‘scales’.

The abbreviation for the British Pound Sterling

comes from the same source:

it is an ‘L’ for Libra/Lb. with a stroke through it

to indicate abbreviation.

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The Andy Griffith Show was the first spin-off in TV history.

It was a spin-off of the Danny Thomas Show.

If you have time why not enjoy an episode?

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The Ambassadorks Of America!

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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The Sunday Sermon

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Oh dear where to start. 

I’ve said before that America is bad – that’s capital ‘B’, ‘A’ and ‘D’ – at foreign policy. The US Government should know this by now, I’m not the only one saying it. It is a well known fact all over the world – except in America which apparently doesn’t know very much about the rest of the world and also apparently isn’t going to learn any time soon.

There hasn’t been any time in history when America needed to take stock of what has happened and try to make a few friends out there in the big wide world rather than pissing everyone else off needlessly.

Sure if you’re the biggest and strongest on the field you can kick anyone around. But to what purpose when it’s just as easy to get people on your side. Most of the woes America faces, the rest of the world faces too. There’s more in common out there that you might at first think.

Cue the man who was going to bring in great change and had the power to do so. But, no, President Obama hasn’t changed a damn thing. He inherited a great big hole and he just jumped in there with his shovel and keeps on digging.

Worse, he has yet again allowed croneyism to take the place of innovation and good sense.

To help him he has given government positions to the biggest bunch of idiots that you could ever imagine.

Their first job it seems was to continue to piss off Europe. Hot on the heels of the NSA getting caught spying on German Chancellor Merkel,  the U.S. Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, Victoria Nuland, was caught in a phone call recording saying “F*** the EU”.

Yes, you read that correctly. And she did all this as she was discussing who should be in the new Ukrainian government. 

Whoops! And Double Whoops!!

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Here it is if you want to hear it for yourselves.

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That’s the Secretary of State.

Now what about the Presidential appointeees, the Ambassadors.

You would think the main criteria for choosing your Ambassadors would be to get someone who has an in depth knowledge of the country where they will be posted. Someone well versed in the culture, history, politics etc. Someone who will fit in straight away and make a good impression on behalf of the American people.

Sound sensible?

Yes, of course it does.

Is it the way America chooses its Ambassadors?

No, of course it’s not.

America chooses its Ambassadors, not on ability, but rather on how much money they have raised for the President’s election or re-election campaign.

That’s what you call corruption in any other country. I’m not sure what it’s called in America but the consequences are plain and pathetic to be seen.

Nowhere better than in the most recent hearings for the ambassador positions.

In this lot of new Ambassadors we had Colleen Bell, a TV producer for a soap opera who was picked as the U.S. envoy to Hungary. Did she know anything about Hungary? No. She didn’t utter a word of sense, just relied on waffle and bluff.

The only thing that eased her humiliation was the new Ambassador to Norway who was so clueless he didn’t even know who was in Government there. He even called the Progress Party, which is part of Norway’s ruling coalition, a hate-spewing “fringe element.”

And last in these examples, but not least in terms of inability and unsuitability for the job, was Noah Bryson Mamet. He was the nominee for the Argentina ambassadorship despite the fact that he’d never even visited that country and can’t speak Spanish.

A couple of million dollars for Obama apparently goes a very long way to getting you the job of representing America on the world stage.

Incredible! And not in a good way.

I’ll give you the opportunity to hear Anderson Cooper’s take on it too.

Until the next rant!

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And Abbey Martin

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It Was An American After All

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Yes there is a new papa and he is an American.

Except he is a South American, from Argentina in fact.

Close but no cigar fasab 🙂

His name was Jorge Mario Bergoglio, but now it is Francis I, and he was the surprise choice in one of the fastest conclaves in recent times.

He is a Jesuit and he is 76 years old and, no pun intended, he has one hell of a mess to try to clean up.

In fact the trouble never stops coming.

As the election was getting under way in Rome, an article published on Monday, in the Italian newspaper La Republica, noted that the Vatican paid an estimated $30 million in 2008 for around 20 apartments in the imposing palazzo at 2 Via Carducci.

The Palazzo at 2 Via Carducci in Rome, the $30 million apartment complex bought by the Vatican.

Not only will these apartments do very little to help the poor and needy in his flock as I guess very few of them could afford even to rent a $1.5 million apartment let alone buy one, but the complex it turns out is also home to Italy’s biggest gay sauna, the Europa Multiclub!

Europa Multiclub, which features a Turkish bath and Finnish sauna, bills itself as the number one sauna in Italy. Open all year, the club also offers weekly “bear parties”, which it advertises on its website with a video of a stripper donning clerical attire.

Europa Multiclub entrance adorned with phallic topiary display. (Does that sign say use rear entrance?)

And to top it all, the housing block accommodates 15 priests, including a 12-room apartment on the first floor of the building for 76-year-old Cardinal Ivan Dias, a socially conservative Cardinal who was the former archbishop of Bombay, who has called homosexuality a disease of the soul. Does anyone detect a hint of hypocrisy?

Red faces to go with those red robes I think.

Good luck Francis, you’re going to need it.

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Significant Number Factoid Friday – Today Number Forty-Four 44

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Okay, this week’s significant number was either going to be 44 or 45, but, rightly or wrongly, the American people voted for Barack Obama and so the number is 44  –  hard luck Mitt.

So here we go, and just like President Obama we’re not sure exactly where.

Enjoy.

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44 Forty-four

 

 

 

In politics

• In the U.S. presidential election of 1944, Franklin D. Roosevelt won reelection over Republican challenger Thomas E. Dewey, becoming the only U.S. president elected to a fourth term.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

 

• A few days ago Barack Obama was elected to his second term as the 44th US President.

Barack Obama 44th President of the United States of America

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In mathematics

• 44 is a tribonacci number, a happy number, an octahedral number and a palindromic number.

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In science

• 44 is the atomic number of ruthenium

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In space

• STS-44 was the 44th Shuttle mission. It was cut short after one of its three navigational units failed.

 

 

• Messier object M44, also known as the Beehive Cluster, is a magnitude 4.0 open cluster in the constellation Cancer,

Messier object M44

  

• 44 is the Saros number of the solar eclipse series which began on April 30, 1448 BC and ended on June 7, 168 BC . The duration of Saros series 44 was 1280.1 years, and it contained 72 solar eclipses.
• The Saros number of the lunar eclipse series which began on October 1, 1363 BC and ended on March 27, 153 . The duration of Saros series 44 was 1514.5 years, and it contained 85 lunar eclipses.

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In sport

• 44 is the retired number for former baseball players Hank Aaron, Willie McCovey and Reggie Jackson; the number is sometimes considered to be a “hitter’s number”.

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• In the NFL 44 was the number of Floyd Little (Denver Broncos) and Pete Retzlaff (Philadelphia Eagles)

Floyd Little

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• In the NBA 44 was the number of Dan Issel, (Denver Nuggets); Jerry West (L.A. Lakers); Paul Westphal (Phoenix Suns); Sam Lacey (Sacramento Kings); and George Gervin (San Antonio Spurs).

Dan Issel

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• A number of football legends at Syracuse University also wore 44, most notably by Jim Brown, Ernie Davis, Floyd Little, and Rob Konrad. Although the number was officially retired in 2005, the legend of 44 remains an important part of the identity of Syracuse University.

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In WWII

1944 was arguably the most interesting year of World War II. Incidents of note included:

 

• The Fosse Ardeatine massacre in Rome when 335 Italians are killed, including 75 Jews and over 200 members of the Italian Resistance from various groups.

 

• The real “Great Escape” (as opposed to the famous movie version) when 76 Royal Air Force prisoners escape by tunnel “Harry” from Stalag Luft III. Only three made it back to the UK, and of those recaptured, fifty were executed.

 

• Exercise Tiger, or Operation Tiger, was the code name for one in a series of large-scale rehearsals for the D-Day invasion of Normandy, which took place on Slapton Sands or Slapton Beach in Devon.
• The first practice assault took place on the morning of 27 April. H-hour was set for 7:30 am, and was to be preceded by a live firing exercise to acclimatize the troops to the sights, sounds and even smells of a naval bombardment. During the landing itself, live rounds were to be fired over the heads of the incoming troops by forces on land, for the same reason. This followed an order made by General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander, who felt that the men must be hardened by exposure to real battle conditions.
• The British heavy cruiser HMS Hawkins was to shell the beach with live ammunition, from 6:30 to 7:00 am, giving the beachmasters half an hour to inspect the beach and declare it safe.
• However, several of the landing ships for that morning were delayed, and the officer in charge decided to delay the bombardment until 8:30am. This message was received by HMS Hawkins, but not by a number of the landing craft, with the result that troops were landing on the beach at the same time as the bombardment was taking place. This unfortunate mix-up resulted in a “friendly fire” incident with 946 American servicemen losing their lives.
• The incident was under the strictest secrecy at the time due to the impending invasion, and was only nominally reported afterward. As a result it has been a largely “forgotten” disaster of WWII.

 

• On June 6 Operation Overlord, or the D-Day landings, took place, when 155,000 Allied troops shipped from England land on the beaches of Normandy in northern France.
• It was the largest amphibious military operation in history and was the beginning of the liberation of France and the other countries in Europe invaded by Nazi Germany.

D-Day Landings

 

• Also in 1944, on July 20 there was an unsuccessful assassination attempt on the life of Adolf Hitler led by Claus von Stauffenberg.

Führerhauptquartier, Stauffenberg, Hitler

 

• At the beginning of August 1944 the Warsaw Uprising began and lasted until October 2, when it was finally ended by Nazi troops.

Warsaw Uprising Symbol

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• Also in August of that year, the Gestapo, acting on a tip off from a Dutch informer, sealed-off an area in an Amsterdam warehouse and captured Jewish diarist Anne Frank and her family.
• They were placed on the last transport train from Westerbork to Auschwitz, and on October 30, Anne Frank and sister Margot Frank are deported from Auschwitz to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

Anne Frank diary

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In militaria

• The .44 Remington Magnum or .44 Special are popular large-bore cartridge calibres. Originally designed for revolvers, a their introduction, they were quickly adopted for carbines and rifles as well.

44 calibre ammo

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• However many people mistakenly believe that the Smith & Wesson (S&W) .44 calibre revolver heavily featured in numerous Hollywood movies, particularly Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry is called the .44 Magnum (the most powerful handgun in the world), neither of which are true. The revolver used in those movies is actually the Smith & Wesson Model 29, a six-shot, double-action revolver chambered for the .44 Magnum cartridge. It comes in a variety of models with 3″, 4″, 5″, 6″, 6½”, 8″ and, later, 10″ barrel lengths.

 

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• StG 44
• The StG 44 (Sturmgewehr 44) is an assault rifle developed in Nazi Germany during World War II that was the first of its kind to see major deployment and is considered by many historians to be the first modern assault rifle.
• It is also known under the designations MP 43 and MP 44 (Maschinenpistole 43, Maschinenpistole 44 respectively).

Sturmgewehr StG44

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• Pzf 44 
• Panzerfaust 44 “Lanze” (or Pzf 44 in short) is an antitank weapon. Development of this weapon commenced circa 1960, with grenade and launcher developed by German company Dynamit-Nobel AG.
• The Pzf 44 entered German service during mid-sixties and in several modifications served until mid-eighties, when it was replaced by moremodern Panzerfaust 3 (Pzf 3) weapon.
• It is a .44 Magnum carbine with a synthetic stock and stainless steel fittings. In common with many Ruger carbines it uses a rotary magazine which holds 4 rounds and fits inside the stock under the breech.

 

Panzerfaust 44 “Lanze” Pzf 44

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• DL-44 
• The BlasTech Industries DL-44 heavy blaster pistol was a powerful sidearm from the time of the Galactic Civil War (yes, a little bit of sci-fi talk here). The DL-44 is described as a powerful, highly modifiable and accurate blaster pistol.

BlasTech Industries DL-44 heavy blaster pistol – tech drawing

• However, in outward design it is uncannily like the (real) German “Broomhandle” Mauser C96 pistol, used by both its German creators and the Ottoman Empire during World War I, and wound up in the hands of such notable figures as T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) and Winston Churchill, and also saw service among various revolutionary movements throughout the world following the First World War.

 

“Broomhandle” Mauser C96

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• T-44
• The T-44 was a medium tank first produced towards the end of the Second World War by the Soviet Union. It was the successor to the famous T-34. Fewer than two thousand T-44s were built, but the design became the basis for the T-54/55 series of main battle tanks, the most-produced tank of all time.

Soviet T44 tank

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• TKX
• The TKX is a relatively new Japanese tank with a 120mm gun, costing approximately $7 million and weighing in at 44 tons weight.

 

Japanese Army TKX 44 ton tank

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• A-44
• Sometimes known as the ‘mystery tank’, the A-44 was developed as T-34 modernization program in 1941. 29-30 tonns, Hull front armour – up to 75 at 60 degrees, sides – 60mm, 76.2mm and 57mm cannons, 600hp enqine. Only paper project.

A-44 ‘mystery’ tank

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• XB-44
• One B-29A was handed over to Pratt & Whitney to be used as a testbed for the installation of the new Wasp Major 28-cylinder engines in the B-29. They came up with the XB-44 variant.

 

XB-44-1 variant of the B-29A

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• X-44 MANTA
• The Lockheed Martin X-44 MANTA (Multi-Axis No-Tail Aircraft) was a conceptual aircraft design that has been studied by NASA and the U.S. Air Force. It was intended to test the feasibility of full yaw, pitch and roll control without tailplanes (horizontal or vertical), attitude manipulation relying purely on 3D thrust vectoring. The aircraft design was derived from the F-22 Raptor and featured a stretched delta wing and no tail surfaces.

The Lockheed Martin X-44 MANTA    (Multi-Axis No-Tail Aircraft)

 

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• T-44A
• The T-44A “Pegasus” aircraft is a twin-engine, pressurized, fixed-wing monoplane, manufactured by Beech Aircraft Corporation, Wichita, Kansas, whose mission is to train Navy and Marine Corps pilots.

 

The T-44A “Pegasus”

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Other stuff

• Cities on the 44th parallel include, Minneapolis,  Simferopol (Ukraine), Bordeaux  (France),  Belgrade and Šabac (Serbia), Halifax (Nova Scotia, Canada), Bucharest (Romania), Pierre (South Dakota), Augusta (Maine), and Montpelier (Vermont).
• Cities on the 44th line of longitude include, São Luís (Brazil), Sana’a (Yemen), Baghdad (Iraq), Nizhny Novgorod (Russia), Hargeisa (Somalia), Arbil (Iraqi Kurdistan), Yerevan (Armenia), and Tbilisi (Georgia).
• 44 is the international direct dial code for phone calls to the United Kingdom;
• Interstate 44 is the freeway that runs from Texas to Missouri;
• U.S. Route 44, is the highway that runs from New York to Massachusetts;
• In Pennsylvania Route 44(PA 44), is the long state highway in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania
• The name of a mysterious savior of Poland was prophesied by the Polish national poet Adam Mickiewicz in his masterpiece dramatic poem Dziady (Forefathers). In scene 5 of act 3, the priest Piotr announces a “reviver of the nation” who is to bring back the lost freedom of Poland, and describes him as: “Born from a foreign mother, his blood of ancient heroes, And his name will be forty and four.”
• 44 is the name of a variant of the card game poker.
• +44 is the name of a band that includes Blink-182 vocalist/bassist Mark Hoppus and Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker.
• A blues song, Forty-Four, also known as “44 Blues”
• Vicks Formula 44 is a cough suppressant
• The 44 Cent Cure is the cost of treatment of intestinal worms that affect 400 million children in various arts of the world and leads to stunted physical and mental development in both boys and girls. They also cause nausea and diarrhea and in severe cases, they kill.
• 44 is the largest number for which Wolfram Alpha offers a visual representation.
• Wyoming was the 44th state to join The United States of America.
• There are 44 candles in a box of Hanukkah candles.
• An agent in the American Television series Get Smart goes under the title of 44, usually assigned to small, enclosed, unexpected spots, to meet Maxwell Smart, agent 86.
• On January 15 1944 An earthquake hits San Juan, Argentina, killing an estimated 10,000 people in the worst natural disaster in Argentina’s history.
• In 1944 meat rationing ends in Australia.
• On March 4, 1944 in Ossining, New York, Louis Buchalter, the leader of 1930s crime syndicate Murder, Inc., was executed at Sing Sing, along with Emanuel Weiss, and Louis Capone.
• In 1944 IBM dedicates the first program-controlled calculator, the Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator (known best as the Harvard Mark I).
• On September 14, 1944 the ‘Great Atlantic Hurricane’ makes landfall in the New York City area.
• And on October 20 an LNG explosion destroyed a square mile of Cleveland, Ohio.

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A Lot Of Idiots Kill Themselves….But….

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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A lot of idiots kill themselves accidently. I’ve highlighted a few examples on this blog of people whose stupidity led to their demise.

But some do it on purpose.

If they are really dumb, however, they don’t quite manage to do it the way they had planned.

Here are some examples.

 

1. Objective Attained – Method Unexpected

Frenchman Jacques LeFevrier left nothing to chance when he decided to commit suicide.

He stood at the top of a tall cliff and tied a noose around his neck.

He tied the other end of the rope to a large rock.

He then drank some poison.

Then he set fire to his clothes.

He even tried to shoot himself at the last moment.

The plan seemed foolproof. Alas it was not.

As he jumped he fired the pistol.

However, the bullet missed him completely and instead cut through the rope above him.

Free of the threat of hanging, he plunged into the sea.

The sudden dunking extinguished the flames and the salty water he ingested made him vomit the poison.

He was dragged out of the water by a kind fisherman and was taken to a hospital, where he subsequently died of hypothermia.

There must have been an easier way. 

Jacques LeFevrier

 

2. Strike another one Elvita!

One Sunday while on a visit to the Empire State Building in New York City, Elvita Adams clambered over an 8 foot high iron fence surrounding the observation deck at about 8.25pm.

She jumped off the building and plummeted earthwards.

But only for a few feet.

A strong gust of wind, possibly as high as 30mph, pushed her back towards the building and she landed on a balcony on the 85th floor, with nothing more than a broken leg.

Asked why she had wanted to commit suicide she said it was because she had been a failure at everything she tried.

Strike another one Elvita!

Empire State Building

 

 

3. She Fell For Him Big Time

Back in France again, suicides at the Eiffel Tower are apparently quite common. In fact France has one of the highest suicide rates at 17.5 suicides per 1000 people!

Killing yourself with the 1,063 foot “Iron Lady” is the third most popular French suicide method behind poisoning and hanging (both of which the guy in the first incident tried unsuccessfully).

A few times, people have attempted to kill themselves but failed to do so. One man was blown onto a rafter by the wind and he was spared. But the most curious case was one in which a woman who jumped, landed on the roof of a car and later married the man who owned it!

Boy did she fall for him!!!

Eiffel Tower, Paris

  

4. Taxi!

In Buenos Aires, Argentina, a woman threw herself off the 23^rd floor balcony of the Hotel Crown Plaza Panamericano in an apparent suicide bid. However her attempt failed when a taxi caught in traffic below cushioned her fall.

Although the impact of her landing on the car shattered its windscreen and made a huge dent in its roof, the impact was not hard enough to end her life.

Instead, the 30-year-old woman was left with broken hips, ribs and significant internal bleeding.

The driver of the taxi, Miguel Cajal, told a local TV station that he noticed policemen stopping traffic and were looking upward. This made him instinctively jump out of his car.

“I got out of the car a second before. If I had not got out, I would have been killed,” the BBC quoted him as saying. The impact, he added, “made a terrible noise.”

The aftermath of a suicidal woman landing on a taxi

 

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