This article was written and recommended by Andy Havens, the Author of Tinkerx. He wrote a post called The UnGrinch 25 last year; a list of ideas on how to keep the fun, spirit and joy in your holiday season. In order to challenge himself, He was upping the ante this year. Let’s see if he can come up with 50 ways to beat the Holiday Humbugs. So? away we go.

Craft Ideas

1. Make a family calendar. Pick a theme or use pics of your family. Fill it with all the important family dates; birthdays, anniversaries, etc. Include a weird or interesting events from Chase’s Annual Events. You can make monthly calendars using MS Publisher, or the ever-free and wonderful Open Office. Good to have, good to give.

2 Create your own ornaments. My favorite, as a kid, was to take a styrofoam shape (bell, star, even a simple ball), and stick a bajillion sequins to it with pins. Pretty. Shiny. And it keeps kids busy for hours while you do other holiday nonsense. Another ornament idea (bonus!) is to take beads (I like the shiny, little, star-flowery shaped ones) and string them along a piece of craft wire. When you’re done, you end up with an ornament that’s also a bendy toy.

3. Lego nativity scene. ‘Nuff said.

4. Toys from tots. There are many organizations that gather up toys for kids who don’t have them. And that’s fantastic. But kids also love to make and give stuff around the holiday season, and may not have the resources. Organize an effort to provide a crafty sort of event where all the necessary parts and instructions for making a neat holiday gift are available to a group of kids who otherwise wouldn’t have access. My bet is that if you or your organization provided the stuff and the supervision, your local, public library could help you find a place to do it.

5. Make a truly edible gingerbread house. Every gob-smacked gingerbread house I’ve ever seen has been “hands off” (and more importantly, “teeth off”). Feh! Where’s the fun? I mean? C’mon! I don’t care if you stick six graham crackers together with peanut butter and put one gum-drop on top for a chimney. Do it, and then let the kids get all Godzilla on it. Or chomp it down yerself. You know you want to?

6. Decorate somebody else’s space. Carefully. Tastefully. Always within the bounds of office rules/etiquette and the law/fire-code. But how nice would it be to enter your office (cube?) and find a wee, unexpected holiday trinket? Totally anonymous. Or to come home and have a strange, lovely wreath hanging on your lamp-post? Put a small, stuffed penguin with a Santa hat on someone’s dashboard today.

7. Group shoebox calendar. Warning: takes planning. Everybody in your gang (family, office, church-group, etc.) brings in enough shoeboxes to make 25. Everybody puts something in them to help decorate the common space. Wrap them (and keep the innards secret), then randomly assign numbers 1-25 to them. Or more or less if you’re doing a non-religious thing. Do 31 and make it a “New Year’s Calendar.” Whatever. Then, on each day, get together as a group, open the appropriate box (take turns, now) and use it to brighten the day and make the place niftier.

8. Bad Mojo Wreath Voodo. OK? this one will probably not go down well for many church youth groups? but it’s meant with a sense of humor, so chill out. Have everyone in your gang (family, group) write something that bugs them on a piece of colored paper that matches (or not) the cheapest, driest, most flamable wreath you can find. Decorate the wreath with the slips of nastiness. On the day of celebration, burn (or otherwise destroy in a more work-friendly manner) the Wreath of Spite. Celebrate the destruction and release of the things that bug you.

9. Holiday bird-feeder. I like bird-feeders. So do my squirrels. Oh, well? But mostly they either look like weird plastic contraptions or little A-frame tenements. Help a bird out. Decorate a special bird-house/feeder for the holidays.

10. Odd snow sculpture. We all make the snowmen. Yes, yes. Lovely snowmen. Do it up different this year. Make a snow carving of your company’s logo. Never mind. Don’t do that. How about a UF-SNOW? Unidentified Freezing Snowcraft? Or a guy climbing up your front tree? Or a giant hand? Don’t be overly critical of your work? just get some friends together and get stupid with the snow.

Entertaining Ideas.

11. Rewrite “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” Let’s face it, hollering, “Fiiiiive gooolden riiings!” is way fun. Way, way fun. You can not resist, so don’t hold back. But what’s even more fun, is hollering your own family version that only you and the clan know. Because, really? doesn’t singing about how your true love gave to you? “eight maids a milking” make you a bit? uncomfortable? I mean? dude gives people for Christmas? That ain’t right. Bob and Doug McKenzie not withstanding, your own version will be more fun. My son, just this morning, was singing, “Fiiiiive gooolden delicious!” Hilarious.

12. Indoor snow-ball fights. We spent two years of my childhood in California, after having lived in Boston, and with parents who grew up in New York. Snow ball fights are a required element of winter joy. Indoor? Substitute aluminum foil balls, rolled-up socks, styrofoam (messy), newspaper wads, etc. instead of snow. The point is to throw things. Banzai!

13. Mall caroling. It’s hard to find places to carol. Outside can get very cold. And, with kids in tow? well, it’s tough. Check with a couple local malls and arrange for a time to invite anyone who’d like to participate to meet, get song books, and walk around the mall singing. See if you can arrange for an accordion player. Seriously. It adds to the cheer. If you want to charge a couple bucks to participate and also collect donations from listeners and then give the money to a local toys-for-tots charity, that makes the whole deal more righteous, and more palatable to certain civic types.

14. Grown-up PJ party. Notice I did not say “adult.” This is not a chance to play spin-the-bottle. This is about getting back to childishness. Come in PJs, bathrobes, bunny-slippers, blankets, etc. Bring your favorite (hopefully holiday related) bed-time story to read aloud to the group. Drink cocoa w/ tiny marshmallows (yes, and some brandy or JD) and have candy canes and graham crackers for snacks. Sit on the floor around the fireplace. Watch all the old
Rankin-Bass claymation holiday specials on VHS. Sing a few carols. Play?

15. Insane White Elephant. Last year, John Moore from Brand Autopsy set up an excellent White Elephant Blog. It ain’t up this year. Oh, well. The basic principles of a White Elephant gift exchange apply, but anyone who has their gift taken can keep stealing from anyone who hasn’t yet had their gift stolen that turn. The more people playing, the more fun. No “deceased” gifts in this version, either. Until you’ve had a gift stolen on any given turn, it’s in play.

16. Make-a-wreath party. OK? this is a combo craft/entertainment idea. So sue me. We used to do this at the church I grew up going to. You show up with the basics of an advent wreath (styrofoam torus and a bunch of evergreen branches), and the host provides all kinds of add-ons; candles and holders, bells, ribbon, holly, berries, etc. Good times, and a wreath to take home, too.

17. Semi-formal holiday martini party. In the old days (the 1950’s), people dressed up to go to holiday parties. And while this may still hold true for some work-sponsored events, more and more often, work holiday parties are tired, dull affairs. Most of the ones I’ve been to are, anyways. So, on your own, get some friends together and dress all high-class, and drink funky, fun martinis. No reason grown-ups can’t have grown-up fun around the holidays, too.

18. Remembrance time. Around the table, have family members or friends recount their best (or most interesting) holiday memories. Yes, it’s corny. But corny is good during this time of the year. Embrace the corn.

19. Tell your faith’s holiday story with sock puppets. You never real own a story until you tell it. I know this, because I played King Nebuchannezzar in a 4th grade production of, “Cool in the Furnace.” I now own The Firey Furnace. Be that as it may? You can hear the Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule, Solstice, etc. stories again and again. But until you write out a script, make your own sock puppets for the players, fashion a stage from a major appliance crate and put on a show for the grown-ups? do you really grok the holiday’s true meaning? I think not.

20. Mix-up the classics. Get the book versions of classic holiday tales like Rudolph, Santa, Frosty, Night Before Christmas, A Christmas Carol, etc. Get some index cards. Write character names, major attributes (“nose glows,” “miser,” “made of snow,” “elf,”) and plot points (“comes down the chimney,” “ridiculed by reindeer,” “just settled down for a long winter’s nape”) on them and keep the categories separate. Now go back and read one of the originals, but when someone (usually a child or me) yells “stop!,” insert a random card from the appropriate face-down pile. So you end up with something like:

“Rudolph didn’t like all the other reindeer calling him names, so he?”
“Stop!”
“? gave Bob Cratchit money to help with Tiny Tim’s legs.”

You can keep going with the original story, substituting other zaniness, or switch over to the one from the card. Whichever seems like more fun to you. And, yes, this is kind of a holiday version of TaleWeaver.

Card Ideas

21. Make your own envelopes. A dear friend of mine (Hi, Susan!) once sent me letters every few months in hand-made envelopes. Hers were made from interesting magazine ads. How cool is that? If you want to get fancy, do a search on the Internet for “make envelopes” and such. But the easiest way is to get the envelopes that go with whatever cards you’re mailing, carefully bust ’em apart, trace them on funky paper (magazine pictures, wallpaper, wrapping paper?) and then cut, fold and glue (or double-sticky clear tape) them together. People may expect hand-made cards. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition. Or hand-made envelopes. Festivisimus!

22. Photoshop your kid(s) into other (classic) pics. I first saw this done to Raphael’s “The Sistine Madonna, Detail of the Angles” painting (as shown). Although a much better job than the one I’ve done here, which is of my niece and nephew (Hi, Nate! Hi, Sophie!) Click on it to see a much larger image. The point is to have fun and take a picture folks will recognize and include people they will recognize. It doesn’t have to be a serious pic, either. I would think that your kid climbing the Empire State Building to put a star on top would be hysterical. Use this instead of a regular picture-of-your-kids card because? well? because it’s goofy. Combine with #9, below, for best effect.

23. Gift cards for chores, favors, hugs, etc. These were a big item when I was growing up. Don’t know if other people did them. The idea was to make gift-certificates or gift cards that “entitled the bearer to (1) one doing of the dishes upon presentation of this card.” You can make these intimate for your honey (I won’t get into those variations here, thank you), or appropriate for work. For example, I once gave my boss ten “Andy will now pipe down” certificates. Upon presentation, I was obligated to shut my pie hole. She only ever handed me two. I believe she traded the rest in for some magic beans. Or they may be floating around on eBay? Hmmm?.

24. “Puzzle Party” cards. Take, buy or make a nice picture and turn it into a jigsaw, either yourself or at Kinkos. Mail one piece to each person you’re inviting to the party. When they come, they add their piece. Depending on how corn-ball you are, you can hold forth on how we’re all a part of the holiday panorama of joy, etc. etc. It also serves to increase the guilt factor that motivates people to come to your party, since if they don’t? their piece will be missing. Ha!

25. “Family News” cards from the future. I love this one. Lots of families I know write a very nice update about what’s been going on over the last year. It’s nice to hear, but? mostly it ends up being, “Dad’s still working and maybe going a bit more stir crazy. Same for mom. The kids are in school and are a year older.” Yawn? I like the idea of fast-forwarding a bit and writing your “Holiday Family News from 2025.” Keep it just as straight-faced and boring, but mention which dimension Mary got lost in on the way to work this time. Talk about how the Martian embassy lost your passport on your 2nd honeymoon cruise, etc. etc. Much more fun. Cloning humor goes over big in this one, too.

26. Mystery cards. Send a really nice holiday card, maybe include a gift certificate, but with no indication of whom it’s from; no names, no return address, etc. Why? To bug the crap out of somebody you love. And isn’t that what the holiday season is all about?

27. Return-reply cards. Send people a card with a self-addressed, stamped envelope or postcard inside to send back to you. Put questions on it you’d like answered, like? what do you want for Christmas next year? How the heck are ya? Which holiday movies did you see and like or hate? People love to be interactive. Give the gift that gives something back to you.

28. Custom mouse pad card. They will throw away the picture of your kids. But if you put that picture on a custom mouse pad? it’s a keepsake.

29. Nice, custom cards. While we’re visiting Cafepress.com. ? You can go to the drug store and have any photo turned into a card. And they sure look like you did just that. But if you take a few more minutes, you can actually have custom cards printed out for you. Ones that look like cards. Which is nicer, you must admit. Combine this with #2, above.

30. Origami cards. Do your regular card, but include a piece (or more, if necessary) of origami paper and instructions for making an ornament, decoration, etc. Your local library has holiday origami books, I bet. Again? the point is to do something different? with a little extra un-Grincy flavor.

Gift/Shopping Ideas

31. Surrogate shopping party. So many of us have someone or several someones on our lists that are impossible to shop for or that we just have a mental block on. Fine. Get together for dinner and share an equal number of those folks with each other, along with a few details and a dollar ceiling per gift. Then release yourselves into a mall with a time limit. Then get back together and share the swag. I guar-ohn-tee that your friends will find stuff for your hard-to-getters that you’d never have thought of. If it ain’t right? Well, ’tis the season to return stuff.

32. Thought gifts. They say, “It’s the thought that counts.” OK. So, this year, only give thoughts for the holidays. Make this the year that you and yours agree to take whatever your budget for gifts was and either give it to a charity or stick it in a savings vehicle; your call, I’m not preaching here. But for yourselves? take the time to actually say the things you haven’t said. Give “the thought” behind the gift. If you’re a spiritual person, pray or meditate on the subject for a bit. Do it in a card if you like, or via email. Don’t make the logistics as much of a pain as shopping/wrapping/etc. That’s not the point. But all the major religions that are celebrating this time of year have gift-giving as a central notion not as a potlatch per se, but as a metaphor for love, friendship, community, etc.

33 Archie McPhee. This idea is a straight-up pimp for the Jumbo Mystery Box from Archie McPhee. I get one of these every year (although this year I have been strongly advised that the ladies want something non-McPhee in their stockings? geez), and use the contents for stockings, Secret Santa, random giftings, prizes for students, etc. You never know, around holiday time, when a bunch of Hindu god finger puppets, glowing eyeballs or rampaging Hun toy soldiers will come in handy.

34. Gifts for the future of the group. Have everybody get everybody something that will only really “work” when you get back together. Pick a group-y activity like a picnic or game night, and have everyone get/give gifts that will be brought together again each time you do that thing.

35. Recommendations or reviews. I get lots of gift certificates. And that’s cool. But it still means I need to figure out what I want to get with the thing. If you give someone a gift certificate (especially to a book or music store/site), provide a list of 5 or 10 ideas that you think they’d like. Write little mini-reviews of books you’ve read, movies you’ve seen, etc. that made you think of the person. Make the list fun, funny or serious? but it will add personality and thought to what can seem like a somewhat generic offering.

36. Make part of the gift yourself. Homemade gifts are special, when they come from adults as well as kids. I recently received a CD from a friend, and it was wrapped in a handkerchief that he’d tie-dyed himself. How cool is that?! If you give someone a coffee machine, create a custom mug for them, too.

37. Food with gifts inside. I don’t know why this is fun, but it is. Make sure you warn people, and make the gifts obvious (small gems can be a choking or tooth-breaking hazard). Seal stuff in zip-lock bags to preserve the food and the toys. Put something in the Jello (action figures?) that will make digging out the prize as much fun as playing with it.

38. Gifts with a story. Write a fictional story about how the gift you’re giving came into your hands. Make it funny, sweet, odd, implausible? whatever. It will make the present more memorable.

39. Don’t overthink. We spend so much time (well, I don’t, but “we” do) trying to figure out the “perfect gift” for people. Unless you’re sweetie is waiting for a ring, or your 8-year-old will DIE without a particular Lego set? there ain’t no such thing. Part of the fun of gifts is getting something you wouldn’t ever have bought for yourself. If it wasn’t, we’d just give each other money. Bleh. So give something odd and unexpected. I mentioned Archie McPhee before. Another great site full of fun and different ideas is the Quincy Shop. Very unique stuff, in a wide range of prices and styles. Really fun. This year, somebody better get me a Buddha Board Zen Art thing, or I’m a-gonna cry. I got most of last year’s stocking stuffers from their “Unique Gifts Under $10” section. Their selection and service gets the Andy Havens’ Seal of Wow! That’s Neat!

40. Share kids. Childhood is a big part of the holidays; both our own and our kids’. If you don’t have kids and are friends with someone who does, offer to babysit so that they can go out and shop, and then do one of the craft things above. If you do have kids, and know folks that don’t, invite them over for an event where the kids will play a part. Holidays go better with runts.

Meaningful Ideas

Hopefully, all the above ideas can be meaningful. This last set, though, is meant to supply you with specific, holiday depth and feelings of joy, brotherhood, jolly?tude? Jolliness? That sounds better.

The holidays can be meaningful? Go figger.

41. Start a bizarre, personal holiday tradition. I heard somewhere (can’t find it online, sorry? it may be apocryphal) that Amy Grant’s family explodes their Christmas tree after New Year’s Day with fireworks. I’m neither hot nor cold on Ms. Grant, but? that’s flippin’ awesome!!! So many of our holiday traditions are either copped from cultures that really aren’t our own anymore, or have been entirely kidnapped by the media/mercantile world. Why not invent a new ritual that’s just for you and your family? Stuff a sock with toys by the fireplace? Why? I sure as heck don’t know. How about, instead, everybody in your family writes one line of a nativity poem. Or fight some gingerbread man wars. Or make advent candles from last year’s used crayons. At my house, we’ve now been playing street hockey the day after Christmas for several years with all the in-laws. Why? Bob wanted to one year. After three years? It’s a tradition!

42. Overtip, ridiculously, at least once. Food service is tough work. And around the holidays, it’s even worse. People are out-and-about, running like mad, full o’ holiday spirit, and, often, not very nice to the wait staff. And because we’re spending more than we should on various baubles, bangles and beads? we’re often a bit penurious when it comes to the everyday stuff. Which hurts the folks whose livelihood depends on our largess. So. At least once, between Thanksgiving and New Year, when you get good service and a nice smile with your meal? leave a $20 tip on a $13 lunch meal. Or, what the heck? leave $50 to cover a $22 dinner. Or $100 for a cup o’ joe. Seriously. Don’t make a big deal out of it. Do it, as the scriptures say, “In the dark.” But do it. You’ll make somebody’s whole season.

43. Start a yearly journal. Very few people keep a journal. I’m a professional writer, and I don’t. I’m supposed to, but I write at work, and I blog, and I write poetry and fiction and, and, and? So I’ve never had a daily journal. But what I do have is a notebook that I take out about once a year. Often around the holidays. And, in my case, I write in it the names of people – everyone I can remember – that I’ve met during the last year or so. And, of course, I go back and read the earlier entries and reflect on how lucky I’ve been to have known so many wonderful people. The names are my “touchstones” to the past. The names are bookmarks in my memory, because people anchor the most important events in my life, I think. Anyway? that’s what’s in my “annual journal” for the most part. Yours, of course, can be anything you want.

44. Share a resolution. We don’t keep our New Year’s resolutions, for the most part, because we are not really accountable to ourselves. We cheat and look the other way. So share a resolution with a friend or family member; let them hold you accountable, and vice versa.

45. Share a resolution. No, this is not a repeat. In this case, I mean make a resolution that includes another person. For example, resolve to have a game-night once a week with your family, or to go for a walk 3 days a week with your spouse. Resolve to send an email back-and-forth at least twice a month with a friend you don’t see much anymore. Resolve to cook healthy for me, and I’ll cook healthy for you twice a week. Resolve to help your boss with his annoying habit of not taking minutes/notes at meetings, and he can help you with your attempts at better process management. So many things that we want to accomplish are impossible alone. Resolve to be better together.

46. Visit someone else’s ceremony. When I was in confirmation class as a young Methodist swain, our pastor took us to a Passover Seder service at one of the nearby Jewish temples. It was a great way to learn about the similarities and differences between my faith and that of my Jewish friends, and to drink wine as a 15-year-old. That specific holiday won’t work around December? but you get the point. Find out what and how others are celebrating around this time of the year. You’ll end up experiencing your own traditions more deeply, I guarantee.

47. Take someone to a performance of Handel’s “Messiah” who’s never been. There’s a church in your area putting it on, I guarantee. If not (some guarantee, eh?), rent a version from the library. It’s truly one of the most beautiful, moving pieces of holiday music you can experience. Sharing it is a great gift.

48. Random (nice) blog comments. If you read lots of blogs, take the time to do something that only 1-in-100 readers generally does; leave a comment. We bloggers write for lots of reasons. But nothing makes our day like a comment from a reader we haven’t heard from before. If you’ve enjoyed the work of a blogger in the past, visit their space and let them know. It takes just a few minutes, and really is a lovely treat for us. Please note, I am not fishing for comments on this blog. I’m projecting. ;->

49. Give to a charity you don’t normally connect with. Stretch a bit. If you mostly give at church, find a secular charity that does something you agree with. If you tend towards issues of hunger, try education. I’m not saying don’t do the stuff you usually do? but find out about a new one. When our giving becomes rote, we lose something of the original reason we were moved to give. Get out of your comfort zone and find a new way to share.

50. Forgiveness. One of the worst barriers to experiencing spiritual, holiday joy is the sense that we are not worthy. Whether directly or indirectly, too much gift giving is often a substitute for the resolution of actual issues. And one of the issues that really can weigh us down this time of the year is a grudge. Whether you’re holding one against someone else, or they’re mad at you about something? take care of it. If it’s so far in the past that the person is dead, moved on, out-of-touch,etc., then talk to a friend, therapist or confessor of some kind. Get rid of it. I don’t care what your religion is or if you have none. The burden of unforgiveness is a strain on the holidays for us all. Lose that, and all the other holiday stuff will be much, much brighter.

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Well, that’s it for this year. Hopefully you found something in here that will help your holiday be more fun, festive and? fruitful? Well, bad alliteration aside, have a joyful season and a Happy New Year.

Written by Getty Images

John Moore/Getty Images

After spending much of the last six years covering the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, I felt like I needed to visit Arlington National Cemetery this Memorial Day weekend. I felt like I owed it some time.

I went with my family – my pregnant wife and my young daughter. Separately and together, my wife and I have covered a lot of heart-wrenching stories around the world, but Section 60 was unlike any place we had been.

The beauty and serenity of Virginia’s rolling hills and awe inspiring views of Washington D.C. clash with today’s reality of national loss, where grief is raw and in your face. You step over grass sods still taking root over freshly dug graves. You watch a mother kiss her son’s tombstone. Two soldiers put flowers and a cold beer next to the grave of a fallen buddy. A young son left a hand-written note for his dad. “I hope you like Heven, hope you liked Virginia very much hope you like the Holidays. I also see you every Sunday. Please write back!”

Section 60 is not about a troop surge or a war spending bill or whether we should be fighting these wars at all. It is about ordinary people trying to get through something so hard that most of us can’t ever imagine it. Everyone I met that afternoon had a gut-wrenching story to tell.

Mary McHugh is one of those people. She sat in front of the grave of her fiance James “Jimmy” Regan, talking to the stone. She spoke in broken sentences between sobs, gesturing with her hands, sometimes pausing as if she was trying to explain, with so much left needed to say.

Later on, after she spoke with a fellow mourner from a neighboring grave, I went over and introduced myself and told her I was photographing for Getty Images and had brought my family on our own pilgrimage to the site. I told her we had been living in Pakistan for the last few years, how we had come back to the States for a few months for the birth of our second child.

Mary told me about her slain fiance Jimmy Regan. Clearly, she had not only loved him but truly admired him. When he graduated from Duke, he decided to enlist in the Army to serve his country. He chose not to be an officer, though he could have been, because he didn’t want to risk a desk job. Instead, he became an Army Ranger and was sent twice to Aghanistan and Iraq – an incredible four deployments in just three years. He was killed in Iraq this February by a roadside bomb.

I told her how I had spent a lot of time in Iraq and Afghanistan, photographing American troops in combat. I told her that earlier this year I was a month in Ramadi and then a few more weeks in a tough spot called Helmand. I told her how I am going back to Iraq sometime this summer and that I was very sorry to see her this Memorial Day in the national cemetery, visiting a grave.

Mary said that they had planned to get married after Jimmy’s four years of service were up next year. “We loved each other so much,” she said. “We thought we had all of the time in the world.”

After a few moments more, my beautiful wife, Gretchen, now almost 9 months pregnant, walked over with our two-year-old Isabella. Our daughter started climbing over me, saying “daddy” in my ear and pulling on my arm to come walk with her. I felt awkward and guilty about the contrast, but if Mary felt it too, she was nothing but gracious and friendly. I told her that I would forward her some photos of her from that day if she would like and she gave me her email address. We said our goodbyes and I moved on with my family through the sea of graves.

Later on, I passed by and she was lying in the grass sobbing, speaking softly to the stone, this time her face close to the cold marble, as if whispering into Jimmy’s ear.

Some people feel the photo I took at the moment was too intimate, too personal. Like many who have seen the picture, I felt overwhelmed by her grief, and moved by the love she felt for her fallen sweetheart.

After so much time covering these wars, I have some difficult memories and have seen some of the worst a person can see – so much hatred and rage, so much despair and sadness. All that destruction, so much killing. And now, one beautiful and terribly sad spring afternoon amongst the rows and rows of marble stones – a young woman’s lost love.

I felt I owed the Arlington National Cemetery a little time – and I think I still do. Maybe we all do.

Written by Yvonne K. Fulbright

Sex – it does the body good.

Yet most of us are quicker to hit the gym before hitting the sheets when it comes to taking care of ourselves. Believe it or not, huffing and puffing your way through a hot, sweat-inducing sex session may be far more beneficial to your overall health than the time you spend on the treadmill.

As research confirms time and time again, good sex in a healthy, stable, monogamous relationship can only better our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well being. Sex, in this context, offers us tons of benefits, most of which aren’t touted nearly enough.

Here are just a few benefits:

– Weight loss and weight control. Forget torturing yourself with the latest fad diet or hours on the elliptical machine when you can burn about 200 calories in 30 minutes of sex! Lovemaking lends itself to improved strength, flexibility, muscle tone, and cardiovascular conditioning. Plus, there’s something super sexy about getting to sleep with your very own “personal trainer.”

– Pain management. Forgo popping a pain killer and opt for something a bit more “au naturel.” Sex has been shown to offer migraine and menstrual cramp relief, as well as alleviate chronic back pain thanks to the endorphins and corticosteroids released during sexual arousal and orgasm.

– Stress relief. Sex, even if only with ourselves, impacts the way we respond to stress, increasing levels of oxytocin and stimulating feelings of warmth and relaxation. What better way to unwind from a tough day than sharing its most climactic moment with your special someone?

– Immune booster. Stop spending late nights at the office. Sex wards off colds and the flu. And sexually active people take fewer sick days, giving the phrase “working late” an entirely new meaning. Bosses, take note.

– Better heart health. A little bit of heart and soul in the sack should be part of every doctor’s orders when it comes to cardiovascular care. Sex may help lower cholesterol and the risk of heart attack.

– Increased self-esteem and intimacy. When sex is consistent and involves mutual pleasure, it can increase bonding since the surge in oxytocin at orgasm stimulates feelings of affection, intimacy, and closeness. When spiritual in nature, sex can lead to an even better quality of life and stronger relationship. Is it any wonder that good sexual energy in a positive relationship can make you feel better about yourself, your partner, and life in general?

– Sleep enhancement. There’s no need to count sheep when sex, including masturbation, helps insomnia. Plus, making love sure beats tossing and turning your way to zzzz’s.

– A better, younger looking you. Sex keeps you looking and feeling younger and, according to some research, may lead to shiny hair, a glowing complexion and bright eyes. This is because it increases the youth-promoting hormone DHEA (dehydroepiandrostone). And feeling more attractive charges your sex life even more.

– Mood lifter. Sex releases pleasure-inducing endorphins during arousal and climax that can relieve depression and anxiety, and increase vibrancy.

– Longevity. There is a significant relationship between frequency of orgasm and risk of death, especially with men. Men who orgasm two times a week have a 50 percent lower chance of mortality than those who climax one time per month. The bonus: Living longer also gives you and your honey the opportunity for even more lovin’!

– Decreased risk of breast cancer. One study of women who had never given birth found that an increased frequency of sexual intercourse was correlated with a decrease in the incidence of breast cancer.

– Reproductive health benefits. According to at least one study, sex appears to decrease a man’s risk of prostate cancer, and the prevention of endometriosis in women. It also promotes fertility in women by regulating menstrual patterns.

In a nutshell, the health benefits of sex in a good, solid relationship are practically endless. Yet, in planning our New Year’s resolutions, how many of us are declaring, “I think I’ll have more sex with my lover” in fulfilling any 2008 health and self-improvement goals?

While exercise on a regular basis is important to your health, sex can do so much more for you and your relationship. So before signing any dotted line for a new gym membership, consider how time allotted to an athletic club could be far more effective in your boudoir.

You can get a lot more bang for your buck in the bedroom, double your “membership” benefits, and, with sex breeding the desire for more sex, thanks to a boost in testosterone, it’s a workout plan you’re likelier to stick to.

Dr. Yvonne Krist?n Fulbright is a sex educator, relationship expert, columnist and founder of Sexuality Source Inc. She is the author of several books including, “Touch Me There! A Hands-On Guide to Your Orgasmic Hot Spots.”

Written by Chris Baskind

For children, it’s visions of sugarplums. But for the men and women who create the ads we see every day, Christmas represents a chance to trot out their best work during the year’s most important retail quarter.

It’s not as if Christmas is difficult to market. There’s plenty of opportunity to sell on emotion. The visual iconography of the holidays lends itself to warm, attractive advertising. And a little humor never hurts.

We’ve been taking a look at this year’s best commercial offerings. While a couple of us have fairly extensive backgrounds in broadcast and advertising, we’ll be honest: we’ve tossed aside the marketing rulebooks and chosen the ones which made us smile.

So ? the envelope, please! Here are picks for The Five Best TV Commercials of the 2007 Christmas Season:

5. Apple Macintosh Computers. What sells this ad is the faithful reproduction of all those 1960s stop-motion TV specials. Santa (and the oddly conical pine trees in the background) seems to have been abducted from “Rudolph the Rednose Reindeer.” You expect to see the Abominable Snowman at any moment. As an aside, even though we’re an all-Mac shop here, we still like the Windows guy best.

4. Tesco. The UK’s big box giant scored a marketing coup getting the Spice Girls to play hide-and-seek in their spot this year. Tesco has always carried a bit more cachet than, for instance, Wal-Mart. It’s no accident they’ve got Posh front-and-center. This ad is attached to a short news commentary on how Tesco pulled it all together.

3. Macy’s. This one had better make Macy’s registers ring, because it couldn’t have been cheap to produce. Emeril Lagasse, Donald Trump, Usher, Martha Stewart – and a surprisingly charming Jessica Simpson. Her sheepish “My bad!” closes Jessica’s Terrible Year? on a high note. There’s some very strong copy writing to wrap it all up.

2. Oxfam. If you thought Jessica Simpson was cute in the Macy’s spot, wait until you see the star of Oxfam’s 2007 offering. We mentioned the group’s Christmas appeal last November: Oxfam’s attempt to link giving with specific low-cost, high-return investments they’re making in the developing world. Perhaps Oxfam Unwrapped might be a good last minute gift idea for someone on your Christmas list.

1. John Lewis. If you’re not in the UK, you may not be familiar with John Lewis Department Stores. But this was an easy choice for the Best Christmas Commercial of 2007. It’s a fine piece of film making: unexpected, whimsical, and visually striking. Before you ask, the music is from Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet.” We’re betting Prokofiev CDs find their way into a lot of Christmas stockings this year.

Happy Holidays from all of us.

Written by Stacy

You might have noticed from an earlier post that I’m a bit of a Disney buff. This is kind of out of character for me, to be honest, because I’m not a huge fan of happily ever after. I like movie endings that are unexpected. After doing a little research, though, I realized that maybe fairy tales and I are a perfect match: those Disney endings where the prince and the princess end up blissfully married don’t really happen in the original stories. To make sure kids go home happy, not horrified, Disney usually has to alter the endings. Read on for the original endings to a couple of Disney classics (and some more obscure tales).

1. Cinderella

Don’t break out your violins for this gal just yet. All that cruelty poor Cinderella endured at the hands of her overbearing stepmother might have been well deserved. In the oldest versions of the story, the slightly more sinister Cinderella actually kills her first stepmother so her father will marry the housekeeper instead. Guess she wasn’t banking on the housekeeper’s six daughters moving in or that never-ending chore list.

2. Sleeping Beauty

In the original version of the tale, it’s not the kiss of a handsome prince that wakes Sleeping Beauty, but the nudging of her newborn twins. That’s right. While unconscious, the princess is impregnated by a monarch and wakes up to find out she’s a mom twice over. Then, in true Ricki Lake form, Sleeping Beauty’s “baby’s daddy” triumphantly returns and promises to send for her and the kids later, conveniently forgetting to mention that he’s married. When the trio is eventually brought to the palace, his wife tries to kill them all, but is thwarted by the king. In the end, Sleeping Beauty gets to marry the guy who violated her, and they all live happily ever after.

3. Snow White

At the end of the original German version penned by the brothers Grimm, the wicked queen is fatally punished for trying to kill Snow White. It’s the method she is punished by that is so strange – she is made to dance wearing a pair of red-hot iron shoes until she falls over dead.

4. The Little Mermaid

You’re likely familiar with the Disney version of the Little Mermaid story, in which Ariel and her sassy crab friend, Sebastian, overcome the wicked sea witch, and Ariel swims off to marry the man of her dreams. In Hans Christian Andersen’s original tale, however, the title character can only come on land to be with the handsome prince if she drinks a potion that makes it feel like she is walking on knives at all times. She does, and you would expect her selfless act to end with the two of them getting married. Nope. The prince marries a different woman, and the Little Mermaid throws herself into the sea, where her body dissolves into seam foam.

Now here are four more fairy tales you might not be familiar with, but you might have trouble forgetting.

1. The King Who Wished to Marry His Daughter
What It’s Like: Cinderella, with an incestuous twist

The King’s wife dies and he swears he will never marry again unless he finds a woman who fits perfectly into his dead Queen’s clothes. Guess what? His daughter does! So he insists on marrying her. Ew. Understandably, she has a problem with this and tries to figure out how to avoid wedding dear old dad. She says she won’t marry him until she gets a trunk that locks from outside and inside and can travel over land and sea. He gets it, but she says she has to make sure the chest works. To prove it, he locks her inside and floats her in the sea. Her plan works: she just keeps floating until she reaches another shore. So she escapes marrying her dad, but ends up working as a scullery maid in another land? from here you can follow the Cinderella story. She meets a prince, leaves her shoe behind, he goes around trying to see who it belongs to. The End.

2. The Lost Childen
What It’s Like: Hansel & Gretel meets Saw 2

This French fairy tale starts out just like Hansel & Gretel. A brother and sister get lost in the woods and find themselves trapped in cages, getting plumped up to be eaten. Only it’s not a wicked witch, it’s the Devil and his wife. The Devil makes a sawhorse for the little boy to bleed to death on (seriously!) and then goes for a walk, telling the girl to get her brother situated on the sawhorse before he returned. The siblings pretend to be confused and ask the Devil’s wife to demonstrate how the boy should lay on the sawhorse; when she shows them they tie her to it and slit her throat. They steal all of the Devil’s money and escape in his carriage. He chases after them once he discovers what they’ve done, but he dies in the process. Yikes.

3. The Juniper Tree
What It’s Like: Every stepchild’s worst nightmare

Cannibalism, murder, decapitation? freakiness abounds left and right in this weird Grimm story. A widower gets remarried, but the second wife loathes the son he had with his first wife because she wants her daughter to inherit the family riches. So she offers the little boy an apple from inside a chest. When he leans over to get it, she slams the lid down on him and chops his head off. Note: if you’re trying to convince your child to eat more fruits and veggies, do not tell them this story. Well, the woman doesn’t want anyone to know that she killed the boy, so she puts his head back on and wraps a handkerchief around his neck to hide the fact that it’s no longer attached. Her daughter ends up knocking his head off and getting blamed for his death. To hide what happened, they chop up the body and make him into pudding, which they feed to his poor father. Eventually the boy is reincarnated as a bird and he drops a stone on his stepmother’s head, which kills her and brings him back to life.

4. Penta of the Chopped-off Hands
What It’s Like: Um?you tell us

These old fairy tales sure do enjoy a healthy dose of incest. In this Italian tale, the king’s wife dies and he falls in love with Penta? his sister. She tries to make him fall out of love with her by chopping off her hands. The king is pretty upset by this; he has her locked in a chest and thrown out to sea. A fisherman tries to save her, but Penta is so beautiful that his jealous wife has her thrown back out to sea. Luckily, Penta is rescued by a king (who isn’t her brother). They get married and have a baby, but the baby is born while the king is away at sea. Penta tries to send the king the good news of the baby, but the jealous fisherman’s wife intercepts the message and changes it to say that Penta gave birth to a puppy. A puppy?! The evil wife then constructs another fake message, this time from the king to his servants, and says that Penta and her baby should be burned alive. OK, long story short: the king figures out what the jealous wife is up to and has her burned. Penta and the king live happily ever after. I can’t really figure out what the moral of this tale is. Chopping hands off? Giving birth to a dog? I just don’t get it. Help me out here, people.

OK, there has to be a ton of other creepy fairy tales out there that you would never read to your kids to lull them off to a peaceful slumber. Let’s hear ’em!

Written By Ross Bonander

During the Civil Rights Era of the 1960s, two men — Gene Roddenberry and Sherwood Schwartz — developed TV shows with a similar, fundamental premise: The characters would be a microcosm of the world, and only through cooperation could they overcome their differences. Shwartz marooned his creativity on Gilligan’s Island with seven imbeciles who deserved each other.

Alternately, Star Trek, Roddenberry’s creation, featured a cast with groundbreaking persity; it confronted relevant social and intellectual issues, and it was set against the vast expanse of the unknown universe, instead of on a confined island.

This approach struck an unparalleled chord, and four decades later the full Trek franchise is worth billions of dollars. It has been explored through six television series, 10 films, hundreds of novels, scores of video games, a Vegas attraction, and untold merchandising opportunities, from T-shirts and action figures in the millions to a limited-edition golf putter shaped — you guessed it — like the USS Enterprise.

Its devoted fans, Trekkies (some prefer Trekkers), own a fanatic detail-oriented reputation that predates the web and makes a similar phenomenon regarding a four-eyed boy wizard look like the pet rock. They are parodied endlessly and endure heaps of ridicule, all with admirable indifference.

As the franchise prepares for its 11th feature film, scheduled for release in late 2008, we present five things you didn’t know about Star Trek.

1- The original Star Trek was canceled early on

That first series, often referred to today as Star Trek: The Original Series (or TOS for short) aired 79 episodes over three seasons on NBC, from 1966 to 1969, and earned 14 Emmy nominations (notably, two for Best Dramatic Series, and three for Outstanding Supporting Actor for Leonard Nimoy). A fierce letter-writing campaign by fans of the show allegedly saved it from cancellation in 1968, but in each season, the network moved the show to a different, and progressively less desirable, time slot. The series premiered at 8:30 p.m. on Thursday nights, but by its final season it was relegated to Friday nights at 10 p.m., airing its final episode on June 3, 1969.

Syndication a few years later breathed new life into the show and is at least partly responsible for fueling the unprecedented cult phenomenon it is today.

2- A Next Generation character was named in honor of a Trekkie

In what would be a dream come true for any die-hard fan, the Next Generation character Lieutenant Geordi La Forge, played by LeVar Burton, was named after a Trekkie. George La Forge was a devoted attendee of numerous Trek conventions who had muscular dystrophy. He had allegedly built a friendship with Gene Roddenberry over the years, and as a salute of sorts, Roddenberry named a character after him. Notably, like his namesake, the character has a disability (he’s blind), but with a prosthesis he can see better than most.

Unfortunately, La Forge was unable to savor this honor, having died in 1975 — a dozen years before the show premiered on television.

On the same show, Roddenberry also honored another fan in this fashion, although it’s a bit more subtle. The character Q is said to be named for Janet Quarton, a woman who ran the UK fan club in the 1970s.

3- Its creator had little direct influence over the franchise

Indirectly, Gene Roddenberry is the father of the entire franchise and deserves proper credit. Star Trek was his creation, and when it was on he did all he could to keep it on and to keep the quality high. However, while his creation inspired every series and film that followed, his own involvement was limited.

He is said to have been very much involved in the first season (and to a lesser degree, the third) of the most successful series of the franchise, Star Trek: The Next Generation. Yet, beyond producing the first movie, Star Trek: The Motion Picture in 1979, he had little influence over the four movies released prior to his death in 1991, serving as a consultant with marginal say over creative decisions.

4- The line “Beam me up, Scotty” was never delivered

It’s not uncommon for certain phrases in television and film to take on a life of their own in the form of paraphrases, but it’s always a surprise to learn that they aren’t as verbatim as first believed. Much like “Me Tarzan, you Jane” (which was star Johnny Weissmuller’s way to describe the level of difficulty acting the lead role in Tarzan), the ubiquitous line “Beam me up, Scotty” assumed to be uttered by Captain Kirk to chief engineer Montgomery Scott, never appeared precisely this way in a Trek series or film.

5- The original series inspired PDAs

The cultural impact of Star Trek is too enormous to deny, but its technological impact is equally as impressive. Some big Silicon Valley names considered themselves fans of the show growing up, notably Steve Wozniak of Apple and Steve Perlman, the founder of WebTV. The inspiration for a number of today’s technologies, such as flip phones, can be traced back to the original series, and many are outlined in William Shatner’s 2002 book, Star Trek: I’m Working on That.

One well-documented example is the user interface developed in the 1990s for the Palm OS. Its designer, Rob Haitani, an admitted Star Trek fan, claims that his first sketches were inspired by the interface on the bridge panels of the Enterprise. He also claims that aspects of the first Treo were influenced by communicators from the original series.

Star Trek is arguably the most successful sci-fi media franchise in history. If you were inclined to watch every canonical minute of every TV show and movie back-to-back, you would have to set aside over three straight weeks (although if your goal is to learn more about Star Trek, you might see more benefit by watching the documentaries Trekkies and Trekkies 2). This franchise has never had the Midas touch, but it enjoys more hits than misses, and the fans are eternally devoted — even non-fans can’t help but be curious.

Trekkies are people too, but for the moment we’ll exclude them from the public at large. The forthcoming Star Trek movie has as much a chance as any other movie to create new fans, but even a cursory look at the wider franchise suggests that anyone approaching it for the first time would find it utterly overwhelming.

This raises the question of whether it’s possible to see an end to Star Trek. It is certainly easy enough to imagine an end to the canonical aspect of the franchise (presumably whenever Paramount no longer deems it profitable), but even if the Trekkie-wide reaction to the new film was “thumbs down” and Paramount pulled the plug, Star Trek would live on the way it always has — through conventions, cultural references, technological innovations, fan fiction, and fan-produced webisodes — because its inspiring premise is restricted only by the limits of human imagination.

Resources:
www.golfsmith.com
http://en.wikipedia.org
www.tv.com
www.tvacres.com
www.bbc.co.uk
http://memory-alpha.org
www.sfgate.com
www.designinginteractions.com

Written by The Internet Journalist

10. Lone Cypress in Monterey

(Image credit: bdinphoenix [flickr])

(Image credit: mikemac29 [flickr])

Buffeted by the cold Pacific Ocean wind,the scraggly Lone Cypress [wiki] (Cupressus macrocarpa) in Pebble Beach, Monterey Peninsula, California, isn’t a particularly large tree. It makes up for its small size, however, with its iconic status as a stunningly beautiful tree in splendid isolation, framed by an even more beautiful background of the Pacific Ocean.

9. Circus Trees

As a hobby, bean farmer Axel Erlandson [wiki] shaped trees – he pruned, bent, and grafted trees into fantastic shapes and called them “Circus Trees.” For example, to make this “Basket Tree” arborsculpture, Erlandson planted six sycamore trees in a circle and then grafted them together to form the diamond patterns.

Basket Tree (Image credit: jpeepz [flickr])

The two-legged tree (Image credit: Wikipedia)

Ladder tree (Image credit: Arborsmith)

Axel Erlandson underneath one of his arborsculpture (Image credit: Wilma Erlandson, Cabinet Magazine)

Erlandson was very secretive and refused to reveal his methods on how to grow the Circus Trees (he even carried out his graftings behind screens to protect against spies!) and carried the secrets to his grave.

The trees were later bought by millionaire Michael Bonfante, who transplanted them to his amusement park Bonfante Gardens in Gilroy in 1985.

8. Giant Sequoias: General Sherman

(Image credit: Humpalumpa [flickr])

Giant Sequoias [wiki] (Sequoiadendron giganteum), which only grow in Sierra Nevada, California, are the world’s biggest trees (in terms of volume). The biggest is General Sherman [wiki] in the Sequoia National Park – one behemoth of a tree at 275 feet (83.8 m), over 52,500 cubic feet of volume (1,486 m?), and over 6000 tons in weight.

General Sherman is approximately 2,200 years old – and each year, the tree adds enough wood to make a regular 60-foot tall tree. It’s no wonder that naturalist John Muir said “The Big Tree is Nature’s forest masterpiece, and so far as I know, the greatest of living things.”

For over a century there was a fierce competition for the title of the largest tree: besides General Sherman, there is General Grant [wiki] at King’s Canyon National Park, which actually has a
larger circumference (107.5 feet / 32.77 m vs. Sherman’s 102.6 feet / 31.27 m).

In 1921, a team of surveyors carefully measured the two
giants – with their data, and according to the complex American Forestry Association system of judging a tree, General Grant should have been award the title of largest tree – however, to simplify the matter, it was later determined that in this case, volume, not point system, should be the determining factor.

7. Coast Redwood: Hyperion and Drive-Thru Trees

There is another sequoia species (not to be confused with Giant Sequoia) that is quite remarkable: the Coast Redwood [wiki] (Sequoia sempervirens), the tallest trees in the world.

The reigning champion is a tree called Hyperion in the Redwood National Park, identified by researcher Chris Atkins and amateur naturalist Michael Taylor in 2006. Measuring over 379 feet (155.6 115 m) tall, Hyperion beat out the previous record holder Stratosphere Giant [wiki] in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park (at 370 feet / 112.8 m).

The scientists aren’t talking about the exact location of Hyperion: the terrain is difficult, and they don’t want a rush of visitors to come and trample the tree’s root system.

[Image: The Stratosphere Giant – still an impressive specimen, previously the world’s tallest tree until dethroned by Hyperion in 2006.]

That’s not all that’s amazing about the Coast Redwood: there are four giant California redwoods big enough that you can drive your car through them!

The most famous of the drive-through trees is the Chandelier Tree [wiki] in Leggett, California. It’s a 315 foot tall redwood tree, with a 6 foot wide by 9 foot tall hole cut through its base in the 1930s.

Chandelier Tree. (Image credit: hlh-abg [flickr])

6. Chapel-Oak of Allouville-Bellefosse

Chapel-Oak of Allouville-Bellefosse (Image credit: Old trees in Netherlands & Europe)

(Image credit: dm1795 [flickr])

(Image credit: Luc Doudet)

The Ch?ne-Chapelle (Chapel-Oak) of Allouville-Bellefosse is the most famous tree in France – actually, it’s more than just a tree: it’s a building and a religious monument all in one.

In 1669, l’Abbe du Detroit and du Cerceau decided to build a chapel in (at that time) a 500 years old or so oak (Quercus robur) tree made hollow by a lightning bolt. The priests built a small altar to the Virgin Mary. Later on, a second chapel and a staircase were added.

Now, parts of the tree are dead, the crown keeps becoming smaller and smaller every year, and parts of the tree’s bark, which fell off due to old age, are covered by protective oak shingles. Poles and cables support the aging tree, which in fact, may not live much longer. As a symbol, however, it seems that the Chapel-Oak of Allouville-Bellefosse may live on forever.

5. Quaking Aspen: Pando (The Trembling Giant)

Quaking Aspen (Image: Wikipedia)

Aspen grove (Image credit: scottks1 [flickr])

Quaking Aspen in winter (Image credit: darkmatter [flickr])

Pando [wiki] or the Trembling Giant in Utah is actually a colony of a single Quaking Aspen (Populus tremuloides) tree. All of the trees (technically, “stems”) in this colony are genetically identical (meaning, they’re exact clones of one another). In fact, they are all a part of a single living organism with an enormous underground root system.

Pando, which is Latin for “I Spread,” is composed of about 47,000 stems spread throughout 107 acres of land. It estimated to weigh 6,600 tons, making it the heaviest known organism. Although the average age of the inpidual stems are 130 years, the entire organism is estimated to be about 80,000 years old!

4. Montezuma Cypress: The Tule Tree

The Tule Tree Towers over a church next to it (Image credit: jubilohaku [flickr])

Full width of the Tule Tree (Image credit: Wikipedia)

Close-up of the tree’s gnarled trunk. Local legends say that you can make out animals like jaguars and elephants in the trunk, giving the tree the nickname of “the Tree of Life” (Image credit: jvcluis [flickr])

El ?rbol del Tule [wiki] (“The Tule Tree”) is an especially large Montezuma cypress (Taxodium mucronatum) near the city of Oaxaca, Mexico. This tree has the largest trunk girth at 190 feet (58 m) and trunk diameter at 37 feet (11.3 m). The Tule tree is so thick that people say you don’t hug this tree, it hugs you instead!

For a while, detractors argued that it was actually three trees masquerading as one – however, careful DNA analysis confirmed that it is indeed one magnificent tree.

In 1994, the tree (and Mexican pride) were in jeopardy: the leaves were sickly yellow and there were dead branches everywhere- the tree appeared to be dying. When tree “doctors” were called in, they diagnosed the problem as dying of thirst. The prescription? Give it water. Sure enough, the tree soon recovered after a careful watering program was followed.

3. Banyan Tree: Sri Maha Bodhi Tree

The Banyan tree is named after “banians” or Hindu traders who carry out their business under the tree. Even if you have never heard of a Banyan tree (it was the tree used by Robinson Crusoe for his treehouse), you’d still recognize it. The shape of the giant tree is unmistakable: it has a majestic canopy with aerial roots running from the branches to the ground.

Banyan tree (Image credit: Diorama Sky [flickr])

Closer view of the Banyan aerial root structure (Image credit: BillyCrafton [flickr])

If you were thinking that the Banyan tree looks like the trees whose roots snake through the ruins of the Ta Prohm temple like tentacles of the jungle (Lara Croft, anyone?) at Ankor, Cambodia , you’d be right!

Banyan tree (or is it silk-cotton tree?) in the ruins of Ta Prohm, Ankor, Cambodia
(Image Credit: Casual Chin [flickr])

One of the most famous species of Banyan, called the Sacred Fig [wiki] or Bo tree, is the Sri Maha Bodhi [wiki] tree in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka. It is said that the tree was grown from a cutting from the original tree under which Buddha became enlightened in the 6th century BC.

Planted in 288 BC, it is the oldest living human-planted tree in the world, with a definitive planting date!

(Image credit: Images of Ceylon)

(Image credit: Wikipedia)

2. Bristlecone Pine: Methuselah and Prometheus, the Oldest Trees in the World.

Methuselah Grove (Image Credit: NOVA Online)

Bristlecone pine grove in which Prometheus grew (Image credit: Wikipedia)

The oldest living tree in the world is a White Mountains, California, bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva) named Methuselah [wiki], after the Biblical figure who lived to 969 years old. The Methuselah tree, found at 11,000 feet above sea level, is 4,838 years old – it is not only the oldest tree but also the oldest living non-clonal organism in the world.

Before Methuselah was identified as the world’s oldest tree by Edmund Schulman in 1957, people thought that the Giant Sequoias were the world’s oldest trees at about 2,000 years old. Schulman used a borer to obtain a core sample to count the growth rings of various bristlecone pines, and found over a dozen trees over 4,000 years old.

The story of Prometheus [wiki] is even more interesting: in 1964, Donald R. Currey [wiki], then a graduate student, was taking core samples from a tree named Prometheus. His boring tool broke inside the tree, so he asked for permission from the US Forest Service to cut it down and examine the full cross section of the wood. Surprisingly the Forest Service agreed! When they examined the tree, Prometheus turned out to be about 5,000 years old, which would have made it the world’s oldest tree when the scientist unwittingly killed it!

Stump of the Prometheus Tree. (Image Credit: James R. Bouldin, Wikipedia)

Today, to protect the trees from the inquisitive traveler, the authorities are keeping their location secret (indeed, there are no photos identifying Methuselah for fear of vandalism).

1. Baobab

The amazing baobab [wiki] (Adansonia) or monkey bread tree can grow up to nearly 100 feet (30 m) tall and 35 feet (11 m) wide. Their defining characteristic: their swollen trunk are actually water storage – the baobab tree can store as much as 31,700 gallon (120,000 l) of water to endure harsh drought conditions.

Baobab trees are native to Madagascar (it’s the country’s national tree!), mainland Africa, and Australia. A cluster of “the grandest of all” baobab trees (Adansonia grandidieri) can be found in the Baobab Avenue, near Morondava, in Madagascar:

(Image credit: Wikipedia)

(Image credit: plizzba [flickr])

(Image credit: Daniel Montesino [flickr])

In Ifaty, southwestern Madagascar, other baobabs take the form of bottles, skulls, and even teapots:

Teapot baobab (Image credit: Gilles Croissant)

The baobab trees in Africa are amazing as well:

Baobab in Tanzania (Image credit: telethon [flickr])

Baobab near Bulawayo, Zimbabwe (Image credit: ironmanix [flickr])

There are many practical uses of baobab trees, like for a toilet:

A toilet built inside a baobab tree in the Kayila Lodge, Zambia
(Image credit: Steve Makin [flickr])

? and even for a prison:

A “Prison Baob” tree in Western Australia (Image credit: yewenyi [flickr])

Written by Sawser

I recall reading about an obscure native culture in which the concept of death is fluid rather than fixed. You might be “dead” (somewhat sick), “very dead” (extremely ill) or “completely dead” (actually deceased) according to their terminology. The following 20 funny photos have been organized by these darkly funny and fatalistic categories! Believe it or not, the image above is completely real – the photograph was taken in Lysefjorden, Norway.

Dead (aka Somewhat Sick): The above victims may survive their ordeals but will certainly have some scars an bruises to show for them. A shark bite here, broken nose there and a few gore marks later these traumatized sports players, spectators and commuters all have priceless photos to document their near-death experiences.

Very Dead (Extremely Ill): The top set of photos, while completely unretouched via Photoshop, was of course staged. A French photographer hired hip-hop dancers to jump and appear to be falling on the sidestreets of France. The latter group of images, though, depict dizzying near-death automotive accidents. How do you suppose that last guy got out in time?!

Completely Dead (Actually Deceased): While nothing is sure in life, everything is certain in death and few of the above-featured inpiduals seem likely to make it out alive. To be fair, a few from this last category have ‘gone under the knife’ so to speak and become victims of Photoshop (good news for the ‘victims’ they feature), though they are nonetheless entertaining after their digital ‘surgery’!

Sources: 1 , 2 , 3 , 4

Written by laurie

Does anyone still believe that the camera never lies? With Photoshop, you can now make a picture speak any thousand words you want, and it will take a cynical attitude and a skilled eye to tell whether any of them is true.

While that might be a creative opportunity for artistic photographers and designers, for news editors, it can all be a bit of a nightmare – and for readers too when the photos skip the newspapers and land straight in your mailbox.

Here are seven of the most famous photoshop fakes.

Tourist Guy

Photography: P?ter Guzli

Perhaps the creepiest Photoshop fake was this shot of Hungarian tourist, P?ter Guzli, apparently standing on top of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 as one of the hijacked planes approaches.

This image did the rounds after the attacks with the claim that it was found in a camera pulled out of the rubble. In fact, Guzli had taken the picture in 1997 and made the edit for friends. Other people then made further edits placing him at every disaster from the sinking of the Titanic to the destruction of the White House by aliens on Independence Day.

The Smoke of War

Photography: Reuters/Adnan Hajj

P?ter Guzli’s collage didn’t fool many people, nor was it intended to. Lebanese photographer Adnan Hajj’s shot of smoke billowing above Beirut following Israeli bombing in the summer of 2006 fooled the news desk at Reuters? but no one who had heard of Photoshop.

The repeat patterns in the smoke made lots of people smell a rat and it turned out that Hajj had even copied some of the buildings. LittleGreenFootballs made a neat analysis of the work done on the image and was one of the first to sound a warning. The result was a scramble among photo agencies to clarify their photo editing policies.

Here’s the less smoky original:

Iraqi Civilians

Photography: Brian Walski/Los Angeles Times

Adnan Hajj was a local stringer trying to make a political point. Brian Walski was a staff reporter for the Los Angeles Times who just wanted to make a better picture – a much more likely trap for both photographers and editors. After shooting a series of shots of American troops and Iraqi civilians in 2003, Walski found that the best composition came by merging two images together. He was fired.

John Kerry And Jane Fonda

Photography: Owen Franken/ Ken Light

Usually, it’s the photographer who does the editing, either because he thinks he’ll get a better picture or because he believes it will deliver a stronger message. This fake cutting that circulated during the 2004 Presidential primaries was the work of neither of the two photographers whose images it featured. The shot of John Kerry was taken by Ken Light at the Register for Peace Rally in June 1971. Jane Fonda was photographed by Owen Franken as at a political rally in Miami Beach, Florida, in August 1972.

The collage was a dirty trick designed to derail John Kerry’s campaign.

Shirtless Sarkozy

Source: L’Express

So what’s the opposite of a dirty trick? French President Nicolas Sarkozy gave American photographers a scolding for intruding on his American vacation in the summer of 2007 but he wouldn’t have minded what the editors at Paris Match (owned by his friend, Arnaud Lagardere) did to his love handles. Rivals L’Express pointed out that the President had been given some Photoshop liposuction.

Oprah the Model

And Oprah Winfrey might not have complained about this August 1989 cover of TV Guide either. It’s Oprah’s head all right but according to CNet.com the body belongs to actress Ann-Margret. Ann-Margret’s fashion designer recognized the dress and spotted the fakery.

The Reichstag Flag

Not strictly speaking a Photoshop fake as the program wasn’t around during the Second World War, but just a reminder that playing with fake smoke and mirrors isn’t new to the modern era.

Ukrainian photographer, Yevgeny Khaldei, didn’t just stage this photo of Soviet troops raising the flag over the Reichstag in 1945 (the first flag had gone up after dusk). He also heightened the smoke and removed the two watches from the wrists of the soldier on the lower left. Good Soviet soldiers don’t loot.

Here’s the original:

Photography: Yevgeny Khaldei

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Tell us what Photoshop fakes you’ve spotted. (You can even learn to make your own fake photos here.)note: Thanks to Dan Zimmerman and others for pointing out that the soldier in Brian Walski’s photo is British, not American. We’re better at identifying cameras than guns.

Written by Alex Ion

Giving speeches and presentations is an inevitable part of life. Whether it be at school or at a conference, speeches and orals dominate most fields of study. What is worse is that over three quarters of the population fear presentations in front of people even though, eight times out of ten there is nothing to fear or be anxious about.

For the remaining 20 percent, the following tips will help you better prepare for a public speech and to better deliver, starting today.

photy by D’Arcy Norman

1. Be prepared and practice.
Part of being nervous during an oral or presentation is due to the fact that you feel like you will forget critical pieces of information or that you will get up front of everyone and forget everything. Practice, over and over, until you are able to do your presentation with the minimal amount of cue cards. Practice in different settings, in front of different people.

2. Pick a topic that interests you.
It is hard to speak passionately and with conviction when you are talking about something that you couldn’t care about to save your life. Pick a topic that you know about so that you will be able to inject a little charisma into your speech. When questions come around at the end, you will be more equipped to answer them if you love what you talked about.

Also, picking a topic that interests you, but that you don’t necessarily know a lot about, makes information found regarding that topic easier to encode into long term memory and then to retrieve it! Easier to remember makes for an easier performance.

3. Don’t leave the audience out.
When the audience is pulled into your speech, or is forced to interact with you while you are giving your speech, their curiosity and attention will be on you. When you do not interact with the audience, you are giving them a huge opportunity to daydream, doze off and not listen. Why spend all that time on a speech to have your audience fall asleep?

4. Know your audience.
Know who you will be speaking to and tailor your speech accordingly. If you are talking to medical students you can use medical terms more liberally than if you were talking to sociology majors.

5. Make it simple to understand.
Not everyone will understand what you are saying and not everyone is interested in what you are saying. Especially when the topic is difficult to start with. Even when you define difficult terms they may not keep up. No one cares about how smart you sound. Losing your audience is not ideal either, which is inevitable if they don’t understand. If you have to use complicated terms, complement them with an easy to understand example of what you mean.

6. Complement your speech with visual aids.
Use power point slides or projectors. Illustrate your examples and put definitions of difficult concepts on simple slides. Some people learn better visually.

7. Dress properly.
Do not dress like you are staying in for the day, i.e. sweat pants?Dress like you mean it and are interested in what you are doing. Dress like you are taking this seriously. What you wear says something about you and people take those who dress seriously, more seriously and think they are more competent.

8. Keep your audience hanging and thinking.
Close your speech by leaving your audience thinking. This will perpetuate your speech and cultivate curiosity in others. It will also leave you and your speech more memorable.

Everything from dressing to the way you deliver your speech is important. It is through practice that you will be able to relieve a bit of the anxiety and fear that accompanies public speaking. Speaking slow and with conviction will captivate the audience and leave them wanting more. Remember, anxiety is normal, but if you work through it you will find that it is not as bad as you make it out to be.