The ancient art of marrying

Dating today in our fast-paced society is complicated. We are free to follow our hearts but what we really lack are rituals of dating. Take for example the dating process in old Turkish villages when the secret of finding your partner lied in the intricate design of a carpet.

Young women were putting their heart, soul and dreams into the pattern of the handmade carpets. When the girl was of the age to marry, the family would hang the carpet in front of the house to let the world know about it. The boys in the village would look at it to see if their dreams match up. They could tell if the girl was lively or dull - all from the design of the carpet.

If, after seeing the carpet, a boy wanted to marry, he and his parents would go to the girl's house to ask permission. The girl would stay in the kitchen making coffee (the famous Turkish coffee of course) and listen at the door. If the parents got along, the father would shout "Bring in the coffee!" The girl would come out but she was not allowed to speak. If she liked the boy, she would have sweetened his coffee. If she did not, his coffee would be very salty.

Everyone would watch to see the face of the boy as he took his first sip. The boy was nervous and his hands would tremble. If he wanted to marry the girl badly enough, even if he got the salt, he would smile as if he's gotten the sugar.

I am not sure I am going to start making a carpet anytime soon. I will have to find other ways to find a life mate. Any suggestions?

How many friends do YOU have?

Feeling lonely? Well... join the club!

Today the average American has only two close friends, and almost one in four has absolutely nobody to confide in, says a new study by sociologists at Duke University and the University of Arizona. The study found that the number of friendless Americans doubled in the last two decades.

The reasons:

• longer work hours, leading to fewer chances to cultivate intimacy
• personal technology, creating the illusion of intimacy but not the real thing

Americans have always been restless people taking pride in their autonomy and self-reliance. But it seems rugged individualists have gotten what they wanted - with a vengeance.

Not everything is bad news though. As community relations are weaking, family ties are strengthening. Couples rely more heavily on each other now which can create a deeper level of connection.

At the same time the Internet is making possible for far-flung friends and relatives to keep closer.

All of life is a trade-off and it seems that friendship is no exception. Even if our time has become more precious than ever before, it's up to us to set aside some of our busy lives for friendship and closeness.

How long will it take to become a millionaire?

If I invest $300 monthly at 6.00%, I'll be a millionaire in 63 years at age 87. To be a millionaire at age 40, I'll need to:

• Increase the amount I invest now to $488,616 , or
• Increase my monthly investment to $3,739 , or
• Achieve a rate of return of 41.65%.

When adjusted for inflation, $1 million in 63 years would be equivalent to $159,265 today. LoL LoL LoL

Priceless

White outfit for the All-White Party at Nikki Beach: $76.45
Strappy white sandals: $ 54.00 (with 20% discount at DSW)
Cab from 79th St and York Ave to 50st St and Lex. Ave: $ 8.00 (with tip)
Rasberry Martini: $13.00
Cosmopolitan: $12.00
Screaming my lungs out on Ozone's "Dragostea din Tei" in one of the trendiest clubs in Manhattan: Priceless

For like 3 minutes I was proud that I knew the words for this stupid song :)

Houston, we've had a problem...

Apollo 13 mission might have propelled this phrase into stardom but these days it seems that NASA does have a problem - a major one I should say.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. government has misplaced the original recording of the first moon landing, including astronaut Neil Armstrong's famous "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," a NASA spokesman said on Monday.

Armstrong's famous space walk, seen by millions of viewers on July 20, 1969, is among transmissions that NASA has failed to turn up in a year of searching, spokesman Grey Hautaloma said.

"We haven't seen them for quite a while. We've been looking for over a year and they haven't turned up," Hautaloma said.

The tapes also contain data about the health of the astronauts and the condition of the spacecraft. In all, some 700 boxes of transmissions from the Apollo lunar missions are missing, he said.

"I wouldn't say we're worried -- we've got all the data. Everything on the tapes we have in one form or another," Hautaloma said.

NASA has retained copies of the television broadcasts and offers several clips on its Web site. But those images are of lower quality than the originals stored on the missing magnetic tapes.

Because NASA's equipment was not compatible with TV technology of the day, the original transmissions had to be displayed on a monitor and re-shot by a TV camera for broadcast.

Hautaloma said it is possible the tapes will be unplayable even if they are found, because they have degraded significantly over the years -- a problem common to magnetic tape and other types of recordable media.
The material was held by the National Archives but returned to NASA sometime in the late 1970s, he said.

"We're looking for paperwork to see where they last were," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060814/ts_nm/space_tapes_dc

Do I smell some bullshit in here... ?