How are you ringing in the New Year tonight?
Party at our house, like the last 8 years :) It should be good - I have some chilli on the stove, brewing, and we have a cabinet full of liqueurs.
See, the idea came up one time that most of us couldn't afford to have the sort of alcohol stock that allowed us to mix any cocktail we wanted.... and Lo! the Idea was born.
The first year we worked out the cocktails we wanted to make, and assigned everyone a bottle - cherry brandy, triple sec, blue curcao, midori, kaluha - not to mention the perennial staples of Gin, Tequila, Vodka & Rum, nor the mixers.
And so we mixed some mighty fine cocktails.
We did an inventory of our stocks just before 31-Dec-05 and came up with about 43 litres (yes, litres!) of alcoholic stuff. Just after New Years Eve we repeated the exercise.
45 litres - AFTER DRINKING HUGE AMOUNTS!
Yes. We GAINED alcohol.
Scary :)
How very sad of me - but I go all warm & fuzzy over this 2 week old kitty, Nyan, who just couldn't keep awake a moment longer!
Inspired by LJ customers suck: Homophobia in the dome
Sigh. I get the reasons on an intellectual level - faith based, Thou Shall Not Do What We Don't Like and the fear of Different.
But on a viceral level? In my soul?
Nope.
Don't get it. And I hope to Mercy I never do.
The UK will repay debts owed to the US dating from the World War II by the end of this year, the government says.
Under the lend-lease programme, which began in March 1941, the then neutral US could provide countries fighting Hitler with war material.
The US joined the war soon after - in the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbour - and the programme ended in 1945.
The final payment of £45m will be made by the 31 December, meeting a 1945 obligation to repay the debt in full.
"Repayment of the war loans to the US Government is expected to be completed on December 31 2006," the Treasury's Ivan Lewis said in a written commons reply.
Story from BBC NEWS
Published: 2006/05/03 18:46:03 GMT
© BBC MMVI
We are hosting the Cuddly Cthuglies again - yesterday & today. Yesterday I escaped with W. for a while and came back with Krispy Kreme Double Dozen for the masses from the Slough Store!
How else have I spent my last week. er..... doing not a lot :) I did check work e-mail (from home) twice - first time as there was something I forgot to do for a client - yeah, a bit sad but important to show willing and responsiveness.
Tried to come up with new things to do with leftover turkey and failed. Kinda gobbled out now :P Hmmm. Must tidy.
Browsing cuteoverload.com and found this today: Kitten Pants!
What is one of your addictions?
Submitted by Paperheart.
Coffee - or rather, caffeine.
If you belong to the category of people who would loved to have a tattoo on your body but have been scared of its permanency, here is some good news. Based on research done by scientists from Massachusetts General Hospital and Duke University, a company called Freedom-2 LLC will start offering a tattoo ink that can be easily removed completely after just one laser treatment.
Current methods of removing tattoos suffer from multiple disadvantages. The root cause is the inks that are mainly derived from substances used in car paints and printing. Since these inks are meant to leave a permanent effect, removal involves multiple expensive laser treatments and in many cases undesirable scarring. The Freedom-2 (F2) ink adopts a body friendly approach to solve this problem. The ink consists of biodegradable dyes encapsulated in tiny polymer beads, and the same traditional delivery methods are used to make a permanent F2 tattoo from it. Removal is done using a single laser treatment that breaks down the beads in the ink, allowing the body to naturally expel the dye contained within it.
The tattoos created using this ink will be qualitatively the same as the ones created now using traditional inks. Since the ink as such does not contribute significantly to the cost of getting a tattoo done, the additional cost of the F2 ink will not prove to be a damper. To be released in early 2007, this ink promises to give you a second chance without pinching your wallet or skin.
I don't know whether this delights or offends me. I love the idea of having a tattoo but not the idea of hating it in 10 years time. However I also feel that having a tattoo should be .... an act of faith in many ways, and the idea that you can change your mind and just undo something that ought to have been done carefully and with much fore-thought is... contrary.
