{FreePint is an online network of information searchers. Members

receive this free newsletter twice a month: it is packed with tips

on finding quality and reliable business information on the Internet.

Joining is free at <http://www.freepint.com/> and provides access to

a substantial archive of articles, reviews, jobs & events, with

answers to research questions and networking at the FreePint Bar.

These sites come from FreePint's "Favourite Tipples" section.}



Check out the UK's National electronic Library for Health. Looks

simple but you can get lost in the complexity of this one.



You don't want to miss the Internet Archive.



Explore the Internet world of the BBC



Begin learning about the European Union at - where else?

- their home page

Looking for the top 100 queries on the Internet today? Look no further: here's WordTracker

Take a look at Yahoo's Buzz Index

Check out Lycos' Daily Top 50

For a weekly survey of top queries, check out Google's Zeitgeist

Here's something interesting: a site that helps you put together searches. It's called NoodleQuest.
Just answer a few questions about your research topic and NoodleQuest will reveal and explain some of the best search strategies you can use.
Cool

I can't plug the Astronomy Picture of the Day site often enough.
You gotta love it.

SolStation gives details on nearby stars. The site also has 3D star maps, invaluable

should you get lost within 50 light years of Earth.

I need more power, Scotty!

Take a tour of the Victoria and Albert Museum


If you like maps, like I like maps, then you have to check out the U.S. Geological Service National Map Viewer.

If you prefer your wisdom from Rock 'n Roll, then check out Song Quotes
Goodness gracious, great balls of fire. - Jerry Lee Lewis, Great Balls Of Fire

Ingenious.org.uk has 30,000 images from sex to flyingmachines.
This site brings together images and viewpoints to create insights into SCIENCE and CULTURE.
Do check it out

Virginia Tech has a huge database of images, you'll want to bookmark

The Department of Education Free Resources website has a bunch of stuff on Christmas Day, American style.

And check out How Stuff Works for more on the subject.

Merry ChristmaKwanzaHannukah!

Here's a quotations and proverbs search from FaganFinder that attempts to collect the largest sources of quotations and related items (proverbs, sayings, maxims, amorphisms, slogans, cliches, etc).

How to search the Internet, from UC Berkeley...
And that's only the beginning

Here's more


And more: HomeTownLocator gazetteer: Census Data

Looking for your ancestors?
The USGenWeb Project consists of a group of volunteers working together to provide Internet websites for genealogical research in every county and every state of the United States.

The BBC Motion Gallery provides access to thousands of shots from the vast and diverse archives of the BBC and CBS News. Spanning over 70 years, BBC content encompasses more than 300,000 hours of footage.

Check out the Astronomy resources at the Space Telescope Science Institute

The goal of the visual sourcebook of Chinese civilization is to add to the material teachers can use to help their students understand Chinese history, culture, and society. To help keep the chronology and geography straight, the designers have included many maps and a timeline.

There's a bunch of information on the Founding Fathers, and their wives, at ColonialHall.com

FDR and Eisenhower planned D-day on
the USS Sequoia

The Sequoia Presidential Yacht is a meticulously restored, 104-foot, 1925 Trumpy-designed yacht that has served Presidents since Herbert Hoover. The yacht is a national historic landmark that is available for exclusive charters in Washington, D.C. (when it is not used by the President or Vice President)

Answer the Homophone, will you?

Worried about "not cutting the muster," or "selling or keeping highbred wolves," or "suffering in a Third World penile system"?

You may have been victimized by a homophone. James J. Kilpatrick explains it all to you.

Lenore Skenazy weighs in on automated bathrooms, in an article entitled I prefer my plumbing dumb

Why am I standing at the sink in a public bathroom, waving? Do I think I recognize the sink? Am I that desperate for company? Or am I simply attempting to wash my hands?

Hint: I don't like them, either

Before

In a photo provided by surgeon Dr. Carl P. Valenziano, chairman of surgery at Liberty Health Jersey City Medical Center in Jersey City, N.J., Tirso Furcal shows an extra finger on his right hand in Furcal's village Brisas de los Palemeras, Dominican Republic in June 2004. Furcal, who was born with the sixth finger, as well as an extra toe on each foot, had them removed by Valenziano in an operation Nov. 11, 2004, at Jersey City Medical Center. (AP Photo/Carl Valenziano)

After

Tirso Furcal holds up his hands in the office of Dr. Carl P. Valenziano, on Friday, Nov. 19, 2004. The operation was performed free of charge. (AP Photo/Mike Derer)

Voice of "Juan Valdez" Dies at 87


Thanks for watching out for that coffee, Juan

Norman Rose, a veteran stage actor whose sonorous baritone gained him national attention as the voice of Juan Valdez, the fictitious coffee grower and advertising spokesman for Colombian coffee, died Nov. 12 at his home in Upper Nyack, N.Y. He was 87. Mr. Rose produced and acted off-Broadway, translated and dramatized foreign plays, appeared in movies and television, narrated modern ballet and television specials and recorded books for the blind. He was a co-founder of New Stages, an early off-Broadway repertory company, and more recently appeared in benefit readings at Symphony Space. Mr. Rose was born in Philadelphia and joined the Washington Civic Theater while attending George Washington University.
Read more here
Mr. Rose is survived by his wife of 60 years, Catherine Vagnoni Rose; three daughters, Elizabeth Rose and Margaret Wood of Nyack, and Johanna Maria Rose of Piermont, N.Y.; a son, Jack, of Holly Hill, Fla.; a sister, Arlene Gordon; five grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

Arctic Countries Agree on Perils of Climate Change but Not Solution
Andrew C. Revkin
Nov 25 2004

The United States and the seven other countries with Arctic territory jointly expressed concern yesterday about profound changes in the Arctic climate and said they would consider new scientific findings concluding that heat-trapping emissions were the main cause.


The circumpolar region

But they did not agree on a common strategy for curbing such emissions, to the disappointment of environmental groups and Arctic indigenous groups.
The joint statement on Arctic climate, which emerged after several days of negotiations in Reykjavik, Iceland, reflected the continuing opposition by the Bush administration to anything other than voluntary measures to slow the growth in such gases...


Read the rest here

More on the Kyoto Protocol

More on the Arctic Council

More on "Impacts of a Warming Arctic" (Large document - pdf)

More on the Inuit Circumpolar Conference

Girl Is First to Survive Rabies Without a Shot

Associated Press
Wauwatosa, WI - A unique combination of drugs has made a 15-year-old girl the first known human to survive rabies without vaccination, doctors said.
A team of physicians gambled on an experimental treatment and induced a coma in Jeanna Giese to stave off the usually fatal infection, said Dr. Rodney Willoughby, a pediatric disease infection specialist at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin.
"No one had really done this before, even in animals," Dr. Willoughby said.
"None of the drugs are fancy. If this works, it can be done in a lot of countries."

Only five persons worldwide before Jeanna are known to have survived rabies after the onset of symptoms, said Dr. Charles Rupprecht, chief of the rabies section at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But they had received standard treatment -- a series of rabies vaccine shots -- before experiencing symptoms.

* * *

John and Ann Giese, of Fond du Lac, said they did not hesitate when doctors approached them about trying the experimental treatment. They already had been told their daughter probably would die.
"Miracles can happen," Mr. Giese said. "We believed it from Day One. We had to convince everyone else."

Read the rest here.

Thankful for the settlers

George Will
November 25, 2004
WASHINGTON -- When giving thanks this year, think of Lena Woebbecke. She and many others paid a terrible price for misreading the prairie sky on the afternoon of Jan. 12, 1888.
That day was unseasonably balmy, by prairie standards -- some temperatures were in the 20s -- and many children scampered to school without coats or gloves. Then, at about the time schools were adjourning, death, in the shape of a soot-gray cloud, appeared on the horizon of Dakota Territory and Nebraska.
In three minutes the temperature plunged 18 degrees. The next morning hundreds of people, more than 100 of them children, were dead beneath the snow drifts. David Laskin, a Seattle writer, reconstructs this tragedy in a terrifying but beautifully written new book, ``The Children's Blizzard.''
It picks up the many threads of the story in Norway, Ukraine, Germany, Vermont and other tributaries to the river of immigration set in motion partly by the 1862 Homestead Act. In return for an $18 filing fee and five years farming, the act conferred ownership of 160 acres. By the tens of thousands the homesteaders came, to live in sod houses, heated by burning buffalo chips and twisted hay.
Of immigrants, the saying was that the cowards stayed home and the weak died on the way. One in 10 crossing the Atlantic in steerage did die. But Laskin says ``the mystique of the Dakotas'' was such that the territory's population nearly quadrupled in the 1880s. Those who made it, with a trunk or two and the clothes on their backs, reached towns that were perishable scratches on the prairie. They got land, freedom and hope.
And prairie fires. And grasshoppers, 100 billion at a time in roaring clouds a mile high and 100 miles across. And iron weather in which children, disoriented by horizontal streams of snow as hard as rock and fine as dust, froze to death groping their way home from a school 150 yards away.
Lena was five in 1882 when her father, a German immigrant, died of smallpox. Her mother remarried twice, having 11 children, eight of whom survived. In August 1887 Lena, her marriage prospects diminished by her smallpox scars, was sent to live with the Woebbeckes and their three children in a two-room house. It was half a mile from the school where she was, five months later, when a cataclysmic cold front came dropping southeast out of Canada at 45 miles per hour.
``To those standing outside,'' Laskin writes, ``it looked like the northwest corner of the sky was suddenly filling and bulging and ripping open.'' In four and a half hours the temperature at Helena, Mont., fell 50 degrees. The prairie air tingled with the electricity of a horizontal thunderstorm. All over the region, school teachers, many of them not much older or more educated than their pupils, had to make life and death decisions about how to get the children home.
``The fear came first,'' Laskin writes, ``but the cold followed so hard on its heels that it was impossible to tell the difference.'' In minutes nostrils were clogged by ice. Eyelids were torn by repeated attempts to prevent them from freezing shut. Unable to see their hands in front of their faces, people died wandering a few yards from their houses, unable to hear, over the keening wind, pots being pounded a few yards away to tell them the way to safety.
``For years afterward,'' writes Laskin, ``at gatherings of any size in Dakota or Nebraska, there would always be people walking on wooden legs or holding fingerless hands behind their backs or hiding missing ears under hats -- victims of the blizzard.'' Lena learned to walk on a wooden foot. In 1901, at 24, she married. At 25 she died, perhaps in childbirth, or perhaps of a complication from the amputation necessitated by frostbite.
``Lena was laid to rest in her wedding dress in the graveyard of the Immanuel Lutheran Church near the country crossroads called Ruby. If there ever was a town called Ruby, it has disappeared, as has the Immanuel Lutheran Church. The church cemetery remains -- a fenced patch of rough grass studded with headstones between two farmhouses not far from the interstate. A tiny island of the dead in the sea of Nebraska agriculture.''
This Thanksgiving, when you have rendered yourself torpid by ingesting an excess of America's agricultural bounties, summon thoughts of thanks for the likes of Lena, those whose hard lives paved the stony road to America's current comforts.

Amen

If you're into health food, read no further -- for calorie hunters and fast food fanatics only

Hardee's unveils the 'Monster Thickburger'
Really hungry? How about 1,420 calories and 107 grams of fat?
Kevin Tibbles
NBC News Correspondent
Nov 16 2004

CHICAGO - In the beginning there was simply the burger and the bun. But with fast food competition, things got complicated.

Now, Hardee's has thrown down the burger gauntlet, serving up what it calls a $5.49 "monument to decadence": the "Monster Thickburger."

Here's how they build it:
Two-thirds of a pound of beef ... 664 calories
Three slices of cheese ... 186 calories
Four pieces of bacon ... 150 calories
Mayonnaise ...160 calories
Butter ... 30 calories
Bun ... 230 calories

Just reading the rest might give you a heart attack.

From The American Minute

What happened on November 19 in American history.

Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Thus begins the Gettysburg Address, delivered this day, November 19, 1863, by President Abraham Lincoln on the battlefield where 50,000 soldiers were killed or wounded in a three day battle. This ten-sentence speech ends with the words: "We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain - that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom - and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
That these dead shall not have died in vain.

Do you remember the Industorious Clock?

Well check out Clockblock 1.0

Go look

Who in the world are the Friends of Tuva?
And what does Tuva have to do with Throat Singing?
And what does that have to with the Nobel Prize winning physicist Richard Feynman?
Check the links: explore the web. You know you want to.

Check this out!

Join Now and Receive: Product Testers Wanted Input your zip code to find out if we are recruiting in your area. Enter Your Zip Code
Membership is Free

eMarketResearchGroup, the new member incentive promotional offer, and the product testing program is an independent program for consumers and is not affiliated with the merchant/brands listed above. eMarketResearchGroup is solely responsible for all incentive fulfillment. *Receipt of the membership incentive gift requires completion of offer terms, including; age and residency requirements, registration with a valid email address, completion of user survey, sponsor promotions and shipping address verification. Upon completion of all requirements, we will promptly ship your membership incentive gift to your verified shipping address. You may review the status of your account via the member account area at anytime. Privacy Policy - Terms & Conditions - Help - Unsubscribe. Copyright © 2004 eMarketResearchGroup. All rights reserved.

"Cmdr. Buzz Corry",of Star of 'Space Patrol,' Dies

Nov 13
Los Angeles(AP) - Actor Ed Kemmer, who played the intrepid Cmdr. Buzz Corry in the popular 1950s children's television show "Space Patrol" before becoming a regular on daytime soap operas, has died. He was 84.

Kemmer died Tuesday at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York City after suffering a stroke on Nov. 5, family friend Jean-Noel Bassior told the Los Angeles Times.

"Space Patrol" chronicled the adventures of Corry, who fought intergalactic villains of the 30th century while flying around in his Terra V spacecraft with comic sidekick Cadet Happy.

The series, which also spawned a radio version, ran from 1950 to 1955 and was broadcast live on ABC as a weekly half-hour program.
Kemmer said he took the role seriously.

"I played it as straight as I could," he told the Columbus Dispatch in 1994. "You don't play down to children. A lot of shows make that mistake. Kids see through that right away."

Kemmer said the show was his most important work. "One engineer at NASA told me that he first got interested in space because of our show," Kemmer once said.

He later switched to playing bad guys with appearances on shows including "Perry Mason,""Gunsmoke" and "Maverick." He moved to New York in 1964 and spent the next 19 years starring regularly on soap operas such as "The Edge of Night,""As the World Turns,""All My Children" and "Guiding Light."

Kemmer spent 11 months in a German prisoner of war camp during World War II after his P-51 fighter plane was shot down over France in 1944. He and others in the POW camp staged plays, and after the war he studied acting.

Kemmer is survived by his wife of 35 years, former actress Fran Sharon, and three children.

Now I know I'm getting old...

Since when are there four states of matter?

Learn all about Plasma at the Space Weather Center.

It's Veterans' Day today, so don't forget to kiss a veteran today, and welcome him or her home.
The Department of Education has provided a bunch of resources, including a teachers guide that suggests classroom activities and provides information about organizing a school assembly, the Veterans History Project, the history of Veterans Day, respecting the flag, and more. It's interesting for evryone, though, not just students.
The Story of Veterans Day" will air nationally on Thursday, Nov. 11, at 8 a.m. and 2 p.m. ET/PT on the History Channel.

AT LAST!

Pigs can fly, hell is frozen, the slipper finally fits,
and Impossible Dreams really can come true.

The Red Sox have won the World Series

Aces Pedro Martinez and Curt Schilling, whose pitching prowess helped win the Series, hugged after the Sox swept the Cards. (Globe Staff / Barry Chin) Joe Louis - 1918-1941 The Fight, companion to a PBS film that premieres October 18, looks at the 1938 fight between American Joe Louis and German Max Schmeling in the context of African-American history and the coming war with Germany. 70,000 fans crammed into Yankee Stadium, and millions turned on their radios to witness, on the eve of World War II, what has been called "the most important sporting event in history." Listen to the broadcast of this fight and their earlier bout in 1936. (National Endowment for the Humanities) Interesting fact from today's resource: On Kristallnacht, Schmeling took an enormous risk and hid the two teenage sons of a Jewish friend in his Berlin hotel room. When the opportunity presented itself, Schmeling smuggled the two boys out of the country. Characteristically, the modest Schmeling made no mention of this episode in his own autobiography. Read more about Max Schmeling. October 12, 2004 More about magnets than you could possibly want to know. I could tell you what this is, but you might as well just click here October 07, 2004 Bookman balks at 'Bootylicious' James J. Kilpatrick is disturbed "A new definition of the word `bootylicious' has just been added to the Oxford English Dictionary Online." esp. of a woman, often with reference to the buttocks; sexually attractive, sexy; shapely. Disabled Are Pleased With E-Voting Associated Press STEPHEN MANNING Oct 3, 2004 This November, Eileen Rivera Ley, 41, will vote by herself for the first time. Blind voters in Maryland and several other states will use electronic voting machines equipped with technology that allows the disabled to vote independently. It used to get crowded whenever Rivera Ley voted. Blind, Rivera Ley had to rely on someone else to read the ballot aloud, then vote for her. That meant as many as four people ? Rivera Ley, the person who pulled the levers and election judges from both major parties as witnesses ? huddled in the voting booth. "It's like a party in there," Rivera Ley said. "You lose any kind of privacy when you have to speak how you want to vote." While many voter rights' advocates are fighting to decertify electronic voting machines, arguing that they're not reliable, one bloc remains steadfast behind the new equipment ? disabled voters who say the machines give them long-denied privacy. Read the rest Tip of the hat to Freaking News October 06, 2004 Rodney Dangerfield will finally get some respect "Well respected" actor/comedian Rodney Dangerfield {1921 -2004} (ABCNEWS.com) From the Chicago Tribune David Germain October 6, 2004 LOS ANGELES -- Rodney Dangerfield, the bug-eyed comic whose self-deprecating one-liners brought him stardom in clubs, television and movies and made his lament "I don't get no respect" a catchphrase, died Tuesday. He was 82. Mr. Dangerfield, who fell into a coma after undergoing heart surgery, died at 1:20 p.m., said publicist Kevin Sasaki. Mr. Dangerfield had a heart valve replaced Aug. 25 at the University of California, Los Angeles, Medical Center. Sasaki said in a statement that Mr. Dangerfield suffered a small stroke after the operation and developed infectious and abdominal complications. But in the past week he had emerged from the coma, the publicist said. "When Rodney emerged, he kissed me, squeezed my hand and smiled for his doctors," Mr. Dangerfield's wife, Joan, said in the statement. The comic is also survived by two children from a previous marriage. As a comic, Mr. Dangerfield -- clad in a black suit, red tie and white shirt with collar that seemed too tight -- convulsed audiences with lines such as: "When I was born, I was so ugly that the doctor slapped my mother"; "When I started in show business, I played one club that was so far out my act was reviewed in Field and Stream"; and "Every time I get in an elevator, the operator says the same thing to me: 'Basement?'" In a 1986 interview, he explained the origin of his "respect" trademark: "I had this joke: 'I played hide and seek; they wouldn't even look for me.' To make it work better, you look for something to put in front of it: I was so poor, I was so dumb, so this, so that. I thought, 'Now what fits that joke?' Well, 'No one liked me' was all right. But then I thought, a more profound thing would be, 'I get no respect.'" He tried it at a New York club, and the joke drew a bigger response than ever. He kept the phrase in the act. After hearing him perform years later, Jack Benny remarked: "Me, I get laughs because I'm cheap and 39. Your image goes into the soul of everyone." Mr. Dangerfield had a strange career in show business. At 19 he started as a standup comedian, making only a fair living. Married at 27, he decided he couldn't support a family on his meager earnings. He returned to comedy at 42 and began to attract notice. He appeared on "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson more than 70 times. After his first major film role in "Caddyshack," he began starring in his own movies. Here are some of Rodney's best See video here More here and here September 17, 2004 On June 1, 1889, newspapers across the country bore huge headlines announcing that on the day before, Johnstown, Pennsylvania, had been ravaged by the most devastating flood in the nation's history. The Federal Government has a great site with historic photos, and information about the National Register of Historic Places August 30, 2004 I found a beautiful site today: Arte Maya Tz'utuhil Museum & Gallery Pedro Rafael Gonzalez Chavajay "Las Huellas de Ayer y de Hoy" Currently with the exhibit: "Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya" at the Palace of Legion of Honor in San Francisco I had always assumed that Henry M. Stanley had said "Dr. Livinstone, I presume," in Africa in 1871. Now James J. Kilpatrick has me wondering August 28, 2004 There's a bunch of interesting search types at Abacci.com Check out the old, and still reliable, Mamma Can't get enough of the Olympics? WWW.OLYMPIC.ORG Librarians' Index to the Internet Theme Collection: The Olympic Games 2004 Olympic Firsts Olympics Timeline from Ancient Greece to the Present Day (Infoplease) Archeology's Ancient Olympics Guide Have I told you about Fagan Finder? Well, I should have Try Harvard's Dialect Survey -- fascinating! Flying Facts about the Earth August 26, 2004 STEWARTVILLE, MN (AP) - A Rochester girl has found a frog near Stewartville with five legs and 23 toes. The director of Quarry Hill Nature Center says three out of four legs appear normal, but the fourth has another leg and three feet attached to it. Greg Munson says otherwise the frog looks healthy. Munson says 27 other frogs found by nine-year-old Cori Praska and her friend were normal. But Munson and others at the nature center say the deformed frog is disturbing. Frogs are particularly sensitive to pollution because they live on land and water and they easily absorb pollutants through their skin. Because of that, scientists consider stressed frog populations and deformations a sign that something could be amiss in the environment. More Something new to check out at the mall: library books The Christian Science Monitor Barbara Lloyd McMichael SEATTLE - Typically, people go to malls to shop and to socialize. They may meet a friend for a quick lunch and then hunt for a new outfit. But at two malls in the greater Seattle area, they can also pick up a copy of the latest bestseller, do a computer search for a new job, and listen to a Spanish- language CD - all for free. The freebies aren't some enormous give-away by the malls, but typical library services in a not-so-typical location. In 2001, the King County Library System, which includes Seattle and is one of the largest circulating libraries in the United States, opened its first library in a shopping mall after the owner of the popular Crossroads Mall in eastern King County contacted the library and offered space. More August 25, 2004 American Environmental Photographs 4,500 photographs documenting natural environments, ecologies, and plant communities in the United States between 1891 and 1936 Smithsonian Education There's something here for everyone— whatever the age, whatever the interest! Start planning your visit now.  This site offers educational content for students, families, and educators. Find teaching materials, links to hundreds of online resources, and access to the world's largest museum complex: The Smithsonian Institution. Top Ten Satellite Images for 2003 Space Imaging its top 10 images from the IKONOS satellite taken during 2003. The images featured here include Baghdad, Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom; a 17th-century fortress in Bourtange, Netherlands; El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, Calif ... and much, much more; the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center; Lake Arrowhead during the devastating 2003 California fires; Mount St. Helens, Wash.; the Vatican City, featuring St. Peter's Basilica and Square; the Taj Mahal in India; Akkeshi Lake Resort in eastern Hokkaido, Japan; and Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, South Africa, one of the 'Seven Natural Wonders of the World.' Their home page is here Go check it out Time Life Pictures Time Life Pictures is an unparalleled collection of striking imagery, documenting past and present events in politics, culture, celebrities and the arts. The collection includes some of the greatest photographers of the 20th century, such as Alfred Eisenstaedt, Margaret Bourke-White, Andreas Feininger, John Dominis, Nina Leen and Gjon Mili Anatomy of the Human Body The Bartleby.com edition of Gray's Anatomy of the Human Body features 1,247 vibrant engravings?many in color?from the classic 1918 publication, as well as a subject index with 13,000 entries ranging from the Antrum of Highmore to the Zonule of Zinn. America's Pride The United States captured two podium spots here Tuesday at the Athens 2004 Games. Top-seeded Misty May and Kerri Walsh continued their amazing string of successes since the start of the Olympic qualifying process in 2003. as the young Americans posted a 21-17 and 21-11 in 43 minutes over second-seeded Adriana Behar and Shelda Bede of Brazil. In the past two years, May and Walsh have won nine of 13 SWATCH-FIVB World Tour events with an 88-6 international match mark. More August 23, 2004 The Origins project was organized around virtual field trips to eight scientific observatories where significant, ongoing research is conducted. We went behind the scenes at these institutions and at locations that are generally off limits to the public, including a rain forest research station in Belize, underneath Antarctica's sea ice, and an underground particle accelerator. Using the Web, we enabled our audience to look over the shoulders of scientists at work?in laboratories and in the field. How does someone get the chance to go to Antarctica? Check this out! August 22, 2004 Ok, sure. We've all got our little preconceived notions about what librarians are and what they do. Many people think of them as diminutive civil servants, scuttling about "Sssh-ing" people and stamping things. Well, think again buster. Librarians have degrees. They go to graduate school for Information Science and become masters of data systems and human/computer interaction. Librarians can catalog anything from an onion to a dog's ear. They could catalog you. Librarians wield unfathomable power. With a flip of the wrist they can hide your dissertation behind piles of old Field and Stream magazines. They can find data for your term paper that you never knew existed. They may even point you toward new and appropriate subject headings. She's not your mother's librarian People become librarians because they know too much. Their knowledge extends beyond mere categories. They cannot be confined to disciplines. Librarians are all-knowing and all-seeing. They bring order to chaos. They bring wisdom and culture to the masses. They preserve every aspect of human knowledge. Librarians rule. And they will kick the crap out of anyone who says otherwise. 'Nuff said? Andrea Almond Associated Press Simi Valley, CA Mary McKnight calls herself Ronald Reagan's No. 1 fan. Gazing somberly at the 40th president's tomb, the retired nurse from Kansas murmured, "It's humbling to be here." Nearby, a boy in a New York Yankees jersey seemed less impressed by Reagan's library and museum, muttering something about wanting to go to Disneyland. The contrast illustrates the challenge facing the nation's 11 presidential libraries - soon to be 12 with the opening of Bill Clinton's this fall - as they compete for visitors at a time when many tourists would rather be riding a roller-coaster than sifting through presidential archives. Although Reagan's death has led to a surge in visitors to the library, attendance at the nation's presidential libraries during the last five years has declined about 13 percent. To reverse the trend, libraries are adding attractions, turning to more aggressive marketing tactics, and leaning on nearby tourist attractions to promote themselves ... "For all the libraries, tourism depends on how the institutions are promoted," said Jay Hakes, director of Jimmy Carter's library in Atlanta. "Across the board, we need to be more aggressive, and I think we're seeing some of that now." The Reagan library has not needed any intense marketing efforts this summer. More than 110,000 visitors have poured into the mission-style complex northwest of Los Angeles since the facility reopened on June 14 after a weeklong memorial to the late president. That is more than half the attendance that the most popular library - Lyndon Johnson's in Texas - sees in an entire year. The Reagan library, which had seen a 31 percent drop in visitors until the former president's death, expects to log an unprecedented 400,000 visitors by the end of the year. "If you'd told me on June 6 that we'd have such a spike and see it continue at these high levels, I never would have believed it," said John Langellier, assistant director of the complex. The presidential library tradition began in 1939 when Franklin Roosevelt raised private money to build his facility. He then turned it over to the U.S. government to operate through the national archives. The Johnson library in Austin, Texas, has drawn the most visitors in the last five years, averaging about 200,000 annual visitors. The John F. Kennedy library in Boston was next, averaging 192,213 visitors. The least visited presidential library is Herbert Hoover's in West Branch, Iowa, which attracts an average of 66,209 visitors. Regardless of size, the goal of all the libraries is the same - to keep the past fresh. Their strategies include regularly rotating exhibits, hosting speakers and educational series, offering school tours and adding attractions that appeal to all generations ... "It's a challenge for all libraries and museums, not just presidential ones, to draw young visitors when competing with the Disneylands and other amusements." Don't know where to find the library near you? They're all listed here Go see 'em! August 19, 2004 Check out Ask Jeeves' new Smart Search It's fabulous August 18, 2004 Citysearch is a leading local search service, providing up-to-date information on businesses: restaurants, retail, travel, professional services, and more You know, there are more made-up languages than just pig latin. You may have heard of others, like Klingon, but there are also many that were invented by individuals or small groups of people. You can get a raft of information on them at http://www.langmaker.com TV Guide Online Improves Search Capabilities, Offers New Options + Improved search (sitewide search now available, categorized results) + Big Movie Guide ++ Lists EVERY movie on TV today and for the next 6 days ++ Sort movies by title, airtime, network, year and tvguide.com rating ++ Detailed descriptions of movie with full cast, photos, and credits + Big Sports Guide ++ Lists EVERY sporting event on TV tonight and for the next 6 days + Episode Guides and Program News Info for more than 700 shows is available Yahoo Launches an "Official" Search Blog The Operational Significant Event Imagery team produces high-resolution, detailed imagery of significant environmental events which are visible in remotely-sensed data available at the NOAA Science Center in Suitland, Maryland. "Events" include: + Current Events + Dust Storms + Fires + Floods + Icebergs + Ocean + Severe Weather + Snow Cover + Storms + Tropical Cyclones, Hurricanes, & Typhoons + Unique Imagery, such as Chesapeake Bay + Volcanoes Lists of Bests is a one-stop shop to find all the "best of" books, music, and movie lists. Which books have you read? Which CDs have you listened to? Which movies have you watched? Subscribe to: Posts (Atom) Follower My Links CompletePlanet Douay-Rheims Bible Internet Library For Librarians Internet Resources Newsletter Intute Pinakes Think Condi! About Me Frank_D Born July 1946, Viet Nam veteran, divorced, trying to leave a mark in the world... View my complete profile Blog Archive ►  2018 (3) ►  May (1) ►  April (1) ►  January (1) ►  2017 (1) ►  May (1) ►  2009 (1) ►  November (1) ►  2008 (1) ►  April (1) ►  2007 (48) ►  May (1) ►  April (6) ►  March (13) ►  February (5) ►  January (23) ►  2006 (9) ►  June (9) ►  2005 (31) ►  May (2) ►  April (1) ►  March (10) ►  February (7) ►  January (11) ▼  2004 (207) ▼  December (9) {FreePint is an online network of information sear... The Department of Education Free Resources website... Here's a quotations and proverbs search from Fagan... How to search the Internet, from UC Berkeley... An... There's a bunch of information on the Founding Fat... FDR and Eisenhower planned D-day on the USS Sequo... Answer the Homophone, will you? Worried about "no... Lenore Skenazy weighs in on automated bathrooms, i... Before In a photo provided by surgeon Dr. Carl ... ►  November (12) Voice of "Juan Valdez" Dies at 87 Thanks for wat... Arctic Countries Agree on Perils of Climate Change... Girl Is First to Survive Rabies Without a Shot As... Thankful for the settlers George Will November 25,... If you're into health food, read no further -- fo... From The American Minute What happened on Novem... Do you remember the Industorious Clock? Well chec... Who in the world are the Friends of Tuva? And what... Check this out! Join Now and ... "Cmdr. Buzz Corry",of Star of 'Space Patrol,' Dies... Now I know I'm getting old... Since when are th... It's Veterans' Day today, so don't forget to kiss ... ►  October (7) AT LAST! Pigs can fly, hell is frozen, the s... The Albany Times - Union has an exhaustive feature... <!-- add resource name and link below xxx--> Joe L... More about magnets than you could possibly want to... Bookman balks at 'Bootylicious' James J. Kilpatric... Disabled Are Pleased With E-Voting Associated Pre... Rodney Dangerfield will finally get some respect ... ►  September (1) On June 1, 1889, newspapers across the country bor... ►  August (19) I found a beautiful site today: Arte Maya Tz'utuh... There's a bunch of interesting search types at Aba... STEWARTVILLE, MN (AP) - A Rochester girl has found... American Environmental Photographs 4,500 photogr... America's Pride The United States c... The Origins project was organized around virtual f... Ok, sure. We've all got our little preconceived no... Andrea Almond Associated Press Simi Valley, CA Ma... Check out Ask Jeeves' new Smart Search It's fabulo... Citysearch is a leading local search service, prov... ►  July (21) ►  June (35) ►  May (67) ►  April (36)