http://www.weshow.com/de/p/27370/interview_mit_dem_wrestler_batista_engl

hello everyone, how are you? anyways today I am doing alright I guess its firday :)  I have so much home work to do getting stressed out..ahhhhh I hate getting stressed its not fun :( anyways everyone I want to say thank to two my very good friends buck & mcmahon 101 for supporting me and candy too she is so cool and cades girl too all of you have been so nice to me on here I really thank for helping me thorugh things on here :) well everyone make sure you all watch smack down 2 night

HUGS EVERYONE

MAKE SURE YOU ALL WATCH MONDAY NIGHT RAW NEXT WEEK

BYEEEEEE

FROM ALANA

Hey Y'All! If you missed Randy performing "Anything Goes" on Letterman, we got ya covered. You can watch the performance right here: http://lateshow.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow/live/index/php/963780.phtml?play=1 Enjoy! www.randyhouser.com

I know this isn't about the WWE Superstars, but I thought I would let you all see it...Let me know what you think. (You will probably enjoy it more if you know a bit about Batman)

 If The Penguin Were Female... 

If The Penguin were female, she'd probably be me. The name's Penelope Halwind (it's not my birth name). I was raised in a trailer park. That should give you some good stereotypical images; all of them true, in my case anyway. I was not about to, as the song goes, "spend the rest of my life with my head hung down in shame." I did EVERYTHING my parents wouldn't, or wouldn't 'let me,' do. This however brought up a concern: finances.

Alas, I am not the svelte cat burglar one of my, I mean The Penguin's, biggest advisaries is. I am 4'11" (in thick-soled shoes) and, since it is unpopular for a woman to reveal her weight, let's just say I am ponderous. You may not be surprised how many trailer park rednecks will jump at the chance to bed anyone, and at the cost of everything of value they own. Including their lives if they doublecross me. See, many of them became my 'henchmen.' I paid them extremely well; anything they wanted. Money, girls, anything. For you see, I was after my own version of the brass ring.

While they stayed out of my way I made my own rounds of Society. I got into tapings of the most popular TV shows, movie sets, art galleries, etc. Then I met my Batman.

Out of all the phony Hollywood types I met I did not expect a simple "gold plated bachelor" to knock me for a loop. At first we just met at the parties of mutual acquaintances but I soon noticed he was watching me. What was his deal? Did he know about my past? I eventually got so angry I couldn't stand it anymore.

I followed him out of a party, pulled myself up to my full height and said "I would like a moment of your time, sir. Privately." He actually smiled and said I could name the time and place. He did have a nice smile...

"My penthouse. This Friday night."

"A date, Penelope?" he smirked. This ruffled my feathers. I replied with a curt ‘No. Sir.'

Friday came and I awaited his presence. When he showed up, well dressed as usual even though informal, he held a rose.

"I have noticed you watching me" I started as I accepted the rose. "Why? I have no notion of your having any intentions toward me. It is plain rude."

He looked around my place and right into my eyes. It was like he could see right through me. I was shocked by this and broke the contact, but not before noticing a sadness in his eyes. How much did he bloody know!?

"May I sit down." Yes, it was a statement. As in where were my manners?

"Well, yes, of course. I do pride myself on my civility. Would you care for a drink?"

We talked until dawn. About frivolities! I hadn't laughed that much in years, maybe ever. He asked to meet again. I said yes.

We met several times after that. The meetings became a highlight of my week. He was not like any other man I had known. He was really trying to be a friend. He even started calling me a cute nickname: Pigeon.

I became more and more worried he would find out about my secret life. I had even begun picking bird themed objects to steal. Before I could puzzle it all out he showed up one night outside a place I was robbing. There I was with my umbrella open against the rain, waiting for my henchmen to return, and I saw him looking right at me. He stopped coming over.

The fairy tale wasn't going to happen, and honestly I didn't care. I had changed however. I could not go on as deeply involved as I was in the underworld. So I bought myself a little cafe. After hours I still deal in stolen merchandise, for a nice profit. I even call it Pigeon's Place. Come in sometime for the house special: "The Bird of Paradise."

Russia's foreign exchange reserves fell by $16.4 billion to stand at $581.1 billion during the week starting Aug. 8 and ending Aug. 15, when war broke out between Russia and Georgia over the breakaway region of South Ossetia, according to figures released Thursday by the central bank of Russia. "This is to the best of our knowledge by far the largest one-week capital outflow in Russia's history, larger than the $12 billion outflow in the third quarter of 1998, at the time of the financial crisis," wrote analysts at Goldman Sachs New Markets Economic Research.

"It's pretty clear that we're back to the worst geopolitical tensions since the end of the Cold War," Christensen said

U.S. dollar appreciation and falling gold prices together contributed roughly $5.5 billion to the decline in Russia's foreign exchange reserves in the week ending Aug. 15, wrote analysts at Goldman Sachs New Markets Economic Research.

The first two days of the war in South Ossetia triggered a sharp depreciation of the ruble against its dollar/euro (55%/45%) dual currency basket. That depreciation was stopped only by central bank interventions.

The Russians are having to face up to the fact that there is a huge price to pay for their bully-boy tactics. The men who control the worlds supply of money don't like waves, and the Russians are making plenty of them at the moment.

It all right Putin poncing about with dart guns, but that wont impress the international financiers

Hey Y'All! If you missed Randy performing "Anything Goes" on Letterman, we got ya covered. You can watch the performance right here: http://lateshow.cbs.com/latenight/lateshow/live/index/php/963780.phtml?play=1 Enjoy! www.randyhouser.com

I can't believe it! My daughters just started preschool for two year olds!! I have been working full time and going to school and I was so nervious to have them start. It's so amazing to see them there, you can see them learning from everything. Well, I have to get going, take care ladies!

<3 Heather 

LA CARTA

Te vi pasar,

una noche,

la luna dijo a mi oído:

"Recuérdala una vez más".

"Te hizo sentir muy hombre,

cuando el viento te azotó,

te regaló su destino,

sabiendo que no vendrías".

Busqué en una estrella

que se coloreó de azul,

que entregó su camino,

al pleno mar brillante.

Pasaron días y noches,

no pude saber de ti.

Mas reconocí el lucero

que me guió aquel ocaso.

Estando cerca,

no recordé la imagen,

que siempre tuve grabada...

Seguiste siendo tan joven,

Seguiste siendo tan cándida...

Me diste tu mano blanca,

Me guareciste del frío,

Y me dijiste, muy seria:

"¡Cuantas cosas te advertí...!

Recorriendo dos caminos

Uno de ellos te he dejado;

Ya no eres limosnero.

Yo te esperaba algún día

con la llave de la cueva,

de la nueva encrucijada.

La lluvia te tiene preso

En la nube en que volabas.

Si me has traído la carta...

No necesitas palabras,

tus ojos lo dicen todo.

Te regalo mi futuro...

a cambio de tu mirada.

I know Im going out on a long limb here but I predict that the NY Giants will defeat the Washington Redskins 16-7 as they open their defense of the Super Bowl title they won last season.  I also predict that the Redskins will, at times, look totally clueless in the game. 

I hope I am right! 

 I suppose David Blunkett's proposal, that we should all work while yet we are still capable of getting out of bed in the morning, is one way of solving the pension crisis.  He argues that "people should stop assuming that the Government had "prime responsibility" for supporting them through "the ever increasing years of retirement".  In other words, he can see that there is no way that the government will be able to meet its commitments as far as pensions are concerned, so that those who are in final salary pension schemes (ie those who work for the state, or who are sufficiently old that they are in an existing scheme) will be able to walk away and wave at the poor sad saps who will not only have to pay to keep these people, but will not even be able to look forward to any sort of retirement for themselves.

 As far as I know, pensions were first dreamt up by Bismarck, who brought in a retirement age of 70 at a point where "The actuarial tables for Germans 1871-80 register the average male life expectancy at birth as 35.6 years and the female at 38.4."  (The same statistics for 2002 give a life expectancy of 75.9 and 81.5 years respectively.)  So the retirement age (which was reduced to 65 in 1916) was set at a time when the expectation was that most people would not live that long.  The trouble these days is that we are not only living long, healthy lives, we are expecting a reasonable standard of living long after we have paid for it.  Every government uses existing payments to pay for pensioners, and assumes that the population and the GDP and everything else will continue to rise inexorably, so that the books will balance.  With a recession looming, however, the amount that the government can expect to receive in taxes will fall, as will the numbers in work.

This poses a conundrum for the government, namely, how to continue to meet people's expectations without bankrupting the nation in the process, or imposing taxes at such a level that the most productive of our citizens decide to take themselves off to a more congenial tax regime.  The thing that immediately occurs to me is: how can a government at once tell older people that in effect, they may not retire, and at the same time expect that there will be enough jobs for the young people who are annually joining the workforce? 

 It is a vicious circle, as the wholesale employment of women has demonstrated: you get more people into work, but there are not really that many more jobs that need doing, in a country which has precious little manufacturing industry of any sort, and where agriculture is not only subject to attacks from a government that really does not understand the countryside, but where such jobs on the land as exist are snapped up by incomers from Eastern Europe.  Consequently, in councils up and down the land, there are pretend jobs such as the ludicrous Equality and Diversity Advisor for the Suffolk Fire and Rescue Service, and any other number of politically correct busybodies churning out paper to no avail at thirty thousand pounds a year or more.  What we are not doing is creating more productive jobs for those who prefer to work with their hands rather than with a pencil, many of whom end up leading miserable lives on benefits for their entire lives.

 Meanwhile, those employers who look at their greying workforces and hope to inject a little new blood into a stagnating enterprise will find, increasingly, that legislation will not let them get rid of the employee who is, frankly, past it.  We may all of us be able to look round at others whom we hope will be pensioned off sooner rather than later - but which of us will admit for ourselves that we are not quite so fast, so quick on the uptake, so willing to learn new skills, so adept at dealing with changes in our working environment, as once we were?  Who willingly will ask to be made redundant, when an unwilling state has, in effect, said that there will be nothing there at the end of the line?

 For make no mistake about it, the sting of Mr Blunkett's words were in the tail - "people should be prepared to use equity release schemes to pay for their care in retirement, rather than protecting the value of their inheritances to their families."  In other words, don't think that because you have toiled all your life to pay your mortgage, have lain awake fretting over how to afford the repairs to your roof, have scrimped and saved for that new kitchen, and are now in a position to have sufficient room for the grandchildren and no mortgage to pay, that the government has not got an eye on your assets, and is intent on relieving you of it at the earliest possible opportunity.  

 The paper from which I quoted above suggests that rather than raising the pensionable age, people should be encouraged to move gradually into part-time work, and makes the observation that "productivity per hour in many work functions increases when a worker moves from full- to part-time."  To put it in perspective, "If the German retirement system had added as many years to the retirement age as we added to the overall life expectancy over the past century, the official retirement age would stand at around 95 years rather than 65 years."  Do we really want still to be working into our nineties?  How much more shall we then resent having to pay for those paper pushers of state who do no real work at all, to say nothing of a government that is simply waiting to relieve us of any tangible benefit we have accrued from all those years of work.    

*sigh*

I finally got my brain to calm down for a minute.

The trees are cleared and MAN what a different view now.

The pile of debris is still here *ugh* even though the city said they would come get it. Kent waited too late to call them, I think. He called while I was out with Cece paying bills this morning. So I am as ready as one can be for a hurricane/tropical storm. We are already seeing cloud bands and the threat of rain is imminent in a few hours. We will be on the windiest side of the storm at first. My back yard looks deserted. I’m going to take a few pictures after this blog to note before and after, hopefully there won’t be much difference!

We took the shower apart and laid it down, lashed everything in the yard, that isn’t coming inside, down, including the trampoline. Kent says I am worrying him to death about the firewood out back, I bagged up everything that had nails in it, the logs I left out there, I just do not want to know that something I neglected to take inside became a missile and hurt someone or tore up something.

Robin and I sat out front last night in her swing, talking about storms and stuff, and I couldn’t help but think, man I love my neighbors! I’m so grateful for living next to people we get along with, and they know they can depend on us and we can depend on them.

I later came inside and out of frustration of being hungry, I rounded up all the nasty canned goods I had and made a huge crock pot of vegetable soup. Its good, but it needs some chicken in it.

I refreshed all our water supply. I keep the utility room stocked with water, and in a little while I will wash up the dishes and get my stock pot cleaned out if there is threat of having to boil water for a while.

I’m trying to prepare for having no power. Last hurricane we had no power for 9 days. While we tried to eliminate that with the tree trimming, still, these things happen. I’ve got a new supply of pagan books to keep us occupied and of course Connie and I have work sheets galore.

I had Connie pack her backpack with clothes in case something happens that we need to leave here. I’ll pack mine and kent’s later. He called the shipyards emergency line and he is to go in to work at 3, he’s taking an extra long nap right now, in case he ends up being awake all night.

If you don’t see me blogging for a few days, that’ll be a pretty fair indicator of having no power.

The liaison at the realty company gave me a break about paying half the rent now and the rest next Friday. That was a nice change, since I’m usually wondering where she is hiding her horns. Cece took me and got all my stuff done, I had 26 dollars left and got eggs, butter, pop tarts and tide. Kent is not too happy about being broke again, but Robin gave him a carton of cigarettes so he can’t complain too loudly.

Well, I’m off to get those before pics. Then to wait for it to hit.

Bring it on, Hanna!! I’m ready LOL ( I think)

Shaun Ellis is known as the wolfman, you may have heard of him, if not google him, he is a fascinating character.

He rescues abandoned wolf pups and instead of domesticating them, he prepares them to be returned to the wild. There is so much that I could write about him here but I am afraid I don't think my poor arms could take that amount of typing, suffice to say that he is amazing.

I just wanted to share this heart-melting, beautiful and wonderful video.

Dear Internet,

I've admired you for a long while, and it's high time we got more acquainted. I've always been a huge fan of print media - newspapers in particular, which I've read vocariously since I was about as tall as the Telegraph is wide.

I've resented your rise in the last decade, as you have gathered a whole generation of readers who would otherwise be reading journalism that was more reliable, more intellectual and researched with more integrity.

But I've come to realise what you represent, and actually, I kind of like it.

Although I've always been looking forward to a career in more traditional publishing, the idea of crossover between newspapers and the web is a exciting proposition - and telegraph.co.uk seems to be the perfect place to begin.

So, for now I'll be using this space to discuss news stories that I find interesting and my views on topics that I think should have more dicussion. Oh, and writing about myself from time to time - I'm very interesting you know. (Well, I think so...)

So it's good to meet you, internet. I hope this is a long and happy relationship.

Yours,

Asif Aziz

ALL THE PICS FROM WEDNESDAY NIGHT AT GREEN IGUANA ANDERSON ROAD

CLICK THE PHOTO TO SEE ALL

Domino and TaJai of the hip-hop collective Hieroglyphics (pictured above with Capcom’s own Marisol) stopped by the mighty Capcom HQ yesterday.  They were here to talk about some upcoming projects and, of course, to play some Street Fighter IV. 

Though it was their first time playing IV, they picked it right up and were busting out the fireballs like they were back at the 7-11. Stay tuned to see what Capcom and the Hieroglyphics crew may cook up next...

SIN CONDICIONES

Siempre pienso en ti

Desde lo infinito de mi ser...

Hoy miro  la noche blanca

Sin tu atuendo fino y transparente.

Figuras de luz reflejan tu silueta en mi mente...

¡Como me arde la piel, cuando observo tu imagen!

¿Serás vampira de amor,

O te llevaste en tus labios

Mi sangre de hombre de ley?

Siendo pecado amarte,

He de pagar mi castigo, por sentirte bien profunda

En mis entrañas y mis sentimientos.

Que me lleven a lo lejos, sin cobija,

El hombre, por ser amado, tiene calor en el frío,

Solo déjenme un hada que me recuerde tu nombre,

Tu hechizo y, de flores, quiero tu agua fresca,

La cambio por realidades, sin tener donde esconderte.

Pecador de los placeres,

Construiré tu casa en el fondo de los mares,

Respetarán mi guarida, las criaturas más feroces

Al saber que allí vivimos, con amor y sin temores,

Con vida desconocida pero llena de colores.

Y los robles, bien marcados, llevan grabado tu nombre.

Al no renunciar a ti, ni entregarte a las mentiras,

Saber que nuestro calvario es amarnos siempre,

Tenernos es ocultarnos para poder disfrutarlo,

Y así, lejos de mundo, no llegará la envidia,

Aunque arriesguemos la vida.

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Today was WID. I was up a lb - 188.2. I guess just the thought of my cheat meal is enough to make those numbers jump.  For real, I'm trying to be level headed about it. 

I was sickly this last week and water consumption wasn't perfect, like usual.  I also upped my workout intensity.  I'm sure there's more than just one factor that went into this, including the nasty hormones beginning to fluctuate.  Ughhhh....

Back when RC had raised my calories to knock me off a plateau I started making notes to learn from my experiences.  The things I noticed when I was being underfed were, very tired, loss of appetite, and retain water, or gain "weight".  I think I may have hit that point this week and didn't even realize. 

Old mentality of "do more, lose more" seeped in when I know better than that.  So, I know the 188 is just water.  The cheat meal that I really want to avoid because of the weight gain may in fact be more what I need right now, not what I should be avoiding. 

I'm going to raise my calories 200 on days I have intense workouts though in hopes of keeping my body from going into starvation mode.

Tonight is KILLA legs with Mark.  Yummmmmy!  We'll hit glutes as well.  I'm starting to notice my gluteus medius showing through - YAYYY!  This is also the muscle that may be adding to my back/hip problems.  So definitely some changes there.  It's amazing the other changes I can SEE at this point in my weight loss.  I can honestly say even though I'm heavier than my lowest ever weight, I am at a place I have NEVER EVER been with my physique and it feels really good!  It's an unbelievable feeling.

We'll check in with tonight's report tonight or tomorrow.

PEACE OUT!