RESTORING HONOR

Joseph Smith Jr

America is under attack from a religion that would see its freedoms taken away, see the clock of progress turned back and assure the institution of a theocracy. These religious fanatics are building their houses of worship in our backyards and, worse, being recognized by the highest levels of our political system. As it is often said, they hate America for its freedom.

Of course, we're speaking of the Mormonofascists. READ MORE

ALFRED HITCHCOCK WOULD BE AMUSED

In San Francisco if you've been by the Palace of the Legion of Honor, Mission Dolores or Fort Point lately and noticed an intense woman with dark hair sketching furiously, it might have been Kim Novak. She's been coming to San Francisco for decades, retracing the path of her most famous character, Madeleine in "Vertigo." In a move that would have amused Hitchcock, Novak disguises   herself by wearing a brown wig. And here's a further irony: She swears she has spotted people taking their own "Vertigo" tour. "They do little things that Madeleine does, like they are reliving the scenes," says Novak, who has sketches to prove it.She hasn't been a major star for more than 40 years. Yet, like Madeleine, Novak continues to draw fans. Every decade or so, when she makes herself available to the public, there's enormous curiosity about the blond sex symbol who went on to have a life apart from Hollywood.
The latest occasion for a Novak sighting is the release of five of her films in a DVD boxed set. They are a mixed bag - "Picnic" shows her at her most sultry, dancing with William Holden to "Moonglow"; "Middle of the Night" implausibly pairs her with Fredric March, bringing out the worst in both of them - but are of interest because all were made under Harry Cohn's rule at Columbia Picturesduring the last gasp of the studio system.
Novak, who is 77 and became a grandmother six months ago, has spent recent mornings at her mansion in Eagle Point, Ore., talking to the media. It reminds her of her studio days, when she would take the train across the country and be met by the press at every stop. Photographers would keep telling her to lift her skirt a little higher, please. "That's why I never wear a skirt anymore," she says. "I only wear pants."
That attire also suits her life of painting, sculpting and riding horses on her several hundred acres. She and her husband of 34 years, veterinarian Robert Malloy, used to raise llamas.
"We don't raise them anymore, but we still have some," Novak says. "They are all pretty old, living out their days like we are."

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi? /a/2010/08/27/PK2I1EJ34A.DTL&type=movies#ixzz0y7JbOjCN

I HAVE A SCHEME

A STRANGE RING GALAXY

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Is this one galaxy or two? Astronomer Art Hoag first asked this question when he chanced upon this unusual extragalactic object. On the outside is a ring dominated by bright blue stars, while near the center lies a ball of much redder stars that are likely much older. Between the two is a gap that appears almost completely dark. How Hoag's Object formed remains unknown, although similar objects have been identified and collectively labeled as a form of ring galaxy. Genesis hypotheses include a galaxy collision billions of years ago and the gravitational effect of a central bar that has since vanished. 

This image, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in July 2001, reveals unprecedented details of Hoag's Object and may yield a better understanding. Hoag's Object spans about 100,000 light years and lies about 600 million light years away toward the constellation of the Snake (Serpens). Coincidentally, visible in the gap (at about one o'clock) is yet another ring galaxy that likely lies far in the distance.
Image Credit: NASA, R. Lucas (STScI/AURA)

FAIR AND BALANCED

HUFFPOST'S QUICKREAD...

News Corp. Executives Actually Recently Met With Saudi Billionaire In Mosque Controversy »

August 24, 2010 at 02:45 PM

By now, you may have heard about how on last night's edition of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart made fantastic comedic hay out of a Fox And Friendssegment, in which the gathered panel indulged in some outsized fearmongery over Cordoba initiative funding without mentioning how the shadowy, unnamed figure at the center of controversy, Saudi prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, was "one of the biggest shareholders of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp." Per our own Katla...

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A WONDER OF THE UNIVERSE

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Researchers do not yet know what is lighting up IRAS 05437+2502, a small, faint nebula that spans only 1/18th of a full moon toward the constellation of the Taurus. Particularly enigmatic is the bright upside-down V that defines the upper edge of this floating mountain of interstellar dust.

This ghost-like nebula involves a small star-forming region filled with dark dust that was first noted in images taken by the IRAS satellite in infrared light in 1983. This recently released image from the Hubble Space Telescope shows many new details, but has not uncovered a clear cause of the bright sharp arc. 

I'D VOTE FOR HIM

HALFASS

HERB RITTS MASTERPIECE

"Wicked Game" is a 1989 song by Chris Isaak from his third studio album Heart Shaped World. Despite being released as a single in 1989, it didn't become a hit until it was later featured in the David Lynch film Wild at Heart. Lee Chesnut, an Atlanta radio station music director who was obsessed with David Lynch films, began playing the song and it quickly became a nationwide top ten hit in January 1991, reaching #6 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, making it the only hit song of his career in the U.S.
Top Model: Helena Christensen - Miss Denmark 1986 // Video directed by Herb Ritts.

TRISKAIDEKAGHOBIK NIGHTMARE

A 13-year-old boy was struck by lightning — at 13:13 hours on Friday the 13th, according to reports.

The teen was watching an air show at Lowestoft, England, when he was struck and was later treated for burns to his shoulder, the U.K.'s Mirror newspaper said. He is expected to fully recover.

Rex Clarke, leader of the St. John Ambulance team that treated the child, described what happened.

"Suddenly there was this huge crack of lightning really close to the seafront and really loud thunder," he told the Mirror. "Seconds later we got a call someone had been hit. The boy was breathing and was conscious."

"He had a minor burn to his shoulder and was taken to hospital as a precaution. It could have been a lot worse," he said, adding: "It's all a bit strange that he was 13, and it happened at 13:13 on Friday the 13th."

triskaidekaphobia |ˌtriskīˌdekəˈfōbēə; ˌtriskə-|nounextreme superstition regarding the number thirteen.ORIGIN early 20th cent.: from Greek treiskaideka ‘thirteen’ + -phobia .

SO SIMPLE

ONE MORE COUNTRY FOR EQUALITY

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The wins keep pouring in! Late this afternoon Mexico's Supreme Court ruled that all 31 states must recognize same-sex marriages performed in the nation's capital, which at the moment is the only place they are legal. Mexico City is a separate federal entity, much like Washington, DC.

ISLAND UNIVERSE

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A long-exposure Hubble Space Telescope image shows a majestic face-on spiral galaxy located deep within the Coma Cluster of galaxies, which lies 320 million light- years away in the northern constellation Coma Berenices. The galaxy, known as NGC 4911, contains rich lanes of dust and gas near its center. These are silhouetted against glowing newborn star clusters and iridescent pink clouds of hydrogen, the existence of which indicates ongoing star formation. Hubble has also captured the outer spiral arms of NGC 4911, along with thousands of other galaxies of varying sizes. The high resolution of Hubble's cameras, paired with considerably long exposures, made it possible to observe these faint details.

This natural-color Hubble image, which combines data obtained in 2006, 2007, and 2009 from the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 and the Advanced Camera for Surveys, required 28 hours of exposure time.
Image Credit: NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

Fog Town, Summer In The City - 7 p.m. Once again, San Francisco lived up to its foggy, cold reputation as locals were subjected to one of the coldest summers in memory. It sure is beautiful, though. 

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"The coldest winter I ever remember was a summer in San Francisco".....attributed to Samuel Clements (Mark Twain).

GREAT BALLS OF FIRE

On August 1, 2010, almost the entire Earth-facing side of the sun erupted in a tumult of activity. This image from the Solar Dynamics Observatory of the news-making solar event on August 1 shows the C3-class solar flare (white area on upper left), a solar tsunami (wave-like structure, upper right), multiple filaments of magnetism lifting off the stellar surface, large-scale shaking of the solar corona, radio bursts, a coronal mass ejection and more.

This multi-wavelength extreme ultraviolet snapshot from the Solar Dynamics Observatory shows the sun's northern hemisphere in mid-eruption. Different colors in the image represent different gas temperatures. Earth's magnetic field is still reverberating from the solar flare impact on August 3, 2010, which sparked aurorae as far south as Wisconsin and Iowa in the United States. Analysts believe a second solar flare is following behind the first flare and could re-energize the fading geomagnetic storm and spark a new round of Northern Lights.
Credit: NASA/SDO/AIA

100 YEAR OLD EDISON FILM

For maximum impact, view it in Full-Screen mode at 1080p resolution (click "Play," select 1080p, then click the  icon, or else the picture will be fuzzy and small).