angelm's Blog

Next time you're on an elevator and feel a little bored, liven up the moment with some of these insightful ideas.    1. When there's only one other person in the elevator, tap them on the shoulder and then pretend it wasn't you.

2. Push the buttons and pretend they give you a shock. Smile, and go back for more.

3. Call the Psychic Hotline from your cell phone and ask if they know what floor you're on.

4. Swat at flies that don't exist.

5. Grimace painfully while smacking your forehead and muttering, "Shut up, all of you, just shut up!"

6. Crack open your briefcase or purse, and while peering inside, ask, "Got enough air in there?"

7. Lay down a Twister mat and ask people if they'd like to play.

8. Leave a box in the corner, and when someone gets on, ask them if they hear something ticking.

9. Ask if you can push the button for other people, but push the wrong ones.

10. Pretend you are a flight attendant and review emergency procedures and exits with the passengers.

11. Stand silently and motionless in the corner, facing the wall, without getting off.

12. Stare, grinning at another passenger for a while, and then announce, "I have new socks on."

13. Draw a little square on the floor with chalk and announce to the other passengers, "This is my personal space!"

14. Fart loudly then exclaim "Was that you. There's no way I could do that one because unfortunately mine don't come out loud."

15. Before the elevator door opens shout "DING" and then laugh and say "beat you again Mr Elevator."

16. Stand really close to someone, sniffing them occasionally.

17. Hire a labrador, wear sunglasses and repeatedly walk into the walls whilst pretending to not hear the other passenger's direction.

18. Drop a pen and wait until someone reaches to help pick it up, then scream, "that's mine!"

19. Hold the doors open and say you're waiting for your friend. After a while, let the doors close and say, "Hi Greg. How's your day been?"

20. Stare at another passenger for a while, then announce in horror, "You're one of THEM!" and back away slowly.

Ingredients:

1 package of crushed vanilla wafers (around 16 ounces)
1 cup melted margarine 
1 can of drained, crushed pineapple (20 ounces)
1 8-ounce package of cream cheese
6 ripe bananas
2 cups of confectioners' sugar
1 (12-ounce) container frozen whipped topping (that has been allowed to thaw)
1/4 cup chopped walnuts (or whatever your favorite nuts are)
10 red (maraschino) cherries

Mix the vanilla wafers and the melted margarine and pat the mixture into the bottom of a 9x13 inch pan.

Beat the confectioners' sugar and the cream cheese until the mixture is fluffy. Spread it on top of the crust. Spoon the pineapple on top of the cream cheese layer. Slice the bananas and put them on top of the pineapple. Put on the whipped topping and then sprinkle with the nuts and cherries.

Blown-away Chihuahua reunited with owners

Mich. � Tinker Bell has been reunited with her owners after a 70-mph gust of wind picked up the six-pound Chihuahua and tossed her out of sight. Dorothy and Lavern Utley credit a pet psychic for guiding them on Monday to a wooded area nearly a mile from where 8-month-old Tinker Bell had been last seen. The brown long-haired dog was dirty and hungry but otherwise OK.

The Utleys, of Rochester, had set up an outdoor display Saturday at a flea market in Waterford Township, 25 miles northwest of Detroit. Tinker Bell was standing on their platform trailer when she was swept away.

Dorothy Utley tells The Detroit News that her cherished pet "just went wild" upon seeing her.

Jobs That Really Stink But Pay O.K.

Poultry processor (Salary range: $16,000-$30,000)
If you get grossed out pulling the gizzards from your plucked and processed chicken, imagine what it's like to be surrounded by the smells, sights, and sounds of a lively poultry processing plant. Workers quit their jobs at a rate five times that of the average employee. It's definitely not a job for the chicken-hearted.

Lift-pump remover (Salary range: $22,000-63,000)
Imagine getting paid to swim -- in sewage. Lift-pump removers actually dive right into the doo, sometimes five stories high, in order to lift a stuck pump in an area of a sewage treatment plant. You could say this is one crappy job.

Animal semen collector (Salary range: $17,000-$54,000)
The sperm of various animals is a necessary ingredient in artificial insemination, but it's not like a dairy bull can just walk into a private room with the latest Playbull in his hooves and walk out with a sample for the Mrs. That bull needs a hand, as do horses, pigs, goats, and even turkeys (who are notorious for low libido).

Diaper sorter (Salary range: $14,000-$27,000)
Cloth diapers are a noble answer to the mountains of disposables babies use annually (on average, 2,800 just for baby's first year). But someone has to sort through these dirty little nappies before they're cleaned and bleached for re-use. This is the kind of job you might take only to increase your bottom line.

Crime-scene cleaner (Salary range: $25,000-$68,000)
It's gruesome, it's gory, it's the stuff of nightmares. Bits of this and that can be splattered all over the place at a crime scene. It's a good job for someone with the guts for it -- or at least someone who doesn't mind cleaning them off the carpet.

Carcass cleaner (Salary range: $40,000-$85,000)
A distant cousin to the crime-scene cleaner, the carcass cleaner fixes up animal corpses so they're fit for display. Among their techniques: Using maggots or flesh-eating beetles or boiling the body. This isn't an entry-level job: Trained biologists, zoologists, and taxidermists usually get the gig.

Odor judge (Salary range: $19,000-$52,000)
As an odor judge, one day you could be sniffing armpits to see if a new deodorant is effective. The next you could be smelling bad breath, stinky feet, or used cat litter. If you're nosing around for a new job, keep in mind that people tend to stay in this line of work for a long time.

Aerosmith to settle lawsuit with Maui performance
Free tickets to see Aerosmith in Hawaii? Dream on, unless you happen to be one of 8,300 people left in the cold when the band canceled a sold-out concert in 2007.Aerosmith has agreed to perform on Maui to settle a class-action lawsuit filed by fans who alleged the band pulled out of the show in favor of a larger concert in Chicago and a more lucrative private performance for Toyota dealers on Oahu.
The suit claimed the cancellation cost Maui ticket buyers between $500,000 and $3 million in travel costs, handling fees and other expenses.

Strawberry Pie

1 unbaked pie crust, 1 quart fresh strawberries, 3 eggs, separated, 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 cup flour, whipped cream. Line a pie plate with rich pastry and fill with strawberries. Beat the egg yolks well, add sugar slowly, and beat until mixture is fluffy. Add flour and continue beating. Fold in beaten egg whites last, and pour mixture over strawberries. Bake in a hot oven (375�F) for 8 minutes. Reduce heat to 325�F and bake slowly until pastry is done. Serve hot with lots of whipped cream.

'Golden Girls' star Bea Arthur dies at 86

FILE - This Aug. 29, 1988 file photo shows actress Beatrice Arthur accepting her Emmy award at the 40th annual Emmy Awards ceremony in Pasadena, Ca. Family spokesman Dan Watt says the 86-year-old Arthur died at home early Saturday, April 25, 2009. He says Arthur had cancer, but declined to give further details. (AP Photo/Reed Saxon, File)Associated Press LOS ANGELES - Beatrice Arthur, the tall, deep-voiced actress whose razor-sharp delivery of comedy lines made her a TV star in the hit shows "Maude" and "The Golden Girls" and who won a Tony Award for the musical "Mame," died Saturday. She was 86.

Arthur died peacefully at her Los Angeles home with her family at her side, family spokesman Dan Watt said. She had cancer, Watt said, declining to give further details.

"She was a brilliant and witty woman," said Watt, who was Arthur's personal assistant for six years. "Bea will always have a special place in my heart."

Arthur first appeared in the landmark comedy series "All in the Family" as Edith Bunker's loudly outspoken, liberal cousin, Maude Finley. She proved a perfect foil for blue-collar bigot Archie Bunker (Carroll O'Connor), and their blistering exchanges were so entertaining that producer Norman Lear fashioned Arthur's own series.

In a 2008 interview with The Associated Press, Arthur said she was lucky to be discovered by TV after a long stage career, recalling with bemusement CBS executives asking about the new "girl."

"I was already 50 years old. I had done so much off-Broadway, on Broadway, but they said, 'Who is that girl? Let's give her her own series,'" Arthur said.

"Maude" scored with television viewers immediately on its CBS debut in September 1972, and Arthur won an Emmy Award for the role in 1977.

The comedy flowed from Maude's efforts to cast off the traditional restraints that women faced, but the series often had a serious base. Her husband Walter (Bill Macy) became an alcoholic, and she underwent an abortion, which drew a torrent of viewer protests. Maude became a standard bearer for the growing feminist movement in America.

The ratings of "Maude" in the early years approached those of its parent, "All in the Family," but by 1977 the audience started to dwindle. A major format change was planned, but in early 1978 Arthur announced she was quitting the show.

"It's been absolutely glorious; I've loved every minute of it," she said. "But it's been six years, and I think it's time to leave."

"Golden Girls" (1985-1992) was another groundbreaking comedy, finding surprising success in a television market increasingly skewed toward a younger, product-buying audience.

The series concerned three retirees ? Arthur, Betty White and Rue McClanahan ? and the mother of Arthur's character, Estelle Getty, who lived together in a Miami apartment. In contrast to the violent "Miami Vice," the comedy was nicknamed "Miami Nice."

As Dorothy Zbornak, Arthur seemed as caustic and domineering as Maude. She was unconcerned about the similarity of the two roles. "Look ? I'm 5-feet-9, I have a deep voice and I have a way with a line," she told an interviewer. "What can I do about it? I can't stay home waiting for something different. I think it's a total waste of energy worrying about typecasting."

The interplay among the four women and their relations with men fueled the comedy, and the show amassed a big audience and 10 Emmys, including two as best comedy series and individual awards for each of the stars.

In 1992, Arthur announced she was leaving "Golden Girls." The three other stars returned in "The Golden Palace," but it lasted only one season.

Arthur was born Bernice Frankel in New York City in 1922. When she was 11, her family moved to Cambridge, Md., where her father opened a clothing store. At 12 she had grown to full height, and she dreamed of being a petite blond movie star like June Allyson. There was one advantage of being tall and deep-voiced: She was chosen for the male roles in school plays.

Bernice ? she hated the name and adopted her mother's nickname of Bea ? overcame shyness about her size by winning over her classmates with wisecracks. She was elected the wittiest girl in her class. After two years at a junior college in Virginia, she earned a degree as a medical lab technician, but she "loathed" doing lab work at a hospital.

Acting held more appeal, and she enrolled in a drama course at the New School of Social Research in New York City. To support herself, she sang in a night spot that required her to push drinks on customers.

During this time she had a brief marriage that provided her stage name of Beatrice Arthur. In 1950, she married again, to Broadway actor and future Tony-winning director Gene Saks.

After a few years in off-Broadway and stock company plays and television dramas, Arthur's career gathered momentum with her role as Lucy Brown in the 1955 production of "The Threepenny Opera."

In 2008, when Arthur was inducted in the TV Academy Hall of Fame, Arthur pointed to the role as the highlight of her long career.

"A lot of that had to do with the fact that I felt, 'Ah, yes, I belong here,'" Arthur said.

More plays and musicals followed, and she also sang in nightclubs and played small roles in TV comedy shows.

Then, in 1964, Harold Prince cast her as Yente the Matchmaker in the original company of "Fiddler on the Roof."

Arthur's biggest Broadway triumph came in 1966 as Vera Charles, Angela Lansbury's acerbic friend in the musical "Mame," directed by Saks. Richard Watts of the New York Post called her performance "a portrait in acid of a savagely witty, cynical and serpent-tongued woman."

She won the Tony as best supporting actress and repeated the role in the unsuccessful film version that also was directed by Saks, starring Lucille Ball as Mame. Arthur would play a variation of Vera Charles in "Maude" and "The Golden Girls."

Ingredients:
4 ounces  sweet chocolate
1/4 cup margarine
1/4 cup sugar
2 eggs, slightly beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup chopped nuts
.
Cream Cheese Topping:
4 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon flour

Melt chocolate and margarine over very low heat. Stir sugar into chocolate mixture; add eggs and vanilla stir until completely mixed. Mix in flour until well blended. Stir in nuts. Spread in greased and floured 8-inch square pan.
topping. Mix cream cheese, sugar, egg and flour until smooth. Spoon over brownie batter mixture in pan, swirl with knife to make a "marble" pattern. Bake at 350� for about 30 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out almost clean.

INGREDIENTS:
3 6-inch flour tortillas 
Cooking spray 
1 1/2 tablespoons sugar 
1 1/2 cups fresh strawberries, cleaned and hulled 
1 tablespoon orange juice 
8 ounces vanilla yogurt 
1 cup chopped strawberries 
1/2 cup shredded coconut or white chocolate shavings 
1. To make the tortilla chips, heat the oven to 350�. Cut the tortillas into triangles, lay them on a baking sheet, and spritz them with cooking spray.

2. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of sugar over the tops of the tortillas and bake for 12 minutes or until crisp.

3. For homemade strawberry sauce, combine the strawberries, orange juice, and the remaining 1/2 tablespoon sugar in a blender. Puree the ingredients until smooth.

4. Once the chips have cooled, set them on a plate. To complete the buffet, set out separate bowls containing the strawberry sauce, yogurt, chopped strawberries, and coconut or chocolate shavings

23 Ways to Drive Your Co-Works Insane

1) At lunchtime, sit in your parked car and point a hair dryer at passing cars to see if they slow down.

2) Page yourself over the intercom. (Don't disguise your voice.)

3) Insist that your e-mail address be Xena-goddess-of-fire@companyname.com or Elvis-the-king@companyname.com.

4) Every time someone asks you to do something, ask if they want fries with that.

5) Encourage your colleagues to join you in a little synchronized chair dancing.

6) Put your garbage can on your desk and label it 'IN.'

7) Develop an unnatural fear of staplers.

8) Put decaf in the coffee maker for 3 weeks. Once everyone has gotten over their caffeine addictions, switch to espresso.

9) Put masking tape on the floor of your office in the shape of a corpse. If anyone asks, "He was the last guy to ask me for something!"

10) Reply to everything someone says with "That's what you think."

11) Finish all your sentences with "In accordance with the prophecy."

12) Adjust the tint on your monitor so that the brightness level lights up the entire working area. Insist to others that you like it that way.

13) Dont use any punctuation

14) As often as possible, skip rather than walk.

15) Ask people what sex they are.

16) Specify that your drive through order is "to go."

17) Sing along at the opera.

18) Go to a poetry recital and ask why the poems don't rhyme.

19) Find out where your boss shops and buy exactly the same outfits. Wear them one day after your boss does. (This is especially effective if your boss is the opposite gender.)

20) Send e-mail to the rest of the company to tell them what you're doing. For example: "If anyone needs me, I'll be in the bathroom."

21) Put mosquito netting around your cubicle.

22) Five days in advance, tell your friends you can't attend their party because you're not in the mood.

Tequila Grilled Beef Steaks
Ingredients:
4 8 to 10 oz New York strip steaks, trimmed -- 1 - 1-1/2 inch
1/2 cup tequila
2 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon pepper
2 teaspoons grated lemon peel
1 clove garlic, minced
salt to taste

Instructions:
With a damp paper towel, wipe steaks; put meat in a 1- gallon plastic food bag. Add tequila, oil, pepper, lemon peel, and garlic; seal bag, and turn to mix seasonings. Set bag in a bowl; chill at least 1 hour or up to 1 day; turn bag over occasionally. Drain steaks and place on a grill 4 to 6 inches above a solid bed of hot coals, or set gas barbecue at this heat). Turn steaks to brown evenly; for medium-rare (cut to test), cook 12 to 14 minutes. meat to  Serves 4.

Botulinum ToxinDeadliest Thing Ever

Botulinum toxin is produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum and it is, beyond a doubt, the deadliest known protein. If the clostridium botulinum spores find their way to food or wounds, they will begin to release the toxin which leads to poisoning if eaten. It is so deadly that a mere two pounds (roughly 1kg) of the stuff is enough to kill the entire human population. It is so deadly that it is potentially useful as a biological weapon. This is the kind of thing we obviously want to keep right away from right? Well, no. Millions of people have this deadly protein injected into their face every year; it is present in minute quantities in Botox which is used to "treat" wrinkles.

Hard work doesn't pay
The average worker gets a raise every year but has less money to spend. Why? Inflation and health insurance costs gobble up the raise -- and more.
This By Scott Burns
I'd like to say a few words about the futility of work.

I'm serious.

Take a look around. Today, we're all 24/7, strutting with BlackBerrys and Bluetooths, miles from the long-lost desk and office, not to mention home. At the risk of being rude, I'm wondering if all this frenzied effort pays off.

We know it does for some.

If it didn't, Starbucks and Whole Foods would not exist. There wouldn't be enough people who can afford $3 for a cup of coffee or $2.69 a pound for free-range organic chicken.

But the operative word here is "some." It's time for Joseph Vineyard, the trendy guy who eats free-range chicken, to meet Joe Six-Pack.

If you look at the averages, the statistics give a simple message: Hard work does not equate to economic progress. It hasn't for decades. We may need hard work to keep body and soul together -- not to mention pay the Visa bill -- but average-worker paychecks clearly show that inflation continues to trump wage gains for most American workers.

Deep doo-doo wouldn't do for Texas cattle rancher

COMANCHE, Texas � Mack Stark figures cattle raisers can appreciate the name of his west central Texas ranch and makes no apologies for the words in big black letters on the steel arch over the dirt and gravel driveway. The name's not exactly fit to print, but let's just say "Deep Droppings Cattle Co." or "Deep Excrement Cattle Co." wouldn't have the same effect. "That has a ring to it," the 75-year-old rancher said.

A ring of truth, Lavon Stark, his wife of almost 45 years, chimes in.

"If you've ever been in the cattle business, you know," she added.

After all, it's why cowboy boots go up almost to your knees. That comes in handy in this part of the state where manure runs deep and cars are outnumbered by cattle haulers rumbling along Texas Highway 36 in and out of Comanche, about 10 miles to the west of the Starks' 140-acre ranch.

And thus the name Mack Stark gave to his operation "six or eight years ago" after a tough day of herding and moving cattle and, naturally, stepping in it.

As he tells the story, after a third trip one day with a hauler to the cattle auction, somebody asked where this latest load was coming from. A tired and dirty Mack Stark blurted out a name that some now might consider a not-so-polite term for the economic situation of the nation.

"He has a dry sense of humor sometimes," Lavon Stark, 72, says.

The name � like its namesake � stuck.

The Starks' sons didn't forget the comment and made him a sign as a gift.

"He just died laughing," his wife recalled.

She asked him if he was certain he wanted to put it up along the highway.

"I sure do," he replied.

Mack Stark said the only really negative reaction came from "one old lady at Rising Star (a nearby town) about how sorry I was for putting that up. She didn't like it. I just let it go at that."

Somebody once stole the sign in the middle of the night, so Mack Stark just went to town and ordered new letters and made a fancier sign flanked by silhouettes of cattle.

It's a tourist attraction of sorts as people spot it and turn around to take pictures � a highway maneuver that Mack Stark worries will lead to a wreck.

"They come all day and into the night," he said. "I'm afraid somebody is going to get killed."

Parishioners unveil Lego statue of Jesus
STOCKHOLM � Parishioners at a church in Sweden celebrated Easter on Sunday by unveiling a 6-foot-tall (1.8-meter-tall) statue of Jesus that they had built out of 30,000 Lego blocks.

It took the 40 volunteers about 18 months to put all the tiny plastic blocks together, and their creation shows a standing Jesus facing forward with his arms outstretched.

The Protestant church was filled to capacity with about 400 worshippers on Sunday when the statue went on display behind the altar, and some of the children in the congregation couldn't help but touch the white art work.

Church spokesman Per Wilder said the statue at the Onsta Gryta church in the central Swedish city of Vasteras is a copy of Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen's "Christus" statue on display in Copenhagen.

He also said that even though the statue is all white on the outside, many of the donated Legos that the church received were of other colors and were placed inside.