Monthly Archive for July, 2009

Doggy Sex Dolls Unveiled

Published on July 31, 2009 in Humor. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Okay, now I have seen it all:

MANY dogs are happy enough to be man’s best friend, but those in need of a bit more “companionship” can now get their own sex doll.

The Doggie Lover Doll, made by PetSmiling, was unveiled at a pet industry convention in Brazil last week.

The company describes the product as: “A female canine manufactured in soft rubber with a silicon vagina and an easy to clean reservoir.”

Its creator, PetSmiling owner Marcos Giroto, said he came up with the idea after noticing his own dog’s frustration.

“I had the idea to make this doll when my Maltese started to grab everybody’s legs,” Mr Giroto said.

“I did some research and couldn’t find anything like it, anywhere in the world. (So) I decided to make it.”

He said his own dog showed a “better quality of life” after being part of the product’s testing.  [News.com]

Seriously, is there really a market out there for this?

Miss Universe Australia Rachael Finch Chased By Crocodile

Published on July 31, 2009 in Wildlife. 1 Comment Tags: , .

Here is an only in Australia story for you:

MISS Universe Australia Rachael Finch met some crocodiles during her Northern Territory visit yesterday and had to run for her life when a 5m croc named Eric lunged at her.

The stunner told the Northern Territory News it was an incredible – yet scary – experience.

She said it was one of the more unusual events she had been involved in since being announced winner of the pageant in April.

“As soon as I saw him move I got nervous,” she said as she laughed about her brush with the huge saltie.

The bubbly beauty visited Crocodylus Park in Darwin to meet some of the biggest crocs in captivity.

The park was established 30 years ago and is home to more than a thousand crocs from 30cm long hatchlings to massive adults.

Finch left Darwin last night to begin her trip to the Bahamas where she will represent Australia at the international finale of Miss Universe in August.  [Northern Territory News]

These types of stories always seem to happen in Australia.  How come you never here of an American beauty contestant being chased by a grizzly bear?

Beluga Whale Saves Chinese Diver’s Life

Published on July 31, 2009 in Wildlife. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

This is an amazing story if true:

A DROWNING diver has a beluga whale to thank for helping to save her life after her legs were paralysed by cramps.

Yang Yun was taking part in a free-diving contest at Polar Land in Harbin, north-east China, in which participants were required to sink seven metres to the bottom of a pool and stay there for as long as possible without the aid of breathing equipment.

Ms Yun, 26, thought she was going to die amid the beluga whales she shared the arctic pool with, after struggling to move her legs while trying to kick her way to the surface.

“I began to choke and sank even lower and I thought that was it for me – I was dead,” she told The Sun.

“Until I felt this incredible force under me driving me to the surface.”

That “incredible force” was Mila, a beluga whale which had noticed her distress and clamped its jaws around her leg.

Using her sensitive nose, Mila drove Ms Yun carefully to the surface, to the amazement of onlookers and an underwater photographer who captured the entire incident on film.

“Mila noticed the problem before we did,” an organiser told The Sun.

“She’s a sensitive animal who works closely with humans and I think this girl owes her her life.”  [News.com]

My Backyard Landscaping Project

Published on July 29, 2009 in Crap About Me. 0 Comments Tags: .

When I bought my house here in El Paso my backyard was literally nothing but rocks. As can be seen in the below photograph I have done a lot of work in the past few months shoveling out rocks and putting in stones and an Asian grill plus landscaping the flower bed:

I still have a long way to go to shovel out all the rocks and eventually put in grass and even a fountain.  That is one of the great things about owning a home is that all the work I am putting into landscaping will ultimately improve the home’s value.  I will post updates as I continue to make improvements on the backyard.

Crazy Woman Otty Sanchez Beheads & Eats Baby’s Brain In Texas

Published on July 28, 2009 in Southwest America. 6 Comments Tags: , , .

This has to be one of the most depraved things I have ever read:

A TEXAS woman decapitated her newborn baby and ate pieces of his body before turning a knife on herself, police said today.

Otty Sanchez was covered in blood and screaming  “I killed my baby, I want to die” when police arrived at the modest San Antonio home.

“She mentioned that someone or something told her to do it and she was hearing voices, so that leads us to believe she was experiencing some kind of mental crisis,” said police spokesman Joe Rios.

The woman had separated from the baby’s father about a week earlier and was living with her mother and sister, who were helping to care for the baby born on June 30.

She was discovered holding the decapitated baby by her mother on Sunday morning.

She appeared to have ingested parts of her child – including the brain – after attacking him with a knife, Mr Rios said.

Otty Sanchez’s sister and her sister’s two children, ages five and seven, were in the house at the time of the killing but were not harmed. [AFP]

This latest report states that the mother Otty Sanchez also ate the babies toes.  She apparently stabbed herself in the chest and slashed her throat in an attempted suicide.  She also told officers that responded to the scene that the devil made her do it.  The father of the baby is demanding that she be executed for her crime. 

Here is a picture of Otty Sanchez:

It sure doesn’t look like she made much of an attempt to slash her throat.

This story is just shocking and unbelievable. 

On Walkabout At: White Sands National Monument, New Mexico

Published on July 27, 2009 in Southwest America. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

I really unique natural wonder that my wife and I recently spent a great day at near my home in El Paso, Texas is White Sands National Monument:

White Sands is located just outside of Alamogordo, New Mexico and is really one of the most unique site you can find in America due its incredibly white gypsum sands that extend across the Tularosa Basin.  The visitor center is actually very well done and provides plenty of information and even a 20 minute film about the park and the Tularosa Basin.  Here is how the basin was formed millions of years ago:

The gypsum that forms the white sands was deposited at the bottom of a shallow sea that covered this area 250 million years ago. Eventually turned into stone, these gypsum-bearing marine deposits were uplifted into a giant dome 70 million years ago when the Rocky Mountains were formed. Beginning 10 million years ago, the center of this dome began to collapse and create the Tularosa Basin. The remaining sides of the original dome formation now form the San Andres and Sacramento mountain ranges that ring the basin.

The park is located within the Tularosa Basin which in this area of the basin water does not drain into any natural water source.  For example rain that falls on the Franklin Mountains at the far southern end of the basin it drains into the Rio Grande River.  However, when rain falls on the Sacramento or San Andres mountains the water flows into the basin but has no river to drain it thus the water sits in pools, which causes a chemical reaction with the soil that creates gypsum.


Sacramento Mountains


The 12,005 foot Sierra Blanca Peak


San Andres Mountains

This gypsum then blows across the desert forming what is now the world’s largest rolling dune field.  As long as water keeps draining into the basin from the nearby mountains, this dune field is only going to continue to expand as more gypsum is made.  The largest pool of water in the basin is Lake Lucero that is known at times to completely fill with water to only drain and form massive quantities of gypsum.

From the visitor center there is a road that drives into the national monument that takes in some of the best sites of the park.  This road has to be one of the most unusual in the nation due to it being surrounded by such incredibly white sand:

At times the National Park Service actually has to plow the road to keep it clear of the ever shifting sand dunes.  As the road enters deep into the park it is dyed completely white due to the surrounding sand dunes:

It is on top of these sand dunes that local families like to climb to the top of, set up some umbrellas, and then do a little BBQing:

A popular activity at White Sands for families is sledding down the dunes:

The visitor center actually sells and rents out these sleds for visitors to use.  My wife and I just planned to park my Ford somewhere and then walk around the dunes a bit before finding a place to sit down and each a cold lunch that we brought with us:

As my wife and I walked around the dunes we were both glad we were wearing good sunglasses because if you take your glasses off you literally cannot see because of the glare of the sun off of the sand.  That is how white it is.  Here is a nice video I found on YouTube of White Sands:

Here is view of the 12,0005 foot (3,659 meters) Sierra Blanca Peak as seen from the park:

In the winter time this mountain is actually snow capped and has a really nice ski resort.  As I took this picture I was thinking to myself that a winter time picture of this snow capped mountain with the surrounding white sands would make for a great photo. Speaking of a great photo, here is one of my lovely wife:

As we walked around the dunes it is really amazing how much plant life has been able to find a way to adapt and survive in these shifting sand dunes such as these yucca plants:

Some how even these colorful flowers have found a way to survive in the vastness of these dunes:

But without a doubt these yuccas are the plants that adapted the best to this alien environment:

These yuccas may look small but their root systems under the ground are actually vast in order to absorb enough water to survive.  This picture of a sand dune that has since blown away but still has roots holding a chunk of sand together gives visitors an idea of just how extensive these root networks are:

There is also a variety of wildlife that has adapted to life in the park by changing their skin and fur color to white.  In this picture you can see my wife posing with one of the many lizards that live in this park that has changed its skin color to white:

The best thing about the park is that just about anyone can see the various wonders of White Sands due to this great walkway they made for people with mobility problems:

It was really good to see the elderly and handicapped be able to get deep into the park and not just be limited to the road where you cannot truly appreciate the scale of this wonderful park.

The National Park Service has a really great website about the park that is really well done and provides plenty of visitor information and geology of this unique American natural wonder.

Missing Bushwalker Jamie Neale Has Falling Out With His Dad

Published on July 25, 2009 in Australia in the News. 0 Comments Tags: , .

 The story of missing bushwalker Jamie Neale is turning more into a soap opera than anything else now:

HE WAS lost in the wilderness, cold and hungry for 12 days.

Now Jamie Neale has been abandoned by his father, who has rushed home to London to be the first to sell his son’s amazing tale of survival to the British press.

Less than 24 hours after the 19-year-old was released from hospital still suffering the effects of hypothermia and exhaustion, The Daily Telegraph reports his father Richard Cass left his son behind in Sydney in a dash home to cash in on the backpacker’s misadventure.

Cass, who told Australian media last week he was not interested in profiting from his son’s rescue and survival story, is understood to have asked his son for a 50 per cent share of Neale’s deal with Channel 9′s 60 Minutes program.

Not content with his son’s offer to cover his father’s airfares and the cost of a drinks celebration with rescue workers at Hotel Gearin in Katoomba, Cass was also believed to be upset by his son’s treatment of him during the Tara Brown interview.

Neale hinted at the pair’s estranged relationship when he told 60 Minutes he was “surprised” his father had flown to Sydney to join the rescue effort.

The admission is understood to have angered Cass, who had crafted a perfect parent image with the media.

Neale had refused his father’s plea to split the $100,000 he was paid for his story, while honouring his pledge to donate proceeds from the deal to the emergency services who helped find him.  [The Daily Telegraph]

Good on Jamie Neale for repaying the authorities for whatever the cost was for his rescue. That is good to hear.  Here is what Jamie’s mom has to say about his father’s greedy ways:

Neale’s mother Jean blasted her ex-husband for seeking payment, telling The Sun

“He phoned me yesterday to say he was selling his story because he was angry Jamie is refusing to share the money with him,” she said.  “His behaviour is outrageous.”  

I don’t know what to think about this story any more.

On Walkabout On: North Franklin Mountain, Texas – Part 2

Published on July 24, 2009 in Southwest America. 2 Comments Tags: , , , .

Prior Posting: North Franklin Mountain – Part 1
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The fork on Texas’ North Franklin Mountain hit a fork where I either had the option of going left to a old tin mine or going to the right which would take me to the summit of the mountain.  I headed right because my goal was to hike to the top of the mountain today, but I did take a look down the mountain where the tin mine was and decided that on a future hike that I would hike down there and take a look at the mine some day:

The trail was soon ascending up the mountain which gave me even better views of the surrounding Franklin Mountains:

The trail continued up the mountain in a series of it seemed endless switchbacks:

There was some parts of the trail that were actually pretty primitive due to rain washing out the trail:

This trail at one time was navigable with a four wheel drive vehicle, but those days are long behind it considering the condition of the trail in some areas as picture above, but it apparently has stopped some people from trying to drive a vehicle up the road as evident by this four wheel drive vehicle that rolled down the side of the mountain:

The views as I ascended up the mountain got better and better and even the Organ Mountains in New Mexico off in the distance began to come into view:

Something else that came into view was this prominent peak along the trail that was capped by some kind of shrine:

I will have to hike over to this peak as well some day in order to see what this is that on top of the peak:

As I walked up the steep switchbacks there really wasn’t much to see besides cactus:

Hiking in the desert of Texas is no where near as scenic as hiking through the Australian Outback, but it is still scenic in its own way.  Finally after about an hour of walking up the switchbacks I came to the top ridgeline of the mountain:

From this ridgeline I had only a short walk to reach the summit of the 7,192 feet (2,192 meters) North Franklin Mountain:

The first thing that a hiker to the top of North Franklin Mountain sees is the weather station that sits on the summit:

Besides the weather station the only other thing on the summit of the mountain is cactus:

So with nothing else to look at on the summit that is why it is best just to sit back and take in the views.  Here is the incredible view of northeast El Paso:

Here is the view looking to the south towards the 6,791 feet (2,069 meter) South Franklin Mountain:

Also towards the south I had a view Mt. Cristo Del Rey, which is quite possibly one of the most dangerous hikes in America:

Here is a view of the west side of El Paso:

If you look closely in the above picture you can see the swathe of green trees in the desert.  This is in fact the mighty Rio Grande River that flows through El Paso and eventually becomes the international border between the US and Mexico.  In this picture you can better see the Rio Grande River:

From the summit I could also look far into Mexico and noticed this large peak in the distance that looked pretty impressive:

It looked like a mountain I would love to hike up, but since it is in Mexico and in particular near Juarez, it would probably be a suicide hike if I tried.  Some of the other things I could see from the summit of the mountain was the Ft. Bliss Army base in El Paso:

Toi the northeast out in the distance I could just make out the Sacramento Mountains on this day since it was a bit overcast, but a good portion of the Tularosa Basin I could make out:

I also had an even better view of the nearby Organ Mountains outside of Las Cruces, New Mexico:

I could also see from the summit the near entirety of Trans-Mountain Road that connects east and west El Paso.  Here is the road as it crosses in between North & South Franklin Mountains and heads to the west:

Here is Trans-Mountain Road as it heads to the east and traverses the Ft. Bliss military reservation land out in the desert:

It took me about two hours and thirty minutes to get to the top of North Franklin Mountain and I ultimately spent about an hour on the summit before heading back down the mountain.  It took me about an hour to walk down the mountain thus making my hike about a four and a half hour outing.  This hike was longer than hiking up South Franklin Mountain, but even though the North peak is higher the views are about the same from each mountain.  Either hike though is a great day out so if you are thinking about hiking in the Franklin Mountains make sure to enjoy hiking up both mountains. 

On Walkabout On: North Franklin Mountain, Texas – Part 1

Published on July 23, 2009 in Southwest America. 2 Comments Tags: , , , .

The Franklin Mountains run through the center of El Paso, Texas and is the largest urban park in the entire United States.  Since the mountains run right through the city of El Paso and stops only for the mighty Rio Grande River, it causes the city to be shaped like a horseshoe around this mountain range:

The highest peak in the entire range is North Franklin Mountain, which rises slightly above the other peaks in the range at an altitude of 7,192 feet (2,192 meters):

To put this into perspective for readers from Down Under, this mountain is roughly the same height as the highest mountain in all of Australia Mt. Kosciuscko, which is 7,310 feet (2,228 meters).  As you can see from this picture North Franklin Mountain is nowhere near as green and beautiful as Mt. Kosciuscko, but it is scenic in its own way:

I planned to hike to the summit of the mountain on this day and judging from the absolutely clear weather, it was the perfect day for a walk.  So from the parking lot at the trailhead I proceeded up the trail and walked by what is know as the Red Bluff where I could see the remains of a long sealed off mine:

I think copper was mined from this area, but I am not sure.  Anyway as I continued up the trail the reason this rock outcropping is called the Red Bluff became quite clear:

There are plenty of rocks and dirt to look at in the Franklin Mountains, but the plants of the native Chihuahuan Desert adds a little color to the browness of the desert:

As I continued to ascend up the zigzagging trail I admired the large rock formations above me:

Look back down the trail I could see the trail I had just came up through the gap of the Red Bluff:

As can be seen the trail leading up North Franklin Mountain is actually an old four wheel drive road which makes for some easy hiking:

Here is a view looking back down the mountain towards the parking lot where my truck was parked:

Here is a close up of my Ford parked over in the parking lot:

From a far you can’t really tell how many red rocks the Franklin Mountains has until you get up close and hike up these mountains:

By now I had worked up a pretty good sweat due to the steady ascent up the mountain and up ahead of me I could see that I had a long way to go before I could reach the summit:

The trail eventually goes right by the base of the mountain’s summit but the trail then continues to the north away from the peak:

The trail eventually ascends up to a gap in the mountain range called Mundy’s Gap:

Here there are park benches to sit on and this is the area that many people stop and take in the views before walking back to the parking lot:

However, I was going to continue all the way to the summit of the mountain.  I did take a minute to sit down, drink some water, and enjoy the views of the east side of El Paso before continuing on down the trail:

As I headed towards the peak I could see I had a long way to go as the trail zig zagged up the side of the mountain:

As I continued down the trail I looked back towards Mundy’s Gap that sits below this prominent rocky peak:

Not far from Mundy’s Gap I came to sign where the trail forks with one way going to a tin mine down on the east side of the mountain and the other trail heading up to the summit of North Franklin Mountain, which was where I was going:

Next Posting: North Franklin Mountain, Texas – Part 2

What Australian Men Think

Published on July 23, 2009 in Facts About Australia. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Do you have an Australian boyfriend and do you ever wonder what is on his mind?  Well wait no longer because the truth has come out:

THE majority of Australian men can’t get no satisfaction, but for many it may be due to their own shortcomings with half saying they would like a larger penis.

The modern Aussie bloke is a fickle beast with a survey showing that while many men appear to be embracing traditional values, they also harbour thoughts of infidelity and would dump their girlfriend if she put on too much weight.

The survey by online magazine AskMen.com found that 46 per cent of Australian males believe that being a good father or husband that takes care of his family is what makes a man “manly”.

They are a sensitive lot too with 94 per cent of the 1500 Australian men taking part in the global survey saying it’s okay for men to cry.

More than half (58 per cent) lamented a decline in moral standards in business and more than 70 per cent believe in the institution of marriage.

But while it appears there has been a re-emergence of traditional values, 69 per cent of men also fantasise about sleeping with their partner’s friends, and 44 per cent admit they would dump their girlfriend if she became fat.  [AAP]

Click the link to read the article, but I am curious to what the same survey would find with American men?