Category Archives: Off Topic

Next Time Take The Train

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err, a bigger boat?

The U.S. Coast Guard said a man is lucky to be alive after he was rescued 11 days into an attempted kayak voyage from Monterey to Hawaii.

The 57-year-old man was attempting to paddle all the way to Hawaii alone.

A helicopter spotted the man, who had turned back to California, in the Pacific Ocean on Tuesday about 60 miles southwest of Santa Barbara’s Point Conception after he sent a distress call, the Coast Guard said.

A friend of the man said he had left Monterey on May 30 attempting to make the voyage of nearly 2,400 miles to Honolulu in a kayak with a solar panel that charged all his electronic equipment.

Next Time Take The Train

Union Employee Tries To Form Union, Guess Where That Goes

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What – labor unions are not welcome at labor unions?

Francisco Cerritos, who was hired by the United Farm Workers of America in 1998, alleges in a May 2 lawsuit filed in Monterey County Superior Court that the UFW broke numerous state labor laws, including failing to pay him overtime, and to provide meal breaks and itemized paychecks. He also alleges the UFW retaliated against him for helping forming an employees union within the UFW.

Union Employee Tries To Form Union, Guess Where That Goes

Deadly Poisonous Sponges Found Off Coast

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Spongebob Gary and Jellyfish

“Killer sponges sound like creatures from a B-grade horror movie. In fact, they thrive in the lightless depths of the deep sea,” the aquarium research center said in a statement.
The institute said scientists first discovered that some sponges are carnivorous 20 years ago. Since then, only seven carnivorous species have been found in all of the northeastern Pacific Ocean.

The sponge was living near colonies of clams and tubeworms that use bacteria to obtain nutrition from methane seeping out of the seafloor.

(KTVU News)
Deadly Poisonous Sponges Found Off Coast

Radioactive Seaweed Sought On Shores

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Godzilla Vs Seaweed

On Feb. 24, marine scientists along the coast — including researchers from Moss Landing Marine Laboratories, Hopkins Marine Station, Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary and UC Santa Cruz — will start collecting giant kelp and testing it for traces of radioactive elements from Fukushima.

The kelp collectors stressed that, even if they do detect Fukushima’s radiation emanating from the kelp, it should not pose a health hazard to humans.

CALL GODZILLA NOW!

Radioactive Seaweed Sought On Shores

Christmas Lights Year Round In P.G. But In Carmel . . .

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By-The-Sea says “Take ’em down”. Especially if they are seasonal home use grade – not meant for outdoor exposure for long periods.
Holmans Ice Lights

City code allows the lights to be on display from the third Wednesday of November until the second Wednesday of January. The law applies to trees, public rights-of-way and private properties in commercial zones, and commercial operations in residential districts.

Nearly all merchants have complied, but there are some who should remove the remaining lights, said planning chief Rob Mullane.

Christmas Lights Year Round In P.G. But In Carmel

BREAKING NEWS! Crop Circles In Chular!

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Aliens have landed in the Salinas Valley?

Chualar UFOs

How did the crop circle get there? That’s the million-dollar question and there may never be a definitive answer. This video was posted to Youtube and shows two guys who claim to have discovered the crop circle.

The Monterey County Sheriff’s Office said that it did not get any reports of strange activity happening in the area.

Chualar Crop Circle

BREAKING NEWS! Crop Circles In Chular!

Revelation – there were no aliens in Chular marking the ground, it was a promotional stunt by a tech company.

Chualar UFO Tegra

The crop circle near Chualar, Calif., contained a stylized image of a computer chip and the number “192” in Braille. On Sunday, the company announced the Tegra K1, a new chip for tablets and smartphones that contains 192 computing “cores,” or mini-computers, for graphics applications.

realclear.com

Got Solar Panels On Your Home?

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If a fire starts, they may just let it burn rather than risk firefighters’ lives.

In a fire, seconds count, and that was why firefighters were speaking out Saturday about the consequences of an added obstacle sprouting up on Bay Area rooftops: solar panels.

Solar panels covered part of the roof of a Piedmont home that was destroyed by a 2-alarm fire on Tuesday.

The cause of the fire was still under investigation Saturday, but Piedmont Fire Chief Warren McLaren was clear with reporters after the blaze was extinguished that the home’s solar panels made fighting the fire that much more difficult.

“Oh absolutely, it made it hard on the roof,” said McLaren.

Concern over solar panels prompted a 2010 report from the Fire Protection Research Foundation that said that the panels were not only potential hazards for tripping or slipping, but the additional weight from the panels contributed to the possibility that the roof would collapse.

KTVU News
Got Solar Panels On Your Home?

Meanwhile, Oakland Has A Different Gull Problem

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The birds are taking out the electrical lines. Times get tough, perhaps they were planning to steal the copper wire so they could buy some french fries.

Gulls Fight The Power

An errant seagull knocked out electricity service to about 2,000 PG&E customers in Oakland on Tuesday, according to the Oakland Tribune.

It seems the bird flew into a set of wires near 4th and Franklin Streets at 6:45 a.m., the newspaper reported.

The gull was electrocuted and died when the bird’s two wings made contact with two wires, turning the avian creature into a live circuit.

(KRON 4 NBC)
Meanwhile, Oakland Has A Different Gull Problem

Sustainable Practices Leads To House Burning Down

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I’ll keep putting my potato peels down the disposal thank you

Brevity Comic Hippie 080609

A fire destroyed a home at 15 East Rounds Ave. Saturday morning after a compost pile spontaneously combusted.

The compost pile was located next to a deck that was attached to the house.

“Once that organic material reaches a certain temperature, it ignites,” said Franklin County Fire Investigator John Bashaw. “Something like that needs to be kept away from a house.”
No one was injured in the blaze.

Adirondack Daily Enterprise
Sustainable Practices Leads To House Burning Down

Deer Are Losing Their Hair

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Baldness cures always seemed like a viable business in P.G.

Deer Baldness

 

Since 2009, researchers have collected hair and blood samples from more than 600 deer and elk with symptoms ranging from a scruffy-looking coat to almost complete baldness, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Monday.

So far, the hair loss has been linked to an invasive species of biting lice that normally feeds on fallow deer native to Europe and Asia. The deer respond by biting and scratching, which researchers believe could be leading to the hair loss, Greg Gerstenberg, a senior wildlife biologist with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, told the Chronicle.

Deer Are Losing Their Hair