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Archive for the ‘Zowie Fun Facts’ Category

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Stand Up To Feel Better And Stay Lean!

In Food & Drink, Mind-Body, Quality of Life, Zowie Fun Facts on May 10, 2012 at 1:01 am

couchtater

This post credited to: Stand Up, Walk Around, Even Just For ’20 Minutes’, at NPR.org

If you’re sitting at a desk reading this article, take a minute and stand up. That’s the latest advice from New York Times Phys Ed columnist Gretchen Reynolds. In her new book, The First 20 Minutes, Reynolds details some of the surprisingly simple ways you can combat the effects of a sedentary lifestyle.

Federal health guidelines recommend 30 minutes of moderate exercise — such as walking or jogging — every single day. But new research shows that even regular exercisers may not be doing enough to counteract the health hazards of sitting down at a desk all day long.

More Health And Exercise Tips:

How Revving Up Your Heart Rate, Even A Bit, Pays Off

Getting your rate into your target zone can help you get more out of a workout.

Lighter Weights Can Still Make A Big Fitness Difference

You don’t have to lift heavy weights to build muscles. More reps with lighter weights works.

How To Eat Out Without Putting On The Pounds

A researcher says one secret to keeping the pounds off is eating slowly and savoring each bite.

Even A Little Exercise Can Help Your Heart

Even modest amounts of physical activity reduce the dangers of heart disease, a new study finds. Read the rest of this entry »

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Madame Ching – Worlds Greatest Female Pirate

In Amazing Stories, Wild Stuff, Zowie Fun Facts on December 13, 2011 at 9:00 pm

ching-shih-pirate

Shih Yang also known popularly as Madame Ching was one of the greatest Chinese pirates who sailed the seas in the 19th century.

 At the height of her career she commanded approximately 2,000 ships and 50,000 pirates controlling the seas from Hong Kong to the Vietnamese border. Piracy was instigated by the people living by the sea; they were starving. They could see the Portuguese and English trading ships carrying fruit, vegetables and meat to the more wealthy Chinese people.

When one of these ships was wrecked by a storm, the sea-side villagers sailed out to the ship to retreive its cargo. When they got to the ship the produce was still being guarded! Out of desperation, the villagers murdered all the guards and took the food home.

This activity was soon organized into a systematic operation under the command of Ching Yih. In fact, other pirates realized how good he was and joined under his command. Ching did not limit his theivery to the sea. His crew also went inland. Along with booty and produce, this pirate crew took villagers as slaves.

The officials at Peking sent forty warships to take down this pirate armada, but failed. Ching sank all these ships except twenty-eight, which he kept for his armada. After the battle with Peking, Ching decided to ‘take’ a wife. Twenty of the ‘choice’ female slaves where brought before him bound, one being Shih Yang. Not only was Shih thought to be beautiful, but she was larger than most women and her feet had not been bound as is traditional custom. Read the rest of this entry »

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World Population Hits 7 Billion This Year – Zowie!

In Mind-Body, Quality of Life, Zowie Fun Facts on October 27, 2011 at 12:34 am

A clock is ticking. Sometime late this year, the United Nations Population Division predicts that with about five babies born every second, the world will have 7 billion people.

Seven billion. It was fewer than 1 billion in 1800, 3 billion in 1960, and 6 billion as recently 1999.

The number keeps growing. The planet does not. Thomas Malthus famously predicted in 1798 that at some point, it would all be too much: starvation and disease would kill people more quickly than we can replace them.

But is this year’s milestone cause for worry? Or just the opposite — celebration?

“With the population still growing by about 80 million each year, it’s hard not to be alarmed,” writes Robert Kunzig, the author of National Geographic magazine’s January cover story, “7 Billion.” “Right now on Earth, water tables are falling, soil is eroding, glaciers are melting, and fish stocks are vanishing. Close to a billion people go hungry each day.”

A funny thing has happened on the way to the apocalypse, though. Yes, there is poverty more dire than most of us in America can imagine, but the growing population has not caused the world to collapse. Instead, we’ve conquered infectious diseases, learned how to grow more food, provided clean water even in crowded cities.

The much-discussed “population bomb” may yet go off, says Kunzig — but so far it has not. Read the rest of this entry »

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Can You Guess Where These Famous Places Are?

In Photography, Zowie Contest, Zowie Fun Facts on June 10, 2011 at 11:06 pm

    

Are you good at puzzles? Maybe you’ll like this one. The above three pictures are all a small snapshot of very famous places everyone will know.

The trick is to figure out where in the world you’ve seen them before. Can you guess? Click on each one for a larger image.

Here are some clues: we’ve named the pictures the following from left to right: (L) Her Inside Out (M) Above the Law (R) Stairway Down Under.  One is a place in Washington, one is in New York and the other one, well let’s just say it’s in a place that almost made it to New York.

Stay tuned over the next couple days to see if anyone solved the mystery.

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Vacation To Exotic Places On The Cheap

In Freedom, Travel, Zowie Fun Facts on June 8, 2011 at 11:14 pm

How would you like to spend a few weeks in Thailand, or wander mysterious ruins of the Incas in Peru, or maybe you’d like to explore the rain forests of Costa Rica, canoe down the Amazon in South America, or the Nile River in Egypt?  

Too expensive you say? Check out the growing enthusiasm for volunteer vacationing – or recently dubbed: Voluntourism.

“Volunteer travel, volunteer vacations, voluntourism, or vacanteerism is travel which includes volunteering for a charitable cause. In recent years, “bite-sized” volunteer vacations have grown in popularity.

The types of volunteer vacations are diverse, from low-skill work cleaning up local wildlife areas to providing high-skill medical aid in a foreign country. Volunteer vacations participants are diverse but typically share a desire to “do something good” while also experiencing new places and challenges in locales they might not otherwise visit.

There are also other types of travelling that engage people with scientific research and education to promote the understanding and action necessary for a sustainable environment. Participants cover a fee that would include expenses on the different sites worldwide, and engage in projects according to their interest or location.” – Excerpted from Wikipedia

Doing a little work on your vacation doesn’t have to be arduous however. You could be leading tour groups, teaching a skill or a language to villagers, or just doing a little research. It all depends on what you’re willing to trade for the cost of accommodations and meals. Sometimes even your airfare is partially covered. That really takes the sting out of paying for a dream vacation! Read the rest of this entry »

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PayPal Co-Founder Paying Students To Drop Out!

In Culture, Prosperity, Wild Stuff, Zowie Fun Facts on May 26, 2011 at 10:45 pm

Yep! You heard that right. Zowie!!

Peter Thiel, the PayPal co-founder and one of the first investors in Facebook, is proposing a controversial path toward more rapid innovation.

Today his Thiel Foundation announced that it was giving 24 people under 20 $100,000 fellowships to drop out of school for two years to start a their own companies.

Some of the recipients are leaving first-rate institutions like Harvard and Stanford to take the fellowship. In a press release, the foundation’s head, James O’Neill, said that in taking the fellowship they were “challenging the authority of the present and the familiar.”

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that Thiel thinks ideas can develop in a start-up environment much faster than at a university. And the project is also intended to question the idea of higher education. Thiel told TechCrunch in April that the United Sates was in a higher education bubble. Read the rest of this entry »

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Virgin Galactic Is Hiring Astronauts

In Fun Technology, Travel, Wild Stuff, Zowie Fun Facts on May 26, 2011 at 12:21 am

spaceport americaVirgin Galactic, the stepchild of Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic, has started hiring astronauts in anticipation of kicking off their commercial spaceflight business at Spaceport America later this year.

Construction on passenger terminal buildings, spacecraft hangars and launch facilities are already well under way with the official opening of the spaceport still on track for end of 2011. In 2008, Governor Bill Richardson announced that Virgin Galactic had signed a 20 year lease agreement with the State of New Mexico. Virgin Galactic’s world headquarters will be established in New Mexico and its operations will be located at New Mexico’s Spaceport America, the nation’s first purpose-built commercial spaceport.

“The signing of this agreement is a momentous day for our state and has cemented New Mexico as the home of commercial space travel,” Governor Bill Richardson said. “I want to thank Virgin Galactic for partnering with us to create a whole new industry that is going to transform the economy of Southern New Mexico—creating thousands of jobs, generating money for education, boosting tourism and attracting other companies and economic opportunities to the area.” Read the rest of this entry »

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Why Your Brain Needs Vacations

In Mind-Body, Quality of Life, Zowie Fun Facts on May 25, 2011 at 12:05 am

In stressful times, when you think you don’t have the time or money to get away and just relax for a change, that’s when you really need it most. Check out this recent CNN article about giving your hard working brain a break for a change.

(CNN) — Mary Kole loves her job, but she’s been feeling like she’s lost the line between “work” and “not work.”

A literary agent for children’s books in Brooklyn, New York, Kole works from home and checks in with clients electronically around the clock — sometimes writers will even call her in the middle of the night with an idea. Stepping outside isn’t exactly relaxing either. “In New York, it’s just subway, office, people, talking, yelling, honking, all the time,” she said.

Kole finally tore herself away from business calls and conferences to take a vacation, one that didn’t take place in her home office. At the beginning of May, she went to Portland, Oregon, by herself and spent five days holed up in a rented house rereading some of her favorite books, cooking and listening to rain. Read the rest of this entry »

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Get Your Mate a Date With You!

In Food & Drink, Life, Quality of Life, Zowie Fun Facts on May 20, 2011 at 9:12 pm

May is National Date Your Mate Month and it is also our anniversary! My husband and I have started a new tradition: Date Night. 

This is a regular weekly event, scheduled in your calendar, and is subject to change only in a dire emergency. It’s dinner or an afternoon picnic, a simple lunch or a long walk with an ice cream cone reward at the end.  It’s the time to turn off the cell phone and computer and television, and devote yourself to quality time with someone important to you.

Date Night does not have to be expensive because it is about being together. Be creative and think of things you have not done together since you were single and dating. It’s a time to reconnect. At the end of each date, write in a special book what you did and how much fun you had. Read from the book on date night every few months. Read the rest of this entry »

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Why It’s Tougher Being A Guy Than A Woman

In Culture, Life, Mind-Body, Quality of Life, Zowie Fun Facts on May 18, 2011 at 11:13 pm

women live longerWhile it is tough to be a woman, being a man can be downright deadly.

Women live longer than men. And now scientists suggest a simple Darwinian reason: Competing for a mate can wear a guy out or get him killed.

“Women live longer in almost every country, and the sex difference in lifespan has been recognized since at least the mid-18th century,” said Daniel Kruger at the University of Michigan. “It isn’t a recent trend; it originates from our deep evolutionary history.”

The idea is presented in the spring edition of the journal Human Nature.

Butting heads

In common chimpanzees, Kruger and his colleague Randolph Nesse report, mortality spikes among males around age 13, just as they’re old enough to breed and start competing for social status. Read the rest of this entry »

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