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Saturday, May 9, 2009

Keanu Reeves

Keanu Reeves

One of the most inscrutable actors to ever hit it big, Keanu Reeves has been by turns adored, reviled, and grudgingly respected by the movie-going public. As the controversy over his talent rages on, his career choices and paychecks show him inching toward A-list status. Reeves, whose first name means "cool breeze over the mountains" in Hawaiian, was born in Beirut, Lebanon in 1964. His mother, Patricia, was a showgirl; his father, Samuel Nowlin Reeves, a geologist. After their marriage dissolved, Keanu moved with his mother and younger sister Kim to New York City, then Toronto. Stepfather was Paul Aaron, a stage and film director - he and Patricia divorced within a year, after which she went on to marry (and divorce) rock promoter Robert Miller and hair salon owner Jack Bond. Reeves never reconnected with his biological father, who is now in prison on charges of cocaine possession. In high school, Reeves was lukewarm toward academics but took a keen interest in ice hockey (as team goalie, he earned the nickname "The Wall") and drama. He eventually dropped out of school to pursue an acting career.

After a few stage gigs and a handful of made-for-TV movies, he scored a supporting role in the Rob Lowe hockey flick Youngblood (1986), which was filmed in Canada. Shortly after the production wrapped, Reeves packed his bags and headed for Hollywood. Reeves popped up on critics' radar with his performance in the dark adolescent drama River's Edge (1986), but his first popular success was the role of totally rad dude Ted Logan in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989). The wacky time-travel movie became something of a cultural phenomenon, and audiences would forever confuse Reeves's real-life persona with that of his doofy on-screen counterpart. Over the next few years, Reeves tried to shake the Ted stigma with a series of highbrow projects. He played a slumming rich boy opposite River Phoenix's narcoleptic male hustler in My Own Private Idaho (1991), an unlucky lawyer who stumbles into the vampire's lair in Dracula (1992), and Shakespearean party-pooper Don Jon in Much Ado About Nothing (1993).

In 1994, the understated actor became a big-budget action star with the release of Speed (1994/I). Its success heralded an era of five years in which Reeves would alternate between largely unwatched small films, like Feeling Minnesota (1996) and The Last Time I Committed Suicide (1997), and unwatched big films like Johnny Mnemonic (1995) and Chain Reaction (1996). After all this Reeves did the unthinkable and passed on the Speed sequel, but he struck box-office gold again a few years later with the Wachowski brothers' cyberadventure The Matrix (1999). Despite his deadpan delivery style and reputation as an oaf, Reeves continues to reel in choice roles and fat paychecks. Whatever he knows, he's not telling the public--his self-deprecating interview tactics and mysterious private life provide little insight into his artistry. As far as Reeves is concerned, it seems, he's just a regular guy who rides a motorcycle, plays in a band (Dogstar), and shows up every now and then for a movie shoot.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Valentines day

Valentines day



Valentine's Day is a holiday celebrated on February 14. In North America, it is the traditional day on which lovers express their love for each other by sending Valentine's cards, presenting flowers, or offering confectionery. The holiday is named after two among the numerous Early Christian martyrs named Valentine. The day became associated with romantic love in the circle of Geoffrey Chaucer in High Middle Ages, when the tradition of courtly love flourished.

Numerous early Christian martyrs were named Valentine. Until 1969, the Catholic Church formally recognized eleven Valentine's Days. The Valentines honored on February 14 are:

Valentine of Rome: a priest in Rome who suffered martyrdom about AD 269 and was buried on the Via Flaminia. His relics are at the Church of Saint Praxed in Rome and at Whitefriar Street Carmelite Church in Dublin, Ireland.

Valentine of Terni: He became bishop of Interamna (modern Terni) about AD 197 and is said to have been killed during the persecution of Emperor Aurelian. He is also buried on the Via Flaminia, but in a different location than Valentine of Rome. His relics are at the Basilica of Saint Valentine in Terni (Basilica di San Valentino).

The Catholic Encyclopedia also speaks of a third saint named Valentine who was mentioned in early martyrologies under date of 14 February. He was martyred in Africa with a number of companions, but nothing more is known about him.

Some sources say the Valentine linked to romance is Valentine of Rome, others say Valentine of Terni. Some scholars have concluded that the two were originally the same person. In any case, no romantic elements are present in the original Early Medieval biographies of either of these martyrs.

An overview of attested traditions relevant to the holiday is presented below, with the legends about Valentine himself discussed in the end.

Friday, February 8, 2008

Bot or BOT




Bot or BOT or similar may refer to:

Computers

Internet bot, a computer program which does automated tasks
IRC bot, a computer program connected to an (IRC-based) Internet chat forum as a normal user
Botnet, a network of "zombie" computers used to carry out automated tasks such as spamming
Botsourcing, the assignment of tasks to an automated, or intelligent, programmed agent
Computer game bot, a computer controlled player or opponent
Alienware Bot, line of budget desktop PCs manufactured by Alienware
Chatterbot, a computer program designed to simulate an intelligent conversation with a human
Desktop Bot, software that resides on a computer and indexes content for the purpose of searching, tagging, or distribution
BOTS, a computer game
Bots (edi), open source EDI software

Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Golden Gate Bridge

The Golden Gate Bridge


The Golden Gate Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate from the opening into the San Francisco Bay to the Pacific Ocean. It connects the city of San Francisco on the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula to Marin County as part of US Highway 101 and State Route 1.

The Golden Gate Bridge had the longest suspension bridge span in the world when it was completed in 1937 and has become an internationally recognized symbol of San Francisco and the United States. In the 70 years since completion, the span length has been surpassed by seven other bridges. It still has the second longest suspension bridge main span in the United States, after the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York City.

Before the bridge was built, the only practical short route from San Francisco to what is now Marin County was by boat, through the interior of the San Francisco Bay. Ferry service began as early as 1820, with regularly scheduled service beginning in the 1840s for purposes of transporting water to San Francisco from what is now Marin County. The Sausalito Land and Ferry Company service launched in 1868, which eventually became the Golden Gate Ferry Company, a Southern Pacific Railroad subsidiary, the largest ferry operation in the world by the late 1920s. Once for railroad passengers and customers only, Southern Pacific's automobile ferries became very profitable and important to the regional economy. The ferry crossing between the Hyde Street Pier at the foot of Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco and Sausalito in Marin County took approximately 20 minutes and cost $1.00 per vehicle, a price later reduced to compete with the new bridge. The trip from the Ferry Building took twenty-seven minutes. Many wanted to build a bridge to connect San Francisco to Marin County. San Francisco was the largest American city still served primarily by ferry boats. Because it did not have a permanent link with communities around the bay, the city’s growth rate was below the national average. Many experts said a bridge couldn’t be built across the 6,700-ft.-wide (2,042 m) strait. It had strong, swirling tides and currents, with water 335 ft (102 m) deep at the center of the channel, and almost constant winds of 60 mph (97 km/h). Experts said ferocious winds and blinding fogs would prevent construction and operation.

Strauss was Chief Engineer in charge of overall design and construction of the bridge project. However, because he had little understanding or experience with cable suspension designs, responsibility for much of the engineering and architecture fell on other experts. In particular, bridge architect Irving Morrow, a relatively unknown residential architect, designed the overall shape of the bridge towers, the lighting scheme, and Art Deco elements such as the streetlights, railing, and walkways. Morrow also chose the famous International Orange color. Senior engineer Charles Alton Ellis, collaborating remotely with famed bridge designer Leon Moisseiff, was the principal engineer of the project. Ellis, who had no engineering degree, was a Greek scholar and mathematician who became an expert in structural design, writing the standard textbook of the time. Moisseiff produced the basic structural design, introducing his "deflection theory" by which a thin, flexible roadway would flex in the wind, greatly reducing stress by transmitting forces via suspension cables to the bridge towers. Although the Golden Gate Bridge design was sound, a later Moisseiff design, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, collapsed in a strong windstorm due to an unexpected resonance mode caused by a too-thin roadway and unexpected wind forces.

With an eye toward self-promotion and posterity Strauss downplayed the contributions of his collaborators who, despite receiving little recognition or compensation, are largely responsible for the final form of the bridge. In November, 1931, Straus fired Ellis and replaced him with a former subordinate, Clifford Paine, ostensibly for wasting too much money sending telegrams back and forth to Moisseiff. Ellis, obsessed with the project and unable to find work elsewhere during the Depression, continued working 70 hours per week on an unpaid basis, eventually turning in ten volumes of hand calculations. Straus initially succeeded in winning credit as the figure most responsible for the design and vision of the bridge. Only later were the contributions of the rest of the design team more fully appreciated.