Asha Anujeeva

My cousin sent me the link to a BBC website that was talking about a new store in Germany called “The Future Store.”  He included the note “I thought you might get a kick out of this.”  So I clicked on the link and watched a video made for a tv news show where the reporter was going around the store and explaining how new technology was being used at this store.

It really was very interesting; the customers use their cell phones to scan the bar code of the product they are buying when they take it off of the shelf before they put it in their cart.  The meat counter has microchips in the meat packages to advise the store that the meat package has been removed, so the store can keep track of when they need to re-stock.  When the customer is finished shopping, they press a button on their phone, which produces a “master bar code” which they use to scan at a self-service checkout counter.  Really all quite interesting.  The biggest question I have about the process is regarding how the store expects to keep the customers “honest” and reduce the risk of shop-lifting?  I’d be curious to learn about that part of the equation! 

I was reading an article on Yahoo news about a man, who lives in a tent on a tiny Shetland Island named Forvik has filed for “independence” from the British Crown.  Apparently the chain of Shetland Islands fall under the British government, and this man (Stuart Hill) has decided to make his island a “crown dependency” out of the 2.5 square mile island that he owns.  He says he will make his own currency and collect no taxes.  What is so very funny about this story is that he is the ONLY resident of the island!  I just can’t even imagine that! 

Sunday was Father’s Day, and everyone in the family packed up and went to our parent’s house to celebrate our and have a nice picnic.  Aunts, uncles, cousins, everyone within a 200 mile driving distance was there.  It was a regular family reunion!  Our parents went a little bit overboard and rented a big moon bounce, pony rides and live entertainers (clowns and jugglers) for the younger children to keep them happy.  OK, they went WAY overboard!  But everyone had a great time, the entertainment was good, the food was great, and it was wonderful seeing the whole family and their kids and catch up on what everyone is doing.

When I got up this morning, I turned on the television news and was very surprised to hear them talking about a 7.2 earthquake in Japan.  Wasn’t there just an earthquake of the same magnitude in China?  So far I haven’t heard any details about a huge number of people being killed by the earthquake, I think that I heard that they only knew of four deaths so far, so I am hoping that is “good news” if there really CAN be “good news” about an earthquake!

I heard on the news today that the anchor of Meet The Press died at his office today.  At first I heard it was a heart attack, then “unknown causes” then cardiac arrest, and now back to heart attack.  So I don’t really know for sure what it was that killed him.

I like to watch his television show every Sunday morning, it was one of the few television shows that I felt were actually “worth” watching to become more informed about what is going on in the world.  Whoever takes his spot as anchor on that show will have a hard time filling his shoes.

I was reading a story on Grist.org today that the US Senate had the opportunity to do something good for the environment, and they blew it.  There were two bills up for vote today, the Consumer First Energy Act and the Renewable Energy and Job Creation Act of 2008 that would have supported efforts to find clean sources of energy to replace our dependence on foreign oil.  Both bills failed to pass, thanks to Republicans voting against the bills.

Shame on you, Senate, Shame on you!

If you are interested in reading the story that I just read, you can click here.

I was shopping at my local Wal-Mart and heard some of the employees talking about how pretty soon Wal-Mart will be requiring their customers to bring their own bags!  I wonder how well the customers are going to be taking that!  Personally, I’m glad – I have several canvas shopping tote bags that I bought a long time ago that I would like to use for my weekly groceries.  Even though I bring most of my empty Wal-Mart shopping bags back to the Wal-Mart for recycling, I really would prefer to not have to deal with them.  Although they DO make good little trash can liners!

I listened to Hillary Clinton’s speech last night, and I thought that she was gracious and showed a lot of class.  I have been really upset over how many people have been saying such negative things about her in the past.  I think that she would have been a wonderful President.  I hope Obama chooses her as his Vice Presidential running mate.

I think I heard that the warships off the coat of Myanmar finally gave up hope of docking and have turned back to head to their origination points.  What a terrible shame, I can only imagine the suffering that will be continuing on in that country because of the steadfast belief by their leader that there are ulterior motives behind the humanitarian aid.  I think that the leader of that country should be ashamed of himself.  Actually I have much stronger feelings than that, but I will keep them to myself.

One of my friends asked me to babysit for her tonight so she can go out to eat dinner with her hubby to celebrate their 5th wedding anniversary.  I said, sure, I’d be glad to babysit.  They have a little baby that is only three months old, they said they’d bring the baby over here and come back to get her around nine.  So, I’m expecting them to arrive any minute now.  I adore babies, especially when they are so young that they can’t run away from you or talk back to you!  I love to rock them and cuddle with them.  I’m looking forward to babysitting this one, she is a sweetie pie!

I heard on the news that the broken toilet on the space station was repaired yesterday.  Apparently the pump for the liquid waste disposal on the space station toilet has been broken for an entire month.  The astronauts have had to use a manual pump to operate the toilet while waiting for new parts.  They had replaced the broken pump three times, and each time the new pump failed.  I heard that there is only one toilet on the entire space station.  I think that is pretty bad planning!  I’d never want to live in a house that only had one toilet!