truck driving on the internet
Friday, March 29, 2002
"This land is bloody. This soil is not sincere with anybody, even with Afghans. Mine is the only body that has benefited from this land,"
---------------------------------
Afghan Man Roams Desert, Eats Stones
By Christopher Torchia
Associated Press Writer
Friday, March 29, 2002; 1:47 AM
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Outside the gates of the U.S. military base at Kandahar airport, Jalat Khan selected a stone from the gravel on the shoulder of the road and swallowed it.
Then Khan, a jobless wanderer in a turban and robe, did it again. And again. Pretty soon, a crowd had gathered, oblivious to the U.S. Army Humvees rolling out of the base on routine patrols.
Even the clatter and roar of American helicopters and transport planes ? part of the daily base traffic that usually turns heads ? couldn't compete with Khan on Thursday, who invited spectators to hear the rattle of stones in his belly as he prodded his swollen paunch.
"When I started stone-eating, people couldn't believe it. They told me that this was magic," said Khan, who developed the habit three years ago because ? in his words ? he was hungry. "This is the one quality I have. Wherever I go, people watch me and gather around."
Part of Khan's mystery is that he's not out to make money from his talent, though he'll take digestible food if it's offered. He's happy to sit cross-legged on the ground and talk.
And because he occasionally pops a stone into his mouth, people listen ? even though he admits to being out of touch.
"I don't know what's happening," Khan said of the successful American bombing campaign that helped oust the Taliban, and the hunt for al-Qaida holdouts in Afghanistan's remote mountains. "The Russians came and left after fighting, and then the Arabs came and they left. Now the Americans are here, and I don't know when they are leaving," Khan said.
Khan, 30, who sought safety on the border with Pakistan during the U.S. bombing campaign that began in October, said he swallows up to one pound of stones daily. He sticks to smooth, round ones about the length of a little finger joint, and passes them every three days.
"I had a very healthy and strong body when I started eating stones," said Khan, who compared his taste for pebbles to an addict who craves tobacco or drugs. "Then I became weak and thin."
Before the Taliban came to power, Khan rented a plot of land in his home province of Helmand, west of Kandahar, and cultivated opium-bearing poppies. But the Taliban banned the practice in 2000, and Khan's father spent all the money earned from opium, so nowadays Khan travels the desert.
He said he had just walked 67 miles from the Pakistan border to Kandahar, the biggest city in the southern half of Afghanistan.
Pausing for a break outside the U.S. military base, he said he dreamed of marrying a U.S. female pilot, who could fly him to Dubai, or maybe the United States. At the same time, he described the Taliban, known for unrelenting, often brutal edicts carried out in the name of Islam, as "good people," without elaborating.
The Taliban's traditional support base was among majority ethnic Pashtuns like Khan in southern Afghanistan, where many people are more forgiving toward a movement that, for all its pitiless excesses, had imposed peace over most of a lawless land.
"This land is bloody. This soil is not sincere with anybody, even with Afghans. Mine is the only body that has benefited from this land," he said.
© 2002 The Associated Press
Thursday, March 28, 2002
Did you know that...
It is impossible to lick your elbow.
A crocodile can't stick it's tongue out.
A shrimp's heart is in their head.
People say "Bless you" when you sneeze because when you sneeze, your heart stops for a milli-second.
It is physically impossible for pigs to look up into the sky.
Between 1937 and 1945 Heinz produced a version of Alphabetti Spaghetti especially for the German market that consisted solely of little pasta swastikas.
More than 50% of the people in the world have never made or received a telephone call.
Rats and horses can't vomit.
The "sixth sick sheik's sixth sheep's sick" is said to be the toughest tongue twister in the English language.
If you sneeze too hard, you can fracture a rib. If you try to suppress a sneeze, you can rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and die, if you keep your eyes open by force, they can pop out.
Rats multiply so quickly that in 18 months, two rats could have over million descendants.
Wearing headphones for just an hour will increase the bacteria in your ear by 700 times.
If the government has no knowledge of aliens, then why does Title 14, Section 1211 of the Code of Federal Regulations, implemented on July 16, 1969, make it illegal for U.S. citizens to have any contact with extraterrestrials or their vehicles?
In every episode of Seinfeld there is a Superman somewhere.
The cigarette lighter was invented before the match.
Thirty-five percent of the people who use personal ads for dating are already married.
A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why.
In the course of an average lifetime you will, while sleeping, eat 70 assorted insects and 10 spiders.
Most lipstick contains fish scales.
Like fingerprints, everyone's tongue print is different.
Over 75% of people who read this will try to lick their elbow. DID YOU!?!?!?!?!?
It is impossible to lick your elbow.
A crocodile can't stick it's tongue out.
A shrimp's heart is in their head.
People say "Bless you" when you sneeze because when you sneeze, your heart stops for a milli-second.
It is physically impossible for pigs to look up into the sky.
Between 1937 and 1945 Heinz produced a version of Alphabetti Spaghetti especially for the German market that consisted solely of little pasta swastikas.
More than 50% of the people in the world have never made or received a telephone call.
Rats and horses can't vomit.
The "sixth sick sheik's sixth sheep's sick" is said to be the toughest tongue twister in the English language.
If you sneeze too hard, you can fracture a rib. If you try to suppress a sneeze, you can rupture a blood vessel in your head or neck and die, if you keep your eyes open by force, they can pop out.
Rats multiply so quickly that in 18 months, two rats could have over million descendants.
Wearing headphones for just an hour will increase the bacteria in your ear by 700 times.
If the government has no knowledge of aliens, then why does Title 14, Section 1211 of the Code of Federal Regulations, implemented on July 16, 1969, make it illegal for U.S. citizens to have any contact with extraterrestrials or their vehicles?
In every episode of Seinfeld there is a Superman somewhere.
The cigarette lighter was invented before the match.
Thirty-five percent of the people who use personal ads for dating are already married.
A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why.
In the course of an average lifetime you will, while sleeping, eat 70 assorted insects and 10 spiders.
Most lipstick contains fish scales.
Like fingerprints, everyone's tongue print is different.
Over 75% of people who read this will try to lick their elbow. DID YOU!?!?!?!?!?
Tuesday, March 26, 2002
Can anyone get a copy of this?
-------------
David Lee Roth
We've always known David Lee Roth was a little peculiar, but now
we're pretty sure he has actually flown over the cuckoo's nest.
Selected journalists recently received two VHS copies of David Lee
Roth's No Holds Bar-B-Que, and all we have to say is, "What the hell
is this?"
The extended video opens with Roth flailing about in a large city in
some sort of Kung Fu/T'ai Chi-style dance with swords and poles.
From there, it only gets stranger. Roth dresses up like a sailor and
hosts a luau, hunts gorillas in the jungle, sports a ninja costume
(while his cover of Gerry Rafferty's "Baker Street" plays in the
background), and plays with more swords (did we mention there are a
lot of swords in this video?).
Not only that, but we also see Roth in army fatigues, carrying some
sort of rocket launcher, wandering about a dark cave (presumably
hunting for Osama Bin Laden?); cavorting with pregnant girls
drinking Bud Light; and dressing as an Arab sheik -- all "live from
the Mojo Dojo."
Stranger yet is the fact that spokespeople for Roth at the Mitch
Schneider Organization sent the tapes with no further explanation
and refused to elaborate further when
contacted. "For now, it is what it is," said a spokesperson.
-------------
David Lee Roth
We've always known David Lee Roth was a little peculiar, but now
we're pretty sure he has actually flown over the cuckoo's nest.
Selected journalists recently received two VHS copies of David Lee
Roth's No Holds Bar-B-Que, and all we have to say is, "What the hell
is this?"
The extended video opens with Roth flailing about in a large city in
some sort of Kung Fu/T'ai Chi-style dance with swords and poles.
From there, it only gets stranger. Roth dresses up like a sailor and
hosts a luau, hunts gorillas in the jungle, sports a ninja costume
(while his cover of Gerry Rafferty's "Baker Street" plays in the
background), and plays with more swords (did we mention there are a
lot of swords in this video?).
Not only that, but we also see Roth in army fatigues, carrying some
sort of rocket launcher, wandering about a dark cave (presumably
hunting for Osama Bin Laden?); cavorting with pregnant girls
drinking Bud Light; and dressing as an Arab sheik -- all "live from
the Mojo Dojo."
Stranger yet is the fact that spokespeople for Roth at the Mitch
Schneider Organization sent the tapes with no further explanation
and refused to elaborate further when
contacted. "For now, it is what it is," said a spokesperson.
NetHack: The Fossilized Grandpappy of RPGs.
Want to impress a room full of old skool netheads? Talk about the classic Nethack. Its ascii graphics don't get any cruder, but it's a classic in every sense of the word. If you've never played, take a moment to at least check it out, but read this article to know what to expect. If you're a NetHack veteran, grab your pet "d" or "f" and venture back into the Mazes of Menace once again.
Want to impress a room full of old skool netheads? Talk about the classic Nethack. Its ascii graphics don't get any cruder, but it's a classic in every sense of the word. If you've never played, take a moment to at least check it out, but read this article to know what to expect. If you're a NetHack veteran, grab your pet "d" or "f" and venture back into the Mazes of Menace once again.
Monday, March 25, 2002
