Christmas Holiday Facts

There's no other holiday like Christmas. Many of us celebrate the holidays without knowing how our traditions got started or what they signify. Christmas is much more fun when you know some facts behind the holiday.

Most of these facts are very interesting and reminds us that there is quite a bit of history behind our family customs. Try using the Christmas Holiday Facts to make your own Christmas quiz for holiday parties and add a unique touch with personal favorites.

Christmas Holiday Facts: (World Amazing Facts)

• The word Christmas is Old English, a contraction of Christ's Mass.

• The first president to decorate the white house Christmas tree in the United States was Franklin Pierce.

• Electric lights for trees were first used in 1895.

• The first Christmas cards were vintage and invented in 1843, the Victorian Era

• "It's a Wonderful Life" appears on TV more often than any other holiday movie.

• "Rudolph" was actually created by Montgomery Ward in the late 1930's for a holiday promotion. The rest is history.

• "The Nutcracker" is the most famous Christmas ballet.

• "Jingle Bells" was first written for Thanksgiving and then became one of the most popular Christmas songs.

• If you received all of the gifts in the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas", you would receive 364 presents.

• The poinsettia plant was brought into the United States from Mexico by Joel Poinsett in the early 1800's.

• Holly berries are poisonous.

• Contrary to common belief, poinsettia plants are non-toxic.

• In 1843, "A Christmas Carol" was written by Charles Dickens in just six weeks.

• The first state to recognize the Christmas holiday officially was Alabama

• Christmas became a national holiday in America on June, 26, 1870.

• Coca Cola was the first beverage company to use Santa for a winter promotion.

• An angel told Mary she was going to have a baby.

• Clearing up a common misconception, in Greek, X means Christ. That is where the word "X-Mas" comes from. Not because someone took the "Christ" out of Christmas.

• Traditionally, Christmas trees are taken down after Epiphany.

• More diamonds are sold around Christmas than any other time of the year.

• In Mexico, wearing red underwear on New Year's Eve is said to bring new love in the upcoming year.
  

Audi Locus : 2007

The name Locus means a condition that defines a continuous figure which is a curve.

The main characteristics of the design are the way its surface shapes are formed with a continuous flow from front until the back of the car. Inspiration for that was obviously the Mother Nature we deal with daily but somehow we usually do not realize that everything in the nature has somehow its specific curves and flowing lines it is very rarely to spot perfectly straight lines. The main goal was to implement this design aspect into a car which creates a relaxing, energetic, vibrant and confident feeling.

It is clear to see a curved sharp edged line that starts at the very front, flowing through the middle section, slightly curved down after the A pillar and then going back up again at the rear wheel arches to follow its way back until the diffuser. This same curve language is also applied to the greenhouse and the way windows are shaped. The front is somehow aggressive looking with the traditional AUDI grill and air intakes that are shaped very much like the headlights to create a coherent feeling. The rear section is obviously very organic with defined curves and subtle details, tail lights are designed to have integrated air outtakes underneath them to avoid any unnecessary details. With dual exhaust and fairly empty rear section, it creates a feeling of subtleness. Another feature is the air intake at the end of the roof which is designed to avoid any distracting design elements on the top of the car combining elegance with functionality.

Atomic BOMB ON HIROSHIMA

THINGS YOU NEVER KNEW YOUR CELLPHONE COULD DO

                           EMERGENCY
> The Emergency Number worldwide for**Mobile** is112

> If you findyourself out of coverage area of your mobile
> network and there is an emergency, 
> dial 112
> and the mobile will search any existing network to
> establish the emergency number for you, 

> and interestingly this number 112can be dialled even if the
> keypad is locked.
> **Try it out.**

> Have you locked your keys in the car? Does you car have

> remote keys?
>
> This may come
in handy someday. Good reason to own a cell
> phone:
> If you lock your keys in the car and the spare keys are at
> home, call
> someone at home on their cell phone from your cell phone.
> Hold your cell phone about a foot from your car door and

> have the person at your home press the unlock button,
> holding it near the mobile phone on their end. Your car will
> unlock.
> Saves someone fro having to drive your keys to you.
> Distance is no object. You could be hundreds of miles away,

> and if you can reach someone who has the other
> "remote" for your car, you can unlock the doors
> (or the trunk).



                Hidden batterypower

> Imagine your cell battery isvery low, you are expecting an
>
 important call and you don't have a charger. 
> Nokia instrument comes with a reserve battery.
> To activate, press the keys
> *3370# 
> Your cell will restart withthis reserve and the instrument

> will show a50%increase in battery.
> This reserve will get charged when you charge your cell
> next time AND...
>                       
     How to disable a STOLEN mobile phone? 


> To check your Mobile phone's serial number, key in the
> following digits on your phone: 
> * # 0 6 #
> A 15 digit code will appear on the screen. This number is
> unique to your handset. Write it down and keep it somewhere

> safe. when your phone get stolen, you can phone your service
> provider and give them this code. They will then be able to
> block your handset so even if the thief changes the
 SIM
> card, your phone will be totally useless.
> You probably won't get your phone back, but at least
> you know that whoever stole it can't use/sell it either.


> Be care while using your mobile phone
> When you try to call someone through mobile phone,don't
> put your mobile closer to your ears until the recipient
> answers. Because directly after dialling, the mobile phone

> would use it's maximum signalling power, which is: 2
> watts = 33dbi, Plz Be Careful, Message as received (Save
> your brain) Please use left ear while using cell (mobile),
> because if you use the right one it will affect brain

> directly. This is a true fact from Apollo medical team.
> Please spread this useful information around
> SAFETY BY ALL FOR ALL 

Use Different Firefox Profiles For Different Browsing Habits

One of the most under-looked features of Firefox is its ability to run different profiles. This is perfect for various reasons. If more than one person is using the same computer, each person can have a different profile where he can have his own customized Firefox setting - such as extensions or bookmarks.

Another reason to use different profiles is when using FireFox for different purposes. Obviously, most people don’t use every extension every time they use Firefox. However, the fact that the extension is installed makes Firefox startup and run slower than usual. The more extensions you run, the slower Firefox will run.

Use Firefox Profiles for different browsing habits

You can create Firefox profiles for the different browsing habits that you have. For example, if you are a web developer, you can have all extensions for that on one profile, without the unnecessary ones cluttering your Firefox. Likewise, if you want to browse without leaving any trace -”private browsing” - you can have a profile with the extension distrust or stealther and noscript.

For normal browsing, you can have another profile, and so on. This will keep your Firefox neat and fast - leaving only the necessary extensions and bookmarks for their respective purposes.

To use Firefox Profiles, follow these steps:

1. Go to Start->Run and type:

Firefox -p

ffprofile.gif
2. Click on Create Profile and name it whatever you want (porn mode, work…)

3. Run each profile and set it up exactly how you want it - download the correct extensions and place the bookmarks that you need.

Place desktop shortcuts for each profile:

To create shortcuts for each Firefox profile, put a shortcut for Firefox on your desktop for each profile. So if you have 4 profiles, place 4 shortcuts to Firefox. Right click->Properties on each shortcut and go to the Shortcut tab. In the target field, it will be something like this:

“C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe”

Simply add -p name to the end where name is the name of the profile. So if the profile name is ‘private’ the Target field should look like this:

“C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe” -p private

ffprofile21.gif
Do this for every shortcut of Firefox.

Depending on how many extensions you normally use, this can speed up your firefox significantly (especially how long it takes it to start up) because the extensions are spread over more profiles. Also, it’s much less cluttered because you can spread bookmarks also.

Restarting Windows Without Restarting Your PC

A modern PC with Vista Home Edition takes about one and a half minutes to boot. An older machine with XP is about the same. That’s 30 seconds for the PC itself (the BIOS) to boot up, plus a minute for the Windows operating system to boot.

Sometimes, you need to reboot Windows (e.g. when installing new software), but there is no need to restart BIOS, too. However, the default is to reboot both. (That’s called doing a “cold boot,” rather than a “warm boot.”) There’s a trick that works on both XP and Vista to get it to do a warm boot instead, thus saving you 30 seconds per cycle.

The trick is to hold down the SHIFT key when invoking the restart.

Windows Vista: Select Start, then hover over the right arrow that is to the right of the padlock icon until the pop-up menu appears that contains “restart” as one of it’s choices. Hold down the SHIFT key while clicking on the “restart” choice.

Windows XP: Select Start. Select “Shut Down…”. Change the drop-down combo box under “What do you want the computer to do?” to “Restart”. Hold down the SHIFT key while clicking on the “OK” button.

How to access FTP servers without any software

FTP is used for transfer of large files. Bloggers and webmasters use FTP frequently for uploading files to their server space all the time.

FTP transfers usually involve some software installed on the computer. The method usually involves connecting to a particular host server URl, and entering the username and password for access. FTP transfers may be primitive (they do not have much security), but they are still widely used.
Imagine yourselves in this situation : you are at a friend’s house or a browsing cafe, and need to access your server immediately (perhaps for uploading WP-Cache during a spike, for example). Do you wait until the download of FTP software is complete? That is a complete waste of time.
There is an easier way to access FTP servers - without any third-party software. All that you require is the humble Windows Explorer or Internet Explorer (either of them can be used). To access any FTP server, enter the following (replace server with the domain/subdomain):

ftp://ftp.server.com

Once you enter this, a dialog box will come up, and you can fill out the user name and password and click Log On.

If you’re still not convinved of using this method, try out FileZilla , a free, open-source software.

Disable popup warnings in Windows XP

Windows XP may be one of the more stable and developed operating systems (Vista is like a beta right now). But there are many irritating aspects in Windows XP.

Windows has a really stupid popup system, which pops up for every unnecessary thing imaginable. For example, there is a popup to warn that disk space is low on the system drive (usually C:\). Also, there is a popup for alerting you that a new program installed. As if you didn't know that you've installed a program!

There is an easy registry hack to get rid of all these popups. Do not be appalled by a registry edit - this is really simple.

Open up the registry editor - go to Run, type regedit and click OK. Backing up the registry before a hack is always a good idea, so click File > Export, choose a location and click save. Then, proceed to HKEY_CURRENT_ USER\Software\ Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentV ersion\Explorer\ Advanced

Right click on the right-hand pane, make New> DWORD Value and name it EnableBallonTips. Set the value to 0 to disable ballontips, and set it back to 1 to enable balloontips.

This hack disables most balloontips. In order to eliminate all popups, some more work is required. In each of the following locations, change the values to 0 to disable balloontips.

Location: HKEY_CURRENT_ USER\Software\ Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentV ersion\Explorer\ Advanced\

1. Change the value of FolderContentsInfoT ip to 0

Location: HKEY_CURRENT_ USER\Software\ Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentV ersion\Explorer\ Advanced\

1. Change the value of ShowInfoTip to 0.

Location: HKEY_CURRENT_ USER\Software\ Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentV ersion\Explorer\ tips\Show

1. Change the value of Show to 0

If anything goes wrong, restore the registry file that you had explored before and settings will be restored.

Top-Earning Female Athletes

Michelle Wie
Golf
$12 million A limited schedule this year (injuries, college enrollment) didn't hurt Wie's endorsement career. But if the teen sensation wants to extend her deals with Nike and Sony, she'll need to spend more time on the course in 2009.

Justine Henin
Tennis
$12.5 million
After ringing up $5 million in prize money during a white-hot 2007, Henin walked away from the sport this past spring, just before her 26th birthday.

Venus Williams
Tennis
$13 million
Big sister Venus defeated Serena at this year's Wimbledon final, showing she's got plenty left in the tank. She's parlayed success on the court into her own fashion line, EleVen, a collection of casual and performance footwear and apparel.

Annika Sorenstam

Golf
$11 million
The Swede has racked up more career prize money than any female golfer in history--some $22 million. The eight-time player of the year has 72 LPGA tournament wins to her credit, including 10 majors. Sorenstam has announced she'll retire from the tour after the ADT Championship in November, just after she turns 38.

Ana Ivanovic
Tennis
$6.5 million

Danica Patrick
Auto Racing
$7 million

Paula Creamer
Golf
$6 million

Lorena Ochoa
Golf
$10 million
Six tournament wins so far this year have netted Ochoa $1.8 million in prize money to go along with major endorsement deals with Audi and Lacoste.
Creamer's victory in the 2005 Sybase Classic made her, at 18, the youngest LPGA event winner in 53 years. She's signed on with Adidas, NEC and Taylor Made.
Patrick's Indy series win in April should set her up for more riches to come, provided she avoids becoming a one-hit wonder.
The 20-year-old Serb has shot up to No. 1 in the world after winning the 2008 French Open. She counts Adidas, Yonex (rackets) and Juice Plus among her major endorsements.
They’ve come a long way, baby. A handful of them, anyway.
When it comes to making money in sports, women are narrowing the gap with men, at least at the top of the pyramid. For women, the highest-paid athletes come almost exclusively from tennis and golf, where prize money and endorsement dollars flow overwhelmingly to the brightest stars.
In contrast, women’s basketball and soccer are still a long way from producing the next LeBron James or David Beckham.

Golfers Annika Sorenstam, Michelle Wie and Lorena Ochoa have broken into eight-figure earnings territory, a testament to the LPGA’s efforts to globalize. The women’s tour not only has top golfers from numerous countries (Sorenstam is from Sweden, Ochoa from Mexico, while Wie is Korean-American, born in Hawaii), but has made a point to broaden its international appeal by holding more events for players in their home markets.
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“The tour has a much more international flavor to it,” says David Carter of the Sports Business Group, an industry consultant.
Women’s tennis has been on the upswing a lot longer, dating back to Billie Jean King’s victory over Bobby Riggs in a 1973 match appropriately named “The Battle of the Sexes.”
The publicity from that match led to the Women’s Tennis Association’s first major national television contract, just in time for Chris Evert to blossom as the first TV star of the women’s game.

A little bit later, when attendance and television ratings held firm for the prime years of Martina Navratilova, Hana Mandlikova and Pam Shriver, it was clear that the public was ready for strong, hard-hitting women, and an international players roster helped ensure a wide audience.
Today, the four highest-paid female athletes in the world are from the tennis circuit: Maria Sharapova (Russia), Serena and Venus Williams (U.S.) and the newly retired Justine Henin (Belgium).

No question, the compelling rivalries of the past decade, particularly between the Williams sisters, have done a lot to overcome occasional obstacles like the 1993 stabbing of Monica Seles, the downfall (and brief return) of Jennifer Capriati and the degeneration of over-marketed Anna Kournikova into a caricature of herself.

Will women’s team-sport athletes ever catch up to men? Probably not any time soon, given the lack of depth that’s tied to a shorter history of organization and development.
It could happen one day, though, Carter thinks, given the consistent, incremental growth of women’s sports and the national trend that has more women in charge of family budgets and entertainment spending.

“The chance does exist, especially as women’s sports get more coverage in the Olympics,” he says.

Olympians and WNBA stars like Diana Taurasi and Lisa Leslie don’t get the same money from Nike that LeBron does, but they’re in the stable. How effectively their personalities are marketed may determine whether the basketball stars of the next generation make their millions or leave the big money to tennis and golf.

Chinese Watermelon Arts

10 Fascinating Last Pictures Taken

The words .œLast picture taken.� before his or her death conjure up many emotions, whether in front of the camera or behind it. This list consists of 10 last time stamps in history taken of and by some fascinating individuals. If anyone has new or conflicting information concerning the photos or information in this list I hope you will share it in your comments.

10

Wiley Post & Will Rogers

1898 1935, 1879 - 1935

Wiley Post who was the first pilot to fly solo around the world and his good friend Will Rogers a famous comedian, humorist and social commentator were set out to fly around the world together. This photo (that.™s Will Rogers in the hat and tie, standing on the wing) was taken on August 15, 1935 shortly before taking off from a lagoon near Point Barrow Alaska. During take off Post.™s experimental Lockheed Explorer sea plane crashed when its engine failed killing both men.

Interesting Fact: The airport in Barrow Alaska was renamed Wiley Post - Will Rogers Memorial Airport.

9

John and Jackie Knill

On January 13, 2005 the bodies of Canadian couple John and Jackie Knill were discovered on a Thailand beach resort. They were two of the many victims killed from the December 26 2004 tsunami. Weeks later a Seattle man doing relief work found a damaged camera and discarded it but kept the memory card in the camera. After downloading the images he discovered pictures of the Knill.™s enjoying their vacation, as well as shots of a huge wave approaching the shore. With each picture it shows the wave getting closer and closer to shore. The last picture taken of them before the wave hit (shown above) was shot just after 8.30 am on December 26.

Interesting Fact: The Seattle man that discovered the images recognized the Knills from a missing person.™s web site and contacted the couple.™s two sons in Vancouver Canada. The man then drove from Seattle to Vancouver to give the sons their parent.™s last images.

8

Albert Einstein

b.1879 d.1955

The photograph above is the last known picture of Einstein, taken in March, 1955. There are not a lot of details concerning this photo but he is probably at his home near Princeton, New Jersey. A month later on April 17, 1955, Einstein experienced internal bleeding caused by the rupture of an aortic aneurysm, which had previously been diagnosed and reinforced. He went to the hospital and took a draft of a speech he was preparing for a television appearance commemorating the State of Israel.™s seventh anniversary with him. Unfortunately he did not live long enough to complete it. The following day Einstein died at the age of 76.

Interesting Fact: Einstein.™s brain was removed within seconds of his death (without the permission of his family) in hope that future neuroscience would be able to discover what made Einstein so intelligent. Recent scientific studies have suggested that regions involved in speech and language are smaller, while regions involved with numerical and spatial processing are larger.

7

Marilyn Monroe

b.1926 d 1962

Many believe Celebrity photographer George Barris took the last pictures of Marilyn Monroe. However, it was actually Life Magazine.™s photographer Allan Grant. The pictures were taken July 7, 1962 during an interview at her home. Six pictures appeared in Life including the one pictured above.
Just under a month later on August 5, 1962, the LAPD received a call at 4:25AM from Dr. Hyman Engelberg proclaiming that Monroe was dead at her home in Brentwood, Los Angeles. The official cause of Monroe.™s death was classified as .œacute barbiturate poisoning.�, and was also recorded as a .œprobable suicide. Many questions still remain unanswered about the circumstances of her death and the timeline from when Monroe.™s body was found.

Interesting Fact: The Life Magazine issue featuring Monroe.™s interview was dated August 3 1962, just 2 day before her death.

6

Bill Biggart

1947-2001

Photojournalist Bill Biggart was covering the events of September 11th and was Tragically killed as the second tower of the World Trade Center came down. Four days later Biggart.™s body was recovered from the rubble and his personal effects, including his cameras were given to his wife. Biggart.™s widow later handed over the camera bag to a good friend and fellow photographer. She was convinced that no pictures had survived because the falling debris had blown off the backs of the two film cameras and the lids of the film canisters had been peeled back. His friend turned his attention to the digital camera that was covered by ash. The lens had been sheared off but when he opened the chamber that held the flash card he discovered it was in pristine condition. The card contained 150 pictures including the last picture taken shown above which is time stamped 10:28 am and 24 seconds. The time was 10:30am when the second tower came down.

Interesting Fact: When Biggart.™s wife reached him on his cell phone shortly after the first tower fell. He told her not to worry, and would meet her in 20 minutes at his studio. .œI.™m safe,.� he assured her, .œI.™m with the firemen..� It was the last time they ever spoke. About 20 minutes later, the second tower collapsed

5

Lady Diana

1961 d.1997

Last year when the long-awaited inquest into Lady Diana.™s death began, this picture was released that shows the last picture taken before the crash. The press competed to be the first to print it even though the last photo ended up just showing part of her hair. Unfortunately and ironically photos like this one ended up contributing to the crash that ended her life.

The photo shows the four speeding away from the Ritz Paris At around 12:20 a.m. on August 31, 1997 with Henri Paul the hotel driver, right, and Dodi Fayed.™s bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones in the passenger seat. In the rear seat is Princess Diana (looking back at the pursuing paparazzi) with Dodi Fayed sitting next to her. Seconds after this picture was taken the Mercedes entered the Place de l.™Alma underpass going at an estimated speed of 105 km/h (65 mph.) The driver lost control of the car and swerved to the left before colliding head-on with one of the pillars in the tunnel. Dodi Fayed and Henri Paul both died instantly. Trevor Rees-Jones was still conscious and had suffered multiple serious injuries to the face. Diana was critically injured but died later that morning in the hospital leaving Rees-Jones the only survivor.

Interesting Fact: As the casualties lay seriously injured or dead in their wrecked car, the photographers continued to take pictures. Critically injured Diana was reported to murmur the words, .œoh my God,.� and after the photographers were pushed away by emergency teams, the words, .œleave me alone.�.

4

Elvis Presley

1935 1977

This last known photo of Elvis was taken on August 16 1977 at 12.28am. The picture was snapped as he is pulling into Graceland after a night out. That afternoon Presley was found on his bathroom floor by fiancée, Ginger Alden. According to the medical investigator, Presley had .œstumbled or crawled several feet before he died.�; he had apparently been using the bathroom at the time. Death was officially pronounced at 3:30 pm at Baptist Memorial Hospital.

Interesting Fact: Elvis had visited his dentist on August 15th to have a temporary crown put in and has been suggested that the codeine the dentist gave him that day resulted in an anaphylactic shock that assisted in his death because he had suffered allergic reactions to the drug previously.

3

Adolf Hitler

1889 1945

This last know picture of Hitler was taken approximately two days prior to his death as he stands outside his Berlin bunker entrance surveying the devastating bomb damage. With Germany lying in ruins after six years of war, and with defeat imminent, Hitler decided to take his own life. But before doing so, he married Eva Braun and then penned his last will and testament. The next day in the afternoon on April 30, 1945 Braun and Hitler.™ entered his living room to end their lives. Later that afternoon the remaining members of the bunker community found Hitler slumped over, and blood spilled over the arm of the couch. Eva was sitting at the other end. Hitler had killed himself by biting down on a cyanide capsule while shooting him self in the head. Eva only used the cyanide capsule.

Interesting Fact: When Hitler asked his physician to recommend a reliable method of suicide his doctor suggested combining a dose of cyanide with a gunshot to the head.

2

Anne Frank

b.1929 d.1945

This is believed to be the last known photo of Anne Frank with her sister Margot taken in early to mid 1942. Later that year In July her sister Margot would be among the first to receive notice that she was to be sent to Nazi Germany ordering her to report for relocation to a work camp. Anne was then told by her father that the family would go into hiding. The Frank family was discovered and arrested on the morning of August 4th 1944. Having been arrested in hiding, they were considered criminals and were sent to the Punishment Barracks for hard labor. In March 1945, a typhus epidemic spread through the camp and killed approximately 17,000 prisoners. Witnesses later testified that Margot fell from her bunk in her weakened state and was killed by the shock, and that a few days later Anne Frank died.

Interesting Fact: In April 1945 just weeks after Anne Frank.™s death, the camp was liberated by British troops.

1

Abraham Lincoln

b.1809 1865

There is some controversy as to which photograph is the last picture of Abraham Lincoln taken before he was assassinated. I ran across three different photos on the Internet that claim last picture. However from information recently discovered the general consensus is the photo pictured above is the one. It was taken by Henry J. Warren during a photo session around the time of his inauguration. Mr. Warren took some candid photographs of crowd scenes on March 4th and two day later on March 6th Warren took this picture out on the White House Balcony.

A little over a month after this picture was taken on April 14, 1865 Lincoln attended a play at Ford.™s Theater. John Wilkes Booth a well-known actor and a Confederate spy from Maryland crept up behind the President.™s box and waited for the funniest line of the play, hoping the laughter would cover the noise of the gunshot. When the laughter came Booth jumped into the box with the President and aimed a single-shot, round-slug .44 caliber Derringer at his head, firing at point-blank range.

Interesting Fact: As mentioned above many Internet sites claim a different last picture taken of Lincoln claiming a date of April 10, 1865. (Just 4 days before the assassination) New evidence indicates what they thought was the last photo was used to paint a portrait. That particular portrait was painted February 5th 1865. This being the case, the Warren photo suddenly became the last picture taken of Lincoln alive.