New Navy Ship Honors 9/11 Victims

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Big Picture: Days of the Dead

From October 31st through November 2nd, a number of festivals, holidays and solemnities take place, all loosely related and revolving around remembrance of the dead. Halloween, Samhain, All Saints' Day, All Souls' Day, the Day of the Dead and other festivals trace their origins back to Celtic, Aztec, Roman and Christian traditions. Halloween is largely a secular observation these days, All Souls and All Saints remain mainly Catholic observations, and the Day of the Dead is still largely a Latin American tradition, its roots in Mexico's Aztec heritage. Collected here are photographs over the past week from the varied observations of the Days of the Dead around the world. (37 photos total)

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Happy 19th Anniversary Mary

Mary and I were married nineteen years ago today.

Happy Anniversary!

A Real Periodic Table

For my favorite chemistry professor.

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Thanks To Keith at BagOfNothing

7th-Grader: Obama, Most US Presidents Related

A seventh-grader and her 80-year-old grandfather are allegedly the first people to discover that President Barack Obama is related to all other U.S. presidents except one.

BridgeAnne d'Avignon, who attends Monte Vista Christian School in Watsonville, traced that Obama, and all other U.S. presidents except Martin Van Buren, are related to John "Lackland" Plantagenet, a king of England and signer of the Magna Carta.

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Thanks To Keith at BagOfNothing

Big Picture: Launch of the Ares I-X

On Wednesday, October 28th, NASA launched its Ares I-X prototype vehicle, the first launch from Kennedy's pads of a vehicle other than the space shuttle since the Apollo Program's Saturn rockets were retired. NASA's Constellation Program's 327-foot-tall rocket produced 2.96 million pounds of thrust at liftoff and reached a speed of 100 mph in eight seconds. The two-minute sub-orbital test flight encountered a few problems along the way, as the launch pad was slightly damaged, a planned stage separation did not go quite according to plan, and a possible parachute failure led to a hard splashdown for its first stage. The Constellation program is under pressure as a recent committee report depicted it as overly expensive. The Obama administration is set to make a decision in the next several months about the near-term direction of U.S. Space Policy. (28 photos total)

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Compassion Moment

This has already been called one of THE most powerful moments in Catalyst history; there wasn't a dry eye in the arena after Jimmy Wambua met Mark, his Compassion Sponsor of 19 years, for the 1st time. It was an unbelievable moment...Jimmy begins to share at minute 3:45.

Catalyst 2009 Compassion Moment from Catalyst on Vimeo.

Another Reminder: Time Change This Saturday Night