i zaw ar map wid zum tweasure dat haz deze zilver doubloons wid a skeleton orf ar queen an deze zum curzed aztec gold doubloons. uz priates gotta find dat tweasure. i hadda polly take ar message ta Kaptun errol 43. bee reedy ta leave fur da high zeas az soon az he weturnz
Silver's on a nice leg up... The cartel will be warming up for their usual smash down USD $31.07 Keep stacking maties!
Ok geewizz, here 'tis... Part 2 (of many more parts!), (sorry for the delay crew v I've had a virus thingy for the past three weeks which meant I couldn't taste the Christmas Dinner!) Well here we go again... and where it will ends nobody knows... Have you ever crawled around under an old house? Apart from the dust and rocks and spider webs there is a lot you can tell about a house by looking carefully below the floorboards at its foundations and plumbing and wiring. For example, if I see a clean new piece of white 240V wire coming from an older part of the house I can tell that a new power point or appliance has been recently installed there. Or when I see a square pillar of bricks beneath a kitchen floor I can guess that there used to be an old kitchen fireplace there many decades ago. Sometimes a thin copper tube going through a brick wall suggests an old wall-mounted oil tank was being used for heating once. And a drooping dusty black ribbon cable suggests that an old TV antenna was replaced years ago. Sometimes we even find old copper pipes that once ran to areas of the house but are no longer used. (These of course are quickly removed and added to the copper stack!) When you are under a house however, it can be hard to make sense of the floor plan above, because you generally can't see the walls and other features. Nevertheless, if you sketched out a plan showing all the wires both where they start and end and if you included all the copper and plastic pipes and assorted wires etc, you might be able to generate a rough idea of what lies above. Tapping on floor boards reveals whether there are bare boards or carpets above. Rows of protruding nails suggest tile underlay. Pipes and drains suggest bathrooms and kitchens. Coaxial cables suggest TV points, and thick wires often run to electric ovens and air conditioners. In very old houses, particularly those that have been extended several times, you can indulge in a bit of 'forensic archaeology' and even work out which room/s came first, and which ones were added next, and so on. A faded scrap of leather, a rusty sheet of iron, an old beer bottle are all clues which can help you work these things out. In some ways, the world we live in is rather like a very large building. It has an external obvious facade, and many varied rooms each of which have gradually changed over the years. The world today looks nothing like it did 500 years ago. But what links remain between the two time periods? I believe our world has a deeper history that largely exists 'below the surface'; a vast array of wiring and piping that is not readily visible in the rooms themselves, but which exists out of sight beneath the floorboards of life, and which can be (with patience and diligence) coaxed into revealing many secrets about those dynamic forces that have shaped the 'building' we see today. Think about this example: adding a new room to an existing building is a very significant process materially, financially, physically and socially. There are plans to be approved, materials to be gathered, costs to be paid and disruptions to be endured. These events all leave 'footprints' of various kinds receipts, council records, bank records, blueprints, timber offcuts -- and loads of rubbish. Looking at these 'evidences' we can often say quite a lot about the new room -- when it was built, who built it and what it cost etc. But the most important question often remains unanswered: WHY was that room added at that particular time? What drove the owners to undergo all that hassle? This is sometimes difficult to determine from the externally available clues. However, if we turn our attention to social records (such birth registers etc.) we sometimes gain a much clearer insight. If a baby just happened to be born around the same time as the room was being constructed then things become slightly clearer; we might reasonably suspect that the new room was added to provide a space for a new family member. Of course people extend their homes for many reasons (and it's never pleasant or cheap) but isn't it the case that when a new child is due and the extra space is required we tend to 'just do it' regardless of the cost (within reason!!) and hassle and mess. In other words the social needs tend to drive quite significant structural changes. The key point in this example is that just as a physical building can tell a story, so too the world itself tells a story. And equally, it tends to be those 'social' aspects of human history that often provide the strongest 'dynamic force' for change and development. If you step back and look at the world as it stands right now you might see a fairly stationary picture. Continuing with the house metaphor, the world's rooms all appear to be furnished and operating reasonably well; things look stable, the lights usually work, and generally it all 'makes sense'. Yet this same 'stability' sometimes makes it harder to see exactly how we 'got to' this configuration. Sure, we can look up the bank records, and building permits etc. but what we really need to know is what were the SOCIAL drivers that propelled us into our current configuration of countries and nations. There are some clues of course; there are people and history books and documents that claim to tell us the true story, and sometimes our own intuition and experience can be used to make deductions about the nature of things. Very often these resources are sufficient (and many people trust them) but I had a few nagging questions... My questions were these: What if we dive under the world's metaphorical floorboards and try to map out all the pipes and wires and pillars and foundations that are seen down there? What knowledge can we glean from this 'wiring map' about the reality of those externally visible social forces that seem to drive change today? And what if that same underground map (properly considered) tells a different story to the one we all know today? And what extra things might it reveal that have simply been forgotten or lost in the dusty mists of time? And what might these differences mean or even predict? So, armed with these questions, my best quill, some blank charts, and the trusty ship's lantern, I donned a pair of pirate overalls and set off on a long journey to explore the farthest reaches of the dusty and ancient foundations of the late great planet earth. What I found astonished me...
I be stuk on a bit a flotsm an not no wer I iz. I juz hop me message in a botl haz fownd yaz. Ifn it wernt for tha sharks I wood put me fet inda wader an padl. But i haz me bodle a rum an is willn ta wayt it out. iz it krizmus yet? Sum dayz I waks up on me liddle bit a flotsm an sweer i can ere magzy cawln me up faw a drink in tha krowz nest. 30.94 a seel brung me tha latist silva prises but i fagot ta adem so had ta upyadate
Arrrggggh I know that life go's on me ship mates, and that it has, too. But for me there has been a pause in my life as I recognize a fellow traveler cut down in the prime of her life and cut short from achieving all that she was able, all that she would of and all that she might of been. Tell those that you love that you do, hug those you love even harder and appreciate those who matter to you for who they are. Life is a fragile thing but people who matter in your life are irreplaceable. The best investment or hedge you can achieve in life is loved ones and real friends. Jeff
Orl hands to the uppa deck as we needs to keep a sharp luke out for durtypilot.(wunder if he was quick eenuff to grab his stack beefore his rustbucket went down?) he must be hungry and thursty.surely he knows how to pull out nails from his raft wid his teef n bend em inter fish hooks.den when he catches em,suck the juice from dere eyes.Yumm.Tastes like $hit but keeps ya alive..if he gets a little dispirited,just spare a thort fur poor old Cap'n Bligh who took a ships whaler frum Just west o Tahiti orl de way to Surabaya wid de rest of the non mutineers.I tink dey all made it but some died after dey got dere..Epic...Hang in dere durty..
P.S Durty, which ocean were you on wen you went darn? The Indian or der Pacific?imagine if we lukin fur yer on de rong wun.... P.S.S silva 30.41usd
JPM may attack the value of gold and silver, but they can never touch the treasures in our hearts. SC, we are flying all the ship's flags at half mast today in honor of your lost friend and her huge potential. Capt'n Turk
SC wee bee wiv ya. Dis pirit crue is wun big famly, so ear are sum speshul hugs for yous orl. OOOOO Southerner
