A Chinese businessman hid two illegally built extra storeys on his penthouse suite with trees and plants. The penthouse already had a roofgarden, but it was increased in size to deceive neighbours and officials.
Take a look in the mirror, have a hard long good look at yourself. Cmon now lets be real, deep down you know that you’re not just this bag of skin and bones. My friend you are literally the Universe experiencing itself in human form, remember this next time you feel worthless and try not to get caught up by all the bullshit society has created. “Becoming” Art by @inuqo. InstagramWebsite .
Our Cassini spacecraft has been exploring Saturn, its stunning rings and its strange and beautiful moons for more than a decade.
Having expended almost every bit of the rocket propellant it carried to Saturn, operators are deliberately plunging Cassini into the planet to ensure Saturn’s moons will remain pristine for future exploration – in particular, the ice-covered, ocean-bearing moon Enceladus, but also Titan, with its intriguing pre-biotic chemistry.
Let’s take a look back at some of Cassini’s top discoveries:
Titan
Under its shroud of haze, Saturn’s planet-sized moon Titan hides dunes, mountains of water ice and rivers and seas of liquid methane. Of the hundreds of moons in our solar system, Titan is the only one with a dense atmosphere and large liquid reservoirs on its surface, making it in some ways more like a terrestrial planet.
Both Earth and Titan have nitrogen-dominated atmospheres – over 95% nitrogen in Titan’s case. However, unlike Earth, Titan has very little oxygen; the rest of the atmosphere is mostly methane and traced amounts of other gases, including ethane.
There are three large seas, all located close to the moon’s north pole, surrounded by numerous smaller lakes in the northern hemisphere. Just one large lake has been found in the southern hemisphere.
Enceladus
The moon Enceladus conceals a global ocean of salty liquid water beneath its icy surface. Some of that water even shoots out into space, creating an immense plume!
For decades, scientists didn’t know why Enceladus was the brightest world in the solar system, or how it related to Saturn’s E ring. Cassini found that both the fresh coating on its surface, and icy material in the E ring originate from vents connected to a global subsurface saltwater ocean that might host hydrothermal vents.
With its global ocean, unique chemistry and internal heat, Enceladus has become a promising lead in our search for worlds where life could exist.
Iapetus
Saturn’s two-toned moon Iapetus gets its odd coloring from reddish dust in its orbital path that is swept up and lands on the leading face of the moon.
The most unique, and perhaps most remarkable feature discovered on Iapetus in Cassini images is a topographic ridge that coincides almost exactly with the geographic equator. The physical origin of the ridge has yet to be explained…
It is not yet year whether the ridge is a mountain belt that has folded upward, or an extensional crack in the surface through which material from inside Iapetus erupted onto the surface and accumulated locally.
Saturn’s Rings
Saturn’s rings are made of countless particles of ice and dust, which Saturn’s moons push and tug, creating gaps and waves.
Scientists have never before studied the size, temperature, composition and distribution of Saturn’s rings from Saturn obit. Cassini has captured extraordinary ring-moon interactions, observed the lowest ring-temperature ever recorded at Saturn, discovered that the moon Enceladus is the source for Saturn’s E ring, and viewed the rings at equinox when sunlight strikes the rings edge-on, revealing never-before-seen ring features and details.
Cassini also studied features in Saturn’s rings called “spokes,” which can be longer than the diameter of Earth. Scientists think they’re made of thin icy particles that are lifted by an electrostatic charge and only last a few hours.
Auroras
The powerful magnetic field that permeates Saturn is strange because it lines up with the planet’s poles. But just like Earth’s field, it all creates shimmering auroras.
Auroras on Saturn occur in a process similar to Earth’s northern and southern lights. Particles from the solar wind are channeled by Saturn’s magnetic field toward the planet’s poles, where they interact with electrically charged gas (plasma) in the upper atmosphere and emit light.
Turbulent Atmosphere
Saturn’s turbulent atmosphere churns with immense storms and a striking, six-sided jet stream near its north pole.
Saturn’s north and south poles are also each beautifully (and violently) decorated by a colossal swirling storm. Cassini got an up-close look at the north polar storm and scientists found that the storm’s eye was about 50 times wider than an Earth hurricane’s eye.
Unlike the Earth hurricanes that are driven by warm ocean waters, Saturn’s polar vortexes aren’t actually hurricanes. They’re hurricane-like though, and even contain lightning. Cassini’s instruments have ‘heard’ lightning ever since entering Saturn orbit in 2004, in the form of radio waves. But it wasn’t until 2009 that Cassini’s cameras captured images of Saturnian lighting for the first time.
Cassini scientists assembled a short video of it, the first video of lightning discharging on a planet other than Earth.
Cassini’s adventure will end soon because it’s almost out of fuel. So to avoid possibly ever contaminating moons like Enceladus or Titan, on Sept. 15 it will intentionally dive into Saturn’s atmosphere.
The spacecraft is expected to lose radio contact with Earth within about one to two minutes after beginning its decent into Saturn’s upper atmosphere. But on the way down, before contact is lost, eight of Cassini’s 12 science instruments will be operating! More details on the spacecraft’s final decent can be found HERE.
Mami Wata, Momu Watu, La Sirene, Sedna, Coventina, Suijin, Mother of Waters
She is the water between us, the water within us, the water that slakes thirst, from which we were born. Water is the natural and the sacred, the functional and the necessary. All over the world, in cultures young and old, water is life and from this force, great adventures, quests, and legacies begin. And whether it is still, moves, rises, or falls, water fills us. Imagine what stories and strange tales can be told from the depths of its depths.
TROUBLE THE WATERS: Tales from the Deep Blue will be a new anthology of water-themed speculative short stories that explore all kinds of water lore and deities, ancient and new as well as unimagined tales. We want stories with memorable, engaging characters, great and small, epic tales and quieter stories of personal and communal growth. Science fiction, fantasy, horror, interstitial, and unclassifiable works are welcome. We are seeking original stories in English (2500 – 7000 words; pays 6 cents per word) from writers of all walks of life from this beautiful planet and will accept some select reprints (pays 2 cents per word). Deadline: November 1, 2017. Projected publication: November 2018, Rosarium Publishing, www.rosariumpublishing.com. Please send submissions as a .doc, .docx, or .rtf file in standard mss formatting with your name, title, and word count to: TroubletheWaters2018@gmail.com
Please note that we are unable to accept simultaneous or multiple submissions. See here for more information.
In 1979, Usborne envisioned an incredible future in which book illustrators could combine a Discovery One pod from “2001: A Space Odyssey” and the head and legs of R2-D2 from “Star Wars” while avoiding cease and desist letters from MGM and 20th Century Fox legal departments.
The Goliath heron (Ardea goliath), also known as the giant heron, is a very large wading bird of the heron family, Ardeidae. It is found in sub-Saharan Africa, with smaller numbers in Southwest and South Asia. This is the world’s largest heron. The height is 4-5 feet, the wingspan is 6–7 ½ feet and the weight is 9–11 pounds. In flight it has a slow and rather ponderous look and, unlike some other herons, its legs are not held horizontally.
Small bright clouds dot Jupiter’s entire south tropical zone in this image acquired by JunoCam on NASA’s Juno spacecraft on May 19, 2017, at an altitude of 7,990 miles (12,858 kilometers). Although the bright clouds appear tiny in this vast Jovian cloudscape, they actually are cloud towers roughly 30 miles (50 kilometers) wide and 30 miles (50 kilometers) high that cast shadows on the clouds below. On Jupiter, clouds this high are almost certainly composed of water and/or ammonia ice, and they may be sources of lightning. This is the first time so many cloud towers have been visible, possibly because the late-afternoon lighting is particularly good at this geometry.
Atlantic – 781 699-1 – Recorded live at The Montreal International Jazz Festival, Canada, in 1985.
Ahmad Jamal – Live At The Montreal Jazz Festival 1985.
Bass – James Cammack.
Drums – Herlin Riley.
Percussion – Selden Newton.
Piano – Ahmad Jamal.
