We all bite the dust and become one with the dust. Behind this simplification comes a remarkable process before our bodies turn to ashes. For someone, it might be gruesome, terrifying, traumatizing, while for others it might be as miraculous as the stages of conception and birth, only in a way that’s reversed—like a justification to the balance of nature. And so, we’re here to present both a discovery and knowledge about the loss of life and the process beyond.

When Death Finally Comes

Our heart stops beating while the lungs stop breathing, and each cell no longer receives oxygen and nutrients from blood. When this happens, the process called livor mortis takes place. It’s the settling of the blood in the lower or dependent part of the body like the back or the legs, depending on the position at death. This is due to the blood draining from the blood vessels starting at the top and accumulating in the lower part.

But most cells aren’t still dead except for the brain cells which die in the first few minutes of death. Cells of the muscle, skin, and bone can live for hours and several days especially the latter two. This is because these cells can use a different type of respiration after the heart and lungs stop working. This is called anaerobic respiration or respiration without oxygen, which can cause lactic acid build up, the reason for the muscles to stiffen. It’s very much the same when we run a long distance and our heart and lungs can’t keep up with our leg muscles. But the different lies on the fact that death can’t clear out this lactic acid because of lack of blood flow, hence causing the whole body to stiffen—or what we know medically as rigor mortis.

Rigor mortis starts at about three hours after death and lasts approximately in 36 hours. When all cells die, it can’t support to fight bacteria and the enzyme of these bacteria plus the cells own enzyme what cause the body to decompose causing the muscles to lose their stiffness.

The process that takes place after death depends on the embalming procedure that we usually do now to somebody that died. Embalming affects the length of time before the body finally cedes to the different stages of decomposition. On the next part of the discussion, we will tackle the more detailed story of how our bodies decompose, which is divided into five stages: Initial Decay, Putrefaction, Black Putrefaction, Butyric Putrefaction, and Dry Decay.

Every living thing faces its own demise, end, and death. But for human beings, our body works wonders as to keep us alive up to the best of what our bodies can—in sickness, in old age, and tragedy. These wonders may not be fully expressed in few paragraphs nor in words, which everyone can easily understand, but the important thing about it is we’re a creation far greater, more astounding, and more breathtaking than any of man’s invention.

Skin

Its the foremost line of our body’s defense by serving as an effective barrier to lots of stress factors like microorganisms, dirt, and heat. With an acidic pH of less than 5, it makes an unfavourable environment for most bacteria. Hair, sebum, and sweat which are mainly found on the skin surface contain enzymes that destroy the integrity of pathogens. Through pores, the skin eliminates body heat, absorbs nutrients, and release metabolic by-products and toxins through sweat. And by a copious amount of blood supply through minute capillaries, clotting mechanisms makes an important role to prevent foreign matters gaining entry into the body through the wound.

Saliva

A significant amount of saliva aids ingested matters into a highly acidic environment of the stomach, which again makes a very terrible place for microorganisms to live in. Human saliva contains a significant amount of enzymes that can digest foods into their basic components which aid further digestive processes.

Respiratory Tract

The respiratory tract is a highly protected system in order to protect the entire body in return. This role starts from the nose as the nasal hair serve to trap large particles. On the other hand, hair-like projections called cilia takes care of the small particles and microbes by trapping and sending them to the throat, thereby allowing elimination through expulsion or swallowing, which involves a series of enzyme-based or immune system interactions.

Blood

The blood plays a very significant and dynamic role in keeping humans alive. One may not survive without an adequate amount of blood because it transports oxygen, nutrients, hormones, inflammatory factors, drugs, and a lot more. Through one of its component the white blood cells, it’s able to detect microorganisms and send signals to the other lines of body’s self defense, while the platelets and clotting factors maintain a safe and exclusive passageway for the circulatory system. They repair leaks and work more incredibly than Band-Aids.

These body components may not suffice to reveal everything as our body has a lot to tell, from the smallest part of the brain to the outermost tip of the toe. It doesn’t just contain a marvel of functioning cells and organs, which make a mass of muscles and bones a human being. The insurmountable amount of wonders it boast what makes a human body a miracle in a truest, tangible form.

Energy conservation is a top advocacy of green living these days. Today, lots of technological innovations in promoting renewable energy methods have been offered to various factories, buildings, and even residential homes. These methods, after all, would not only let them assist on the advocacy of conservation but also aid them in cutting down on energy cost.

One of the most innovative and trendiest energy saving scheme is the use of solar panels. Solar panels or photovoltaic modules have been long ago used by many industrial companies in a way to cut down from their large expenses. But today, its use has already penetrated the world of household commodity. Frugal citizens, despite splurging money on purchase and installation of the device, think that this method would make up for all the cost, not to mention continuous electricity supply despite power outage. Imagine a house jam-packed with high-energy consuming appliances running all day without even tossing a penny for the electricity bill. Sounds too good to be true, isn’t it? Perhaps a little peek about the truth would help us get to the point.

Advantages:

- Oil, which is imported from other countries, is what most people currently use to power their homes, buildings, and everything in the community. It’s not a renewable resource and takes millions of years before making a gallon out of decayed trees and animals. When it’s gone, it’s like gone forever and we will no longer have power or energy.

- Solar cells are quiet energy generators. They don’t vibrate or squeak while extracting useful energy from the sun.

- It creates zero pollution in producing electricity, which is the most important advantage that makes it more practical than oil.

- Little maintenance is required to keep solar cells running. There are no moving parts in its system, which makes it impossible to really hurt them. They tend to last a good long time with only a yearly cleaning to worry about.

Disadvantages:

- Solar power can’t be harnessed during a storm, on a cloudy day or night. This limits users how much power they can save for the future days or in the nighttime. There will be days that you may still need to rely on billed electricity.

- It requires a large area for installation like almost the entire of your roof to achieve a good level of efficiency especially when you aim for all-day, all-night consumption. Morever, as energy shortages are becoming more common, solar energy is becoming more price-competitive.

- The efficiency of the system also relies on the location of the sun especially in the Northern hemisphere where sunshine varies according to season, although this problem can be overcome with the installation of certain components.

- Solar panels are devices, which can undergo wear and tear. Once this device achieved its lifespan, we have to consider replacing it again, meaning another purchase, another expense.

I decided to watch the “The Lovely Bones” and there’s this thing that captured my interest. Although the movie is centered on a girl being murdered with the rest of the story lying on the many depths of different relationships within a family, the scene where Mark Wahlberg as the father teaches his daughter how to make ships in bottles really earned my attention. The scene may have only run for a few seconds but the emotion and truth underlying it was so poignant. It was then that making ships in a bottle came across my mind as something that’s worth learning for a lifetime.

I found out that making those intricate things isn’t really easy and others who have become the masters of its art and craftsmanship actually spend years and years to learn it. Some of them became disheartened at first because their ships would always capsize and their finish works would always look like crap, well of course, in accordance to their descriptions. But the reward of their patience, hard work, and excellence after the many years of polishing has turned their work into more than what we call masterpieces. Every bottle with a beautiful ship in it is their creation out of passion, imagination, and dedication, which I think is worth more than awes and praises. It’s love that’s in every bottle I believe.

Now I begin to think that making such art is another great way to spend our free time, whenever we’re bored or simply have nothing to do. Finding materials in making the ships is so easy with the use of either a cardboard material or wood, some clays in different colors, paint, wooden sticks, glue, and old clothes, while old bottles of wine for the main housing. We can actually do some recycling out of scraps we’ve got in our house or ask for these materials from our friends or neighbours.

This craftsmanship is exactly what I’d want to see my family doing besides the common knitting and embroidery, or collecting stuffs which are only common for the ladies. This kind is definitely enjoyable by anyone, by adults or kids, by men or women. As long as you have passion for creativity and vision for art, making a miniature of the Black Pearl would be surely fun and interesting. More to that, we can always make souvenirs and gifts out of our craft and much more because they’re made out of our passion. So, for the lovers of the sea or for the lovers of art, this time is always the perfect time to make ships in bottles.

We witnessed triumph and failure, tears of joy and pain, and most importantly courage and determination in the last prestigious event of Winter Olympics held in Canada. We saw athletes from different countries competing for pride and glory, but above all that we witness how the world united for the name of sportsmanship.

Perhaps this occasional event that only happens once in every four years is enough to give us all those goose bumps, tears, and shivers down our spine; but thinking about it, Winter Olympics or any other Olympic events for this matter are definitely a rare spectacle that gives each and everyone inspiration and hope. We may never know that what might have pushed us to follow every progress in the winter games is the hidden spirit of a sportsman within us.

In this sense, it’s never too late for us to try winter sports or any winter activities. We’re given a privilege to enjoy the annual winter season, which is absolutely an opportunity for us to engage in healthy and fun activities such as skiing, skating, or snowboarding. Sports are definitely positive channels, which we can add to enhance our lifestyles. It doesn’t choose color, age, or social status to bequeath its wonderful effects to personal growth and wellness.

So for the next time winter comes around, we might as well think of trying skiing in Mammoth Mountain, California or skate in the icy field of Central Park. This would be an absolutely fun and exhilarating moment we can always cherish with our family, friends, or significant others, not to mention an added experience in our own life diary.

With ongoing problems about pollution and garbage disposal as two of the most serious issues in the environment, environmental activists and scientists have come up with incorporating biodegradable elements to products that are especially made with plastics.

In order to support this project, animal and pet products have developed flushable poop bags that can be safely flushed down to the toilet and degrade naturally. For some reason, dog poop has been a major source of water contamination in addition to the solid waste problem caused by the ordinary plastic wraps used in disposing it. This is in accordance to some study that showed 4% of landfills is constituted of dog poop and disposable diapers. Unaware citizens usually resort to using ordinary plastics that can actually stay up to a thousand year without undergoing decomposition.

The developed flushable poop bag is aimed to be as one of consumer-oriented products, which actually are catered with standards that pertain to efficiency, reliability, and affordability. There’s nothing much more to explain given that the biodegradable poop bags are not only intended to give assurance to Mother Earth, but they also give easy means of disposing animal feces without the mess and horrible smell lingering in everyone’s backyard.

(See how flushable poop bags work: http://www.flushdoggy.com/ )

Imagine living in a world that’s perfectly clean, pollution-free, and with a fresh air to breathe. This would only be possible through little blocks of help we contribute, and combing all of our blocks together, we’re going to make the biggest that the whole world would see.

This weekend I was fortunate enough to be invited to “tryouts” for a team not most would really ever consider, being a Sheriff Deputy.  Like any job, there is a hiring process you have to go through and hurdles you have to jump to be considered as a Sheriff Deputy Candidate.  About six months ago, I had submitted my application for the Reserve Deputy Sheriff.  It wasn’t until last week, when I received a letter in the mail inviting me to the physical abilities test and exam.

Excited about the opportunity and nervous at the same time.  It has been awhile since I have done any sort of structured workouts and wasn’t sure that I was ready enough to attend. As time approached I ended up pushing myself to testing site.  Upon arrival, I noticed the massive amounts of people who wanted to tryout for this once in a lifetime opportunity.  After orientation I found out the details of what was expected of me to pass and move onto the next step, which is the exam. I knew if I didn’t pass this, I would not be going on the the exam session. In the next hour I needed to show that I can do:

A) 1 1/2 mile run (16:32 or less)

B) 29 Sit ups (60 Seconds)

C) 25 Push ups (No Time Limit)

D) Vertical Jump (14inches)

C) 300m sprint (60 seconds)

In theory, it looks and usually is pretty simple especially for those who workout on a daily basis.  I ended passing all of the different components to this test.  One thing I can say, I will start working out on a daily basis.  I can definitely feel the affects this week and boy I’m sore. Overall I’m glad I had the opportunity to pass this first of many hurdles.

It is important to keep to have a structured workout to keep your body at its best. Your muscles are like rubber bands and if you don’t involve yourself in physical activity, your muscles will become tight. So the next time you use them, it will feel sore like mine did at the test.  It is important to perform at least 20mins of physical activity a day, weather is would be a light walk or a vigorous run. Check out Men’s Health Online, they have many different workout routines and information catered to you.

It must be a great idea to rent a photo booth for a bat mitzvah because kids at this age enjoy the most and would line up to take photos for hours. The kids would really go crazy and have as many photos as you cannot imagine. This would be a unique and treasured experience for your child and his friends as well. The photos of your kid with friends in four different poses will make you too enjoy and relive those moments thereafter.

As there is unlimited print out facility as well as to capture as many photos as they want, any one can go and have photos as many times as he or she wants. This party would be amazing for your kidís friends that they can rave about. These photos can be a great addition to your scrapbook and memorable for lifetime. The assistant that is provided with the photo booth can help you organize the photos in whatever order you like and make a photo album of the occasion. You can be the first to rent a photo booth for a bat mitzvah and you can surprise your child this time.

If you are going to get married, the first step in wedding planning should be its organization because this gives the base of successful marriage. Organization or planning will help you do all the arrangements and carry on the entire marriage ceremony smoothly and successfully. First of all you will have to sit with your fiancÈ and work out the budget and then decide what are your plans for the day.
To start you will need to make a list of ëto doí things for different category of volunteers in your planning list. Write the things to be done date and sequence wise in each list and also give separate tags like dress, photographer, ring, cake and so on so that you identify each list easily.
On the wedding day, you must have a reliable helping hand that would take care of all the arrangements and also look after the guests. The decoration of the wedding location should be done beforehand and special care should be taken for family and close friends. If you have planned to have a formal dinner along with the wedding, then you will have to take care of that too.

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It seems today that there are never enough hours in the day. We always start out with long lists of things to do in the morning and when we review the list at night it seems that if anything it got longer. I often wonder how this happens and if it was something every generation goes though or if it is something new. One of the best ways to find a solution is to find out what the problem is. In this case the problem would be time. Now the amount of time in a day has not changed over the years so we can not blame it on that. If you look at where a lot of our time is spent however I believe we would find that some of the really time suckers in our life are electronics. Some of these would include TV, Computers, Video Games, i pods, and Cell phones. Lets start with the TV. I we really thought about how much time was spent watching our favorite shows or surfing the channels I think we would be surprised. For cell phones how many times have you been right in the middle of something and gotten a phone call. Now we could choose to ignore it but then if you are like me you would spend time wondering what they needed. I guess the lesson to be learn is to control the time wasters in our lives instead of letting them control us