The Book of THoTH Newsletter Issue 146

[ReverendChaos]

Newsletter for the week of April 27th to May 3rd

Hello to everyone! To all of our new subscribers out there, welcome
to the book of THoTH Newsletter and to our Book of THoTH Google
group. Thanks for taking the time to subscribe and thanks for joining
our group. We're glad that you've joined our mailing list and hope
that you enjoy what we have to offer in its pages.

As of this newsletter, we have had 17 new members to join us this
week at BoT. To those who've joined, we say thanks for taking the
time to be a part of the greatest paranormal site on the web! Due to
this new addition of members, we now stand at 7,894 members strong. A
huge thanks to each and everyone of you for helping to make this site
what it has become! We couldn't do it without you.


This Week at BoT:
The GoldStar has once again changed hands. Last week's winner, THoTH,
has passed this most prestigious award to someone who's been absent
from BoT for a while. He's given the GoldStar award to Dawn for being
back in full swing since the moment she returned, for her family
values, and for being "just wonderful". Congratulations and welcome
back, Dawn! It's well deserved, so wear it well and keep it
shining.

Evadatam5150, last week's winner of the Book of THoTH LabCoat, has
finally posted a question. His question is, "Why do beans make you
fart?"

If you know the right answer, or can think of one better, then step
into the "BoT LabCoat Quiz Part VIII" thread in the Science section of
our forums and give it a shot. If your answer is chosen, then you may
walk away with the coveted and most stylish BoT LabCoat. Not to
mention any money that may be in the pockets.
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/ftopic-19452-150.html


This Week in the Forums:
"Russian ufo April 6th" is Kira's thread that tells about a sighting
similar to the one that was witnessed over Chicago's O'Hare
International Airport. To see the video of it and to contribute to
the discussion, don't miss Kira's thread in the UFO section.
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/ftopict-20443.html

Is there a connection between the recent crop circle in Avebury and
expected solar storms in 2012? This is what a thread by mensa517 is
talking about. To see the pictures of this crop circle and to share
your views, see "Crop Circle....Solar Storm 2012?" in the Phenomena
section.
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/ftopict-20429.html

"Strange Occurrences at our Home" is a thread by Dawn that discusses
the various incidents told about in her front page article last week.
She's given a few updates on the state of things, as well as some
photos taken in the house. To read more and to join in on the
discussion, have a look at her thread in the It Happened to Me
section.
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/ftopict-20312.html

TrentCoole has a thread in the Animal Kingdom & Cryptozoology section
about an "almost perfectly preserved and complete" baby mammoth that
was found in Russia two years ago. To find out more about this
exciting find and the most recent updates on it, don't miss "Baby
Woolly Mammoth Results".
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/ftopict-20355.html

In the Alternative History & Civilizations section, Borgia has a
thread asking about "The Lamentations of Jared". This is a 5,800 BC
work that describe how gods came to earth and led mankind astray. If
you have any information on this and would like to help Borgia out in
his quest, please see his "Lamentations of Jared" thread.
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/ftopict-20445.html


Random Site Feature of the Week:
If you like playing online games, then we have a page for you. It's
called Max Arcade and is a page full of everything from Tic Tac Toe to
Alien Attack. There's something there for everyone and it's a page
not to be missed. You'll need either Macromedia Flash or Macromedia
Shockwave to play, but don't fret.. you can get them from the Max
Arcade page if you don't already have them. So take a look and have
some relaxing fun!
http://www.book-of-thoth.com/max-arcade.html


Strange Fact of the Week:
Although the Huntsman spider in Australia gives only a mildly painful
bite and is not venomous enough to be harmful to humans, it is said to
be the cause of as many (if not more) injuries and deaths as any other
spider there. The reason for this is it's large and scary appearance,
combined with it's fondness for hiding in places like cars. Put these
two attributes together and you have a recipe for car wrecks caused by
surprised and frightened drivers.


Trivia Question of the Week:
What unconventional method was tried in the U.S. in an effort to end
the Dust Bowl era drought of the 1930s? What was the inspiration for
this attempt?


Answer to Last Weeks Trivia Question:
In most of Asia and in many sections of Africa, what stone is said to
be helpful in warding off the evil eye?

Turquoise. Crafted into rings, necklaces, and bracelets, turquoise is
worn to protect yourself and your children from the evil eye. Many
times, small turquoise earrings are also put in the pierced ears of
infants still in the cradle as a way to fight off harmful spirits.


This Week in History:
May 3, 1937: Margaret Mitchell won the Pulitzer Prize in fiction for
Gone With the Wind.

May 3, 1979: Margaret Thatcher became the first woman elected prime
minister of England.

May 4, 1626: Peter Minuit landed in Manhattan, which he later bought
for $24 worth of cloth and brass buttons.

May 4, 1961: Civil rights activists, called "freedom riders," left
Washington, DC for New Orleans.

May 5, 1809: Mary Kies of South Killingly, Conn., became the first
woman to be granted a patent. The patent was for the rights to a
technique for weaving straw with silk and thread.

May 5, 2004: Pablo Picasso's "Boy with a Pipe" became the most
expensive painting ever sold.

May 6, 1889: The Universal Exposition opened in Paris, marking the
completion and dedication of the Eiffel Tower.

May 6, 1937: The German airship Hindenburg blew up and burst into
flames at Lakehurst, N.J.

May 7, 1824: Beethoven's 9th Symphony premiered in Vienna.

May 7, 1945: Germany unconditionally surrendered to the allies in
Rheims, France.

May 8, 1794: Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, the father of modern
chemistry, was guillotined during the Reign of Terror.

May 8, 1945: V-E Day marks the European victory of the Allies in
World War II.

May 9, 1926: Explorers Richard E. Byrd and Floyd Bennett flew over
the North Pole.

May 9, 1962: The Beatles signed their first recording contract and
hired George Martin to be their producer.


This Week's Birthdays:
Niccolo Machiavelli (May 3, 1469) - Niccolo Machiavelli was an Italian
philosopher, writer, and politician who is considered to be one of the
main founders of modern political science. Deemed a Renaissance Man,
he was a diplomat, political philosopher, musician, poet, playwright,
and above all, he was a Civil Servant of the Florentine Republic. He
is most famous for a short political treatise, "The prince", which was
a work of realist political theory.

Thomas Henry Huxley (May 4, 1825) - Known as "Darwin's Bulldog"
because of his advocacy of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, he
was an English biologist who was perhaps the finest comparative
anatomists of the second half of the nineteenth century. Although he
didn't accept all of Darwin's ideas, he defended evolution and
advocated scientific education and an agnostic (a term which he
coined) professional science.

Soren Kierkegaard (May 5, 1813) - Kierkegaard was a prolific 19th
century Danish philosopher and theologian. Kierkegaard strongly
criticized both the Hegelianism of his time, and what he saw as the
empty formalities of the Danish church. Crossing the boundaries of
philosophy, theology, psychology, and literature, he came to be
regarded as a highly significant and influential figure in
contemporary thought.

Robert Peary (May 6, 1856) - Peary was an American explorer who
claimed to have been the first person to reach the geographic North
Pole. He made several expeditions to the Arctic and explored
Greenland by dog sled. Unlike many previous explorers, Peary studied
Inuit survival techniques and used their aid in this travels. He
received honors from several scientific societies in Europe and
America for his Arctic explorations and discoveries.

Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (May 7, 1840) - Tchaikovsky was a Russian
composer of the Romantic era. Including the ballets "Swan Lake" and
"The Nutcracker", the "1812 Overture", and several symphonies, he is
the author of some of the most popular concert and theatrical music in
the current classical repertoire.

Jean Henri Dunant (May 8,1828) - He was a Swiss businessman and social
activist who, during a business trip in 1859, witnesses the aftermath
of the Battle of Solferino in modern day Italy. This inspired him to
record his experiences in the book "A Memory of Solferino" which later
became the inspiration for the formation of the International
Committee of the Red Cross. He shared the first Nobel Peace Prize
with Frederic Passy in 1901.

Howard Carter (May 9, 1873) - Carter was an English archaeologist and
Egyptologist. Starting out at the age of 16 when he began copying
inscriptions and painting in Egypt, he later worked on the excavation
of Beni Hasan and was famous for finding the remains of Queen
Hatshepsut's tomb. His most well known accomplishment was discovering
the existence of Pharaoh Tutankhamun and then finding his tomb.

This week, we have two BoT members having birthdays. The first one is
our very own boss, THoTH, who's birthday is May 3rd. The other is
angel_andi who's celebrates on May 5th. Happy Birthday to both of
you! May you have a great day of celebration and a wonderful year to
look forward to.


Tech Tip of the Week:
As most of you should know, the motherboard of your computer is the
main part of it and contains your hardware components like modems,
graphics cards, video cards, etc... Due to such an important role
that the motherboard has, letting dust build up can lead to some
serious problems that can't always be repaired. This week, we'll tell
you how to clean your computer's motherboard. Keeping it clean and
free of dust will improve performance and help improve the cooling.

Before you begin to clean your motherboard, unplug your computer from
the electrical outlet. After your computer is unplugged, use a
screwdriver to remove the side cover's screws and remove the cover.

Next, inspect any data and power cables' connections along with PCI
and AGP slots. If you feel you'll need to remove anything to clean
your motherboard, make note of where they will plug back in.

Next, remove all add-on cards that are inserted in your motherboard.
These include such hardware as RAM, modem cards, sound cards, LAN
cards, etc...

Now, using canned air, blow air around all of the motherboard's sides,
being sure to keep the nozzle four to five inches away from board
components.

After you are finished using the canned air and have dislodged all
dirt and dust, replace all cards, any cables if they were removed, and
then the cover.

Cleaning your motherboard and keeping it free of dust and other
foreign particles every few months can and will save your computer's
life.


Unsolved Question of the Week:
From around 1923 until his death in 1951, a Latvian immigrant by the
name of Edward Leedskalnin built a monument to his "sweet sixteen".
Distraught over the cold feet that his fiancee acquired just one day
before their wedding, he left for America where he eventually settled
in southern Florida. It is there that he constructed what is now
known as Coral Castle in an attempt to regain her affections. How
exactly he accomplished this, is not precisely known.

After living in Canada, California, and Texas, he moved to Florida
City, Florida in 1918. The reason for his move is that he had
developed tuberculosis and wanted to live in a better climate in order
to aid his health. Despite his illness though (which he claimed he
had controlled by the use of magnets), he was able to begin
construction on what he then called "Rock Gate Park" five years
later.

The construction of his castle began while living in Florida City.
For it, he used rock that was harvested from the land that he lived
on. In 1936 he decided it was time to move to a different location.
The motive behind his decision is not clear. Some say it was to
protect his privacy during a time of land development in Florida City,
and some say it was the result of him being robbed and wanting a safer
location. Some even say that he moved to take advantage of better
"earth energy". Whatever the reason, he relocated himself and his
incomplete castle to Homestead, Florida. After the ten-mile journey
using the aid of a friend with a tractor and possibly a small trucking
company, he arrived at his new location where he continued to work on
his creation until his death from malnutrition.

Aside from the castle that served as Ed's living quarters, and it's
surrounding walls, there are many other structures at the site. Many
of the objects such as a heart shaped stone table, a fountain, and
huge rocking chairs seem like mere examples of devotion to a lost
love. Others objects, such as a thirty ton obelisk that is perfectly
aligned with the North Star, a sundial that is accurate within two
minutes, and representations of planets such as Mars and Saturn, leave
many to wonder what kind of knowledge that this man with only a fourth
grade education really possessed. He even built his own AC current
generator.

How this five-foot tall and 110 pound man built the structures, no one
knows exactly. But what is known is that many of the stones used in
it's construction make the ones used in the Pyramids of Egypt and
Stonehenge seem small in comparison. The largest stone used in his
castle is over three times the size of the heaviest stone found in the
Great Pyramid of Giza. Two of the stones, monolithic in nature, stand
higher than any stone found in Stonehenge. Did Ed know secrets that
the ancients knew? One had to wonder, seeing how many of the
structures at the castle are calibrated to astronomical
specifications, just like those monuments of old. He himself even
once stated, "I have discovered the secrets of the pyramids and have
found out how the Egyptians and ancient builders in Peru, Yucatan an
Asia, with only primitive tools, raised and set place blocks of stone
weighing many tons!"

Ed never divulged his secrets while he was alive. When asked how he
built the castle, his usual reply was, "It's not difficult if you know
how." He also told people that he just understood "the laws of weight
and leverage well." This is probably not too surprising, considering
that he came from a family of stone masons in Latvia. He could have
very well used some obscure method of leverage that has been lost to
time; a method that enabled people with preindustrialized technology
to accomplish things that today's laymen find impossible without heavy
equipment. However, he did write many papers and brochures on
magnetic energy and some rather radical theories of physics. He
largely disagreed with known science and claimed that all objects in
the universe were magnetic generators of some kind. He stated that
with proper training, a person could actually see the "magnetic forces
of the universe as tiny beads of light circulating between objects",
and he believed that the manipulation of these forces could result in
control of weight and leverage and that gravity was just another form
of magnetism that could be controlled. He also was known to speak of
using a "perpetual motion holder". Does this somehow explain the
teenagers who allegedly saw him working in secret describe how he
caused the large blocks to "move like hydrogen balloons"?

There are many skeptical theories as to how he built his monument.
One of the simplest, and the most hard to disprove, cites that since
he normally only worked at night by lamplight, he had the help of
others. Other theories point out the few existing photographs that
show him working with tripods equipped with pulleys and chains.
However, the tripods appear to be only about 20 feet tall while the
largest stones are 25 feet long when standing vertically. These
tripods are also made from wooden telephone poles which could not
support the larger stones. As for the pulleys, it's believed that
there weren't enough pulleys to lessen the weight of the stones to the
extent that a 100 pound man could lift them. There are also 3/8 inch-
thick chains of his that can still be found in the Tool Room of the
Castle and are seen in the photographs. But these have been rated
with a 3.5 ton workload and could have in no way been able to support
some of the stones that were used.

Some people also argue that the stones which make up the castle and
it's various stuctures don't really weigh that much because they are
porous "coral". Well, the castle isn't exactly coral. It's made of
Oolitic Limestone which is a sedimentary rock composed of fossilized
coral. It's found throughout southern Florida, often beneath only a
few inches of topsoil, and is what Ed used in both his Florida City
and his Homestead locations. They're so sturdy that they even
withstood a direct hit in 1992 by the category 5 Hurricane Andrew,
which leveled everything in the area. Everything except Ed's
castle.

Lastly, there were also the strange numbers. After he died, the
numbers 7129/ 6105195 were found carved into a doorjamb of the
castle. To this day, those numbers remain undeciphered. Could they
be some sort of clue as to how he performed the feats that he did?
Are they part of a formula that he used, or some remnant of an unknown
science that perhaps only he, and maybe the ancients, knew? It's
possible that until meaning is found for those numbers, or some long
lost and hidden evidence is found, the mystery of how Coral Castle was
built will remain in the realm of the unanswered.


Quote of the Week:
"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to
please everybody."
- Bill Cosby


That concludes this week's edition of the BoT newsletter. We hope
that you've enjoyed it, found it a nice change in your inbox, and are
looking forward to receiving the next one. As always, we should have
lots more waiting in store for you.

Until next time, keep your eyes to the skies and the door to your mind
unlocked. You never know who might drop by for a visit.