Thursday, May 31, 2007

Kolkata

Calcutta is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal. It is located in eastern India on the east bank of the River Hooghly. The city has a population of almost 11 million, with an extended metropolitan population of over 14 million, making it the third-largest urban agglomeration and the third-largest city in India.

The city was very populated and served as the capital of India during the British Raj until 1911. Once the centre of modern education, science, culture and politics in India, Kolkata witnessed economic stagnation in the years following India's independence in 1947. However, since the year 2000, an economic rejuvenation has arrested the morbid decline, leading to a spurt in the city's growth. Like other large cities, Kolkata continues to struggle with urbanisation problems like poverty, pollution and traffic congestion.

A vibrant city with a distinct socio-political culture, Kolkata is noted for its revolutionary history, ranging from the Indian struggle for independence to the leftist and trade union movements.

Sunday, May 27, 2007

Ghost ride

To ghost ride, often used in the context of "ghost riding the whip" (a "whip" being a vehicle) or simply ghostin', is when a person puts the car in neutral or allows it to idle and then the driver (and passengers) of a vehicle exit while it is still rolling and dance beside it or on the hood or roof.
Ghost riding is one of the latest trends to be popularized by hyphy culture, which originated in Oakland, California. The act is one of the highest forms of "going dumb" and a representation of the style of hyphy. The term "ghost ride the whip" was given nationwide exposure in E-40's 2006 song "Tell Me When to Go".As with car surfing, ghost riding can be dangerous and has resulted in three known deaths in North America.
Ghost riding is also known as "going Patrick Swayze," or just "going Swayze," referring to Patrick Swayze's lead role in the movie Ghost.

Monday, May 21, 2007

Cream

Cream is a dairy product that is composed of the higher-butterfat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, over time, the lighter fat rises to the top. In the industrial manufacture of cream this process is accelerated by using centrifuges called "separators". In many countries, cream is sold in several grades depending on total butterfat content. Cream can be dried to a powder for shipment to distant markets.
Cream produced by cows (particularly Jersey cattle) grazing on usual pasture often contains some natural carotenoid pigments derived from the plants they eat; this gives the cream a slight yellow tone, hence the name of the yellowish-white colour cream. Cream from cows fed indoors, on grain or grain-based pellets, is white.

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Solar System

Solar System consists of the Sun and the other space objects gravitationally bound to it: the eight planets, their 162 known moonsthree currently recognized dwarf planets (including Pluto) and their four known moons, and billions of small bodies. This last group includes asteroids, Kuiper belt objects, comets, meteoroids and interplanetary dust.

In wide terms, the charted regions of the Solar System consist of the Sun, four terrestrial inner planets, an asteroid belt composed of small rocky bodies, four gas giant outer planets, and a second belt, called the Kuiper belt, collected of icy objects. Beyond the Kuiper belt lies the scattered disc, the heliopause, and eventually the hypothetical Oort cloud.

In sort of their distances from the Sun, the planets are Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Six of the eight planets are in turn orbited by natural satellites, usually termed "moons" after Earth's Moon, and each of the outer planets is encircled by planetary rings of dust and other particles. All the planets apart from Earth are named after gods and goddesses from Greco-Roman mythology. The three dwarf planets are Pluto, the largest known Kuiper belt object; Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt; and Eris, which lies in the scattered disc.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Resonator

A resonator is a device or system that exhibits resonance or resonant behavior. Many objects that use resonant effects are referred to simply as resonators. Examples of resonators are discussed in this article. A cavity resonator is a resonator composed of a space that is typically bounded by a dielectric that uses resonance to select a specific band of frequencies.
A distributed parameter resonator of the distributed network kind has capacitance, inductance, and resistance which cannot be isolated into separate lumped capacitors, inductors, or resistors. The time factor of spread of wave energy in the network is appreciable. Resonators can be of the dielectric type or magnetic type. A hollow conductor that uses resonance to increase an electromagnetic wave is called a cavity resonator. In the context of electronic components, resonator may refer to a ceramic resonator, a device used to create an oscillation of a specific frequency, first and foremost for use as the clock signal for digital circuits. A single layer coil (or solenoid) that is used as a secondary or tertiary winding in a Tesla Coil or Magnifying Transmitter is also called a resonator.

Tuesday, May 8, 2007

Lavender

The Lavenders Lavandula are a genus of about 25-30 species of flowering plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae, native from the Mediterranean region south to tropical Africa and to the south east regions of India. The genus includes annuals, herbaceous plants, subshrubs, and small shrubs. The native variety extends across the Canary Islands, North and East Africa, south Europe and the Mediterranean, Arabia, and India. Because the refined forms are planted in gardens world-wide, they are occasionally found growing wild, as garden escapees, well beyond their natural range.
Lavenders are extensively grown in gardens. Flower spikes are used for dried flower arrangements. The fragrant, pale purple flowers and flower buds are used in potpourris. Dried and sealed in pouches, they are located among stored items of clothing to give a fresh fragrance and as a deterrent to moths. The plant is also full-grown commercially for extraction of lavender oil from the flowers. This oil is used as an antiseptic and for aromatherapy.

Friday, May 4, 2007

Willamette Valley

The Willamette Valley is the region in northwest Oregon in the United States that environment the Willamette River as it proceeds northward from its appearance from mountains near Eugene to its confluence with the Columbia River. One of the most creative agricultural areas of the world, the valley was the destination of choice for the emigrants on the Oregon Trail in the 1840s. It has formed the cultural and political heart of Oregon since the days of the Oregon Territory, and is home to nearly 70% of Oregon's population.

Description
The valley may be insecurely defined as the watershed of the Willamette, bounded on the west by the Coast Ranges, on the east by the Cascade Range. It is bounded on the south by the Calapooya Mountains, which separate the headwaters of the Willamette from the Umpqua River valley. Because of the differing cultural and political interests, the Portland metropolitan area, as well as the Tualatin River valley, is often disincluded in the local use of the term. Cities for all time considered part of the Willamette Valley are Eugene, Corvallis, Albany, and Salem.
The agricultural richness of the valley is considered to be in no small measure a result of the Missoula Floods, which inundated the valley just about forty times between 15,000 and 13,000 years ago at the end of the last ice age. The floods were caused by the intervallic rupturing of the ice dam of Glacial Lake Missoula, the waters of which swept down the Columbia and flooded the Willamette Valley as far south as Eugene. The floodwaters carried rich volcanic and glacial soil from Eastern Washington, which was deposited across the valley floor when the waters subsided.

The main agricultural products of the valley include many varieties of berries and vegetables. The valley also produces mainly of the grass seed, Christmas trees and hazelnuts sold in North America. But it is greenhouse and nursery stock that have become the biggest agricultural commodity in the valley.
In current decades, the valley has also become a major wine producer, with multiple American Viticultural Areas of its own. With a cooler climate than California, the gently rolling hills surrounding the Willamette are home to some of the best pinot noir in the New World, as well as a high-quality pinot gris.