passionfruit_gal

A friend found this in the kitchen of a furnished house she is renting, but has no idea what it is. There is not blade anywhere on it, or handles. Anyone know what it is?

http://yfrog.com/mngprej

For 3 days I have had no Yahoo mail sync on my HTC HD7 Windows phone.

I have been in contact with Windows Phone 7 team who are stumped and have deduced it is a settings issue from Yahoo as they have a lot of people with the same issue at the same time. They confirmed my incoming and outgoing server addresses are correct for the up-to-date info they have.

Basically - error 8000FFFF

Outgoing mail fine

No incoming

Sporadically (3 hours today, 30 minutes yesterday) auto sync will work and some messages come through, but manual sync creates same error. At the moment even auto sync produces the error.

I have tried all of these to no avail:

- deleted yahoo mail, reinstalled using wizard (settings already done for you)

- deleted yahoo mail, reinstalled as "other mail"

- deleted yahoo mail, changed password on my pc, reinstalled on mobile and logged in with new password

- checked ssl for incoming, checked ssl for outgoing. Unchecked ssl for both. Checked for one and not the other etc etc etc

- changed incoming and outgoing server addresses to every combination I could find online - imap, pop3 etc etc

- cleared my draft folder on my phone and on my web mail

- emptied all messages in my inbox

- checked there are no large messages trying to come thru

Basically, there is very little I have tried.

Although I'm happy to hear from people and suggestions, I am mostly trying to get Yahoo's attention to look into this issue and to have other people confirm they too are having this problem.

Patience is wearing thin...

I'm after a word to describe parents who are strict. It's for a book I'm writing and the character is a young Italian American girl who thinks her parents are strict and she is on the phone to a friend. What word would she use for this?

I'm not from NY (indeed not from USA) but I'm writing a book that is set there. I'm needing an area of NYC that would be a plausible place for young 20-somethings to go for a night out.

If you know of any specific places to suggest - even better! Otherwise, just an area/street would be great.

Criteria - the people are affluent from an Italian-American background (but not "guido" if that makes sense?) and very "hip", trendy, classy, now etc.

I want them to start with a good casual, well known pizza place for dinner then move on to a nightclub/bar with music for dancing - not just standing around with cocktails.

Anyone able to help me with plausible areas/places my fictional group could go???

Thanks!

Hi!

I'm wanting some ideas for a book I'm writing that features New York mob families. I'm needing an idea for a new business venture they could be going into that will obviously, generate lots of Ca$$$$h for them.

I'm wanting a new direction rather than the old - drugs, prostitution, racketeering, gambling etc.

Maybe something to do with banking or something computer based?

Any ideas?

Thanks!

I want to get some feedback on a short story I wrote but I'm not if I'm allowed to link to my blog on Yahoo Answers. I've had a post removed before and I think it was because I linked to somewhere else. Not sure.

Anyway, would like to know how I can post my short story for people to read and give feedback on. It's too long for a question on here.

Thanks!

What would be the obvious high school for a Catholic Italian girl living on Staten Island? Family is from the South Shore.

Then, what about for a Catholic Italian guy?

Would it be acceptable for them to go to a non-catholic school like Wagner? If they did go to Wagner, would they still go to church?

What church is the most popular for Italian Catholics on the South Shore?

This is for research, thanks!

Hi!

I'm doing some research and would like to know some words, foods, pastimes etc of Italian-Americans.

What are some things you would never do or always do? Stereotypes/cliches are fine!

If you're in NYC, are there any specific Italian-American traits unique to New York?

What are the popular hang-out places, restaurants etc?

What is the current fashion in clothes, cars, music etc?

To give you a heads up, I'm in Australia and have never been to NY! And I am NOT of Italian descent, so be gentle with me and assume I am VERY dumb and explain things sloooowly so I get it.

Thanks, your help is much appreciated!

I've posted about the book idea I'm most drawn to write at the moment, (http://answers.yahoo.com/question/;_ylc=X3oDMTBxcD... but I also have another idea that I might get back to again.

I'd appreciate your thoughts on it and whether it is something you would be interested to read.

Be aware it is a Young Adult book but I'd also like it to appeal to a wider (i.e. older) audience too.

Please be aware that the beginning of the story sounds soooo cliche teen-horror, I know. But if you stick with it, you'll see where the story twists and introduces the main idea - love.

Setting - high school

Kate (18yrs) feels she just fits into the background at school. Not cool, not geeky - inoffensive.

She stumbles across something at school (not sure what this something is yet!) she doesn't realise implicates someone in a lot of mess. That someone (a teacher) realises she knows his secret (even though Kate isn't aware of its significance) and plans to kill her.

Kate is meant to be in detention at 3pm with the teacher behind the killing plot, but instead at the last minute takes herself to the school tower which is out of bounds but is a haven for her. She hears someone else coming into the tower and not wanting to be caught, she leaves and slowly heads to her detention.

Meanwhile, another girl is in Kate's place and time where she is meant to be killed.

The teacher's intent to kill Kate is so strong, it has a life of it's own. Because Kate is in the tower when the intent is "let loose", she is protected by the school spirit (this is based on a legend at my own real life high school about a ghost in the tower that was out of bounds!).

The intent then richochets until it finds the next target closest to the teacher who let loose the intent.

(are you still with me?)

The teacher had an altercation with another girl that flared him up enough that the intent for Kate, turns and attacks this girl instead.

Kate walks into the detention room late, just in time to see the other girl (Whitney) get killed (something suitably gory for a teen audience) in the place she was meant to be in.

Chaos ensues and Kate is caught up in the investigation into how the accident happened. To everyone, including Kate, it looks like an accident.

INTRO LOVE BIT

Investigating the accident is 20y.o. Paul who is the older brother of one of Kate's classmates.

Kate even in her distress at the situation starts to fall for Paul because he is so kind to her when questioning her. And of course he is drop dead gorgeous - er duh.

Kate is shaky but ok and after a long day goes home to sleep and try to forget the day.

This is where the spirit intervenes and a time loop is created to help protect the students.

Kate wakes up to the exact same day as the one she just finished. Everything is exactly the same. When she gets to school, Whitney is still alive and as obnoxious as ever. Kate figures it must be a dream and goes through the day with a headache from the de ja vous. The headache prevents her from going into the room where she stumbled on the damning evidence that implicates the teacher is something bad (any ideas what this could be?) as she did the previous day and instead heads to the sick bay to get some painkillers. The day continues the same and at 3pm she heads to her detention as with the day before, but suddenly remembers what happened in her dream and runs to the classroom rather than dawdles.

She gets there in time to save Whitney from the accident. Whitney is a bit cut up but otherwise fine.

Next day the loop continues but when Kate gets to school, everything is the same except Whitney who looks shocked and keeps looking at her hands which were cut the day before. Kate realises that Whitney is in the loop with her while everyone else continues the same day again, unawares.

The girls band together during the day comforting each other in the scary situation.

At the same time of day as Whitney's accident, another girl Grace is killed with Kate and Whitney as witnesses to the freak accident.

Paul comes in again to interview Kate and she tells him what is happening. Paul doesn't believe her but realises she is very upset and he spends the rest of the afternoon with her trying to calm her down.

Next day loops again and Kate realises that Paul will not have remembered anything she told him. Grace is fine but Kate and Whitney realise that they will need to save Grace at 3pm - which they do.

Next day loops again but this time Grace is with Kate and Whitney in the loop and the girls start to try and figure out what is happening and how they can stop it.

Kate realises the only time she gets with Paul are when the accidents happen.

Story continues with more people being drawn into the loop and Kate building her relationship with Paul even though he forgets her at the end of each day. Kate uses this advantage to speed up the relationship though by u

For years I've had book ideas in my head but never had the motivation to focus and actually write them down.

I also know that once I start, it would become (and have to be) an obsession. I'm the sort of person who stays awake all night to finish something I've started, even if I have time the next day to do it. I read all 4 Twilight books within a week and it consumed my every thought during that time (saw the movie for the 2nd time last night so it's returned to my thoughts again!).

I read all 7 Harry Potter books in 2 weeks and grieved their disappearance when I'd finished the last one.

I don't do things by halves!

It's because I recognise this single-minded preoccupation in myself that I procrastinate when it comes to starting something I enjoy doing. I KNOW I'll become manic and fixated on it and rob time away from my family and friends to feed it.

But, finally I have some time to be obssessed by a project and have thought of a concept that has really inspired me and managed to tear me away from Twilight websites! It's something I really want to write and that I would want to read.

Problem is, I can't get my head around a setting for the concept. I have the characters in my head and the emotion of the story, I just can't piece it together in a way that makes the story interesting, believable and relevant.

The basic idea I have is (surprise, surprise) a love story. I'm a sucker for heartbreaking love stories and I know I want the love story to be the central thread the story is created around.

So here is the nucleus of my story, I just need some help with the setting and conflict.

Girl and Boy (18ish, strangers to each other) have grown up knowing they will have an arranged marriage - some sort of political agenda?

As they get older they (girl especially) rebel against not having a choice in who they marry and they want to marry for love.

Girl meets boy in neutral place that doesn't give away who each of them are. They fall in love over a few clandistine meetings without knowing who each other really are (the "who they really are" part is one of the things I need help with and will be dependant on setting).

Girl is given birthday gift of a glimpse into the future which predicts that disaster (to her family or herself) will occur if she marries her betrothed.

She takes this to mean that the arranged marriage is cursed and she must avoid it at all costs which ties in nicely with her wanting to choose anyway.

Until she knows who the betrothed is, she won't be able to figure out what the disaster will be if she married him and so she can't go to her parents to dissuade them from an arranged marriage. She must hold the secret until the puzzle makes sense in order to avert the disaster and save her family/herself.

INTRODUCING HEARTBREAKING LOVE TWIST

When she is introduced to her betrothed, it is the boy she is in love with.

She can't marry him because he is the betrothed one, but she can't be with anyone else because it is him she loves.

They are now able to spend lots of time with each other under the pretence of getting to know their betrothed before the wedding, but instead they fall deeper in love and at the same time recognise the reason why the union will end in disaster (insert your idea here!).

Seeing no way around the problem, Girl flees in hopes that Boy will forget her and marry someone else.

Anguish, despair, tears etc etc etc for month on both sideas.

Boy believes Girl mustn't love him and so agrees to another betrothal.

In the mean time, Girl discovers a solution to quandry (insert idea here) and rushes back to find Boy, only to be told he is to marry someone else.

More tears, angst, self-torture etc etc.

At altar Boy realises he can't marry anyone but Girl and walks out on marriage determined to end his life.

At 11th hour Girl and Boy manage to get to each other and vow to never leave each other but to work together on solving conflict.

End book 1.

Book 2 - working together, Girl and Boy try to avoid the future shown to girl and allow them to marry. In process Girl and Boy must separate AGAIN for the sake of the bigger picture. Perhaps girl must pretend she will marry someone else for political strategy with Boy watching on helpless?

Book 3 - conclusion and Girl and Boy FINALLY get it together.

Um, er, that's it.

That's what I have going round and round my head and I'm desperately trying to mold it around a setting and conflict I'm comfortable writing about.

So far I have considered and 90% discounted an Indian setting (arranged marriage) because I'm not comfortable with writing a Bollywood novel which is how I imagine it would turn out.

The other option is a fantasy land in days of yore a'la Lord of the Rings. However, I'm not a huge fantasy reader and it doesn't appeal to me to write something that I wouldn't be attracted to read myself.

The thought of creating a whole other world is quite daunting and I'm rubbish at invent

I'm raging! I dwld a copy of Breaking Dawn (Twilight 4) because I couldn't wait for my bookstore who has to order me in a copy (4 weeks they say!).

I've paid for it but can't wait for it to arrive. As I've already paid for it, I didn't want to pay for an e-version as well.

So I went on scribd and other sites and found a version in pdf.

But I'm pretty sure the version I've started reading is missing parts - namely, the sex scene. I've read forum comments about how the only sex scene that is described is the first one and the rest are glossed over. But in my dodgy version there is NOTHING about the first night. They swim and next thing it's morning.

Is my version dodgy? Should there be something about their first night or does it just go from swimming to the morning after when Edward is upset by the bruises?

Do you know where I can get a non-dodgy version to dwld?

I'm so worried that I've ruined the book for myself!

grrr

Wondering if anyone can explain why recipes (usually in baking) often list unsalted butter in the the ingredients, but then also say to add a pinch or 1/2 tsp of salt.

Why not just used salted butter and omit the pinch of salt?

Is there some chemical reason or to ensure the salt level is exact?

Although I can't imagine there would be much difference between the amount of salt in salted butter and the added pinch.

Ok on my slowly dying PC tonight I did a Google search in IE7 for "healthy eating".

After clicking a few links that were completely unrelated to the topic, I looked carefully at the actual website addresses listed in the search and they didn't seem to match the title of the page.

E.G.

Page title - Teen Health and Wellness

Address - www.kingdomofpets.com

So my husband copied the exact search into his laptop and the exact same results came up EXCEPT the web addresses were different and matched the title of the page.

E.G.

Title - Teen Health and Wellness

Address - www.teenhealthandwellness.com

We experimented with Mozilla with the same weird results on my computer and the normal results on my husband's laptop.

Any ideas??????????

My husband is in IT (web specifically) and he's stumped (and too overloaded with work to figure it out).

Anyone else had this happen? First for me....

OMG

I am gobsmacked and in utter disbelief at the absolute naive, half-baked, already-invented-and-implemeted, cost prohibitive crock of ideas I have found on YouTube as entrants for "Google's 10 to the 100 project".

Quickly - Google is wanting to spend US$10m in developing up to 5 ideas the public have for helping change the world. Categories include helping via education, community, energy, housing, health etc. Entry is via submitting a form explaining your idea and if you wish, a 30 sec video on YouTube to accompany it. BTW it's hilarious to see people say at the 28 sec mark after a lengthy suck up to Google "so my idea is..." BZZZZ. Too late. 30 secs is up buddy...

I entered the search terms "google 10 project" and started looking at some ideas.

Truth be known I was hoping I'd find loads of excellent ideas and videos to scare me out of doing my own for my idea.

OMG. I have yet to find ANYTHING that is remotely inspiring or indeed evidence that brains inhabit these people's heads. Honestly, try yourself by looking some up on YouTube.

A brief run down of the ideas I've seen so far. Remember the key points when considering the vaibility of these ideas 1. $10m is not the prize to the person with the best idea, it is funding to get up to 5 ideas off and running.

2. It is for UNIQUE ideas not ones that have already been tried or are in the process of being implemented

3. Consider the costs:

1. Put satellites in the sky and send messages to satellite dishes so that people can communicate all around the world.

2. Get rid of obesity. That was the whole idea. Just get rid of it...

3. Use all the left over food from schools and restaurants and give it to homeless people.

4. Google should get everyone to send in their old computers, they will fix them up and sell them to 3rd world countries for $20 each

5. Build a city on water

6. Build a car that runs on water

7. Every family in the west adopts a family in poverty and helps pay for things for them

8. Put solar panels on everyones roofs and then they can sell the excess energy to the electric companies and get paid instead of paying

9. Google should invent a game to teach people that giving is better than taking. Do a giving action - you get points. Do a taking action - you lose points.

10. Fill jet engines with water and "some sort of coolant" so that when it runs it produces "some sort of cool air" instead of creating heat

11. Use the science behind "rubbing your hands together creates heat which is energy" to power the world (granted this was a teenager, so I'll forgive the lack of science/energy transference knowledge)

12. Wind turbines on Jupiter

13. Replace all pavements and roads with removeable panels so that road works don't distrupt traffic while they break up the concrete to fix pipes etc

14. Google should get companies to pay them for every click from a Google website and that money should go to charities.

15. People should have funraisers (sic) and give the money to help turn cloudy skies blue

The only decent ideas I have found so far are an online/interactive Google University with recognised degrees utilising all of Google's products. FLAW I think more than $10m is going to be needed to even get this off the ground and there are a lot of online universities already, albeit not on the scale of this person's idea.

The other idea is a light bulb that utilises LED's to reduce energy useage by 80%. FLAW energy efficient light bulbs have been invented, the problem is the cost efficiency to produce them, the cost for people to buy them and the fact that electric companies (and this addresses the flaw in some of the ideas above) are often a huge source of income for governments and surprise, surprise if they are private, they kinda like making money! So turning our world into a "free power" world is going to take a lot of persuasion, a looooooooooong time, a hell of a lot more than $10m and perhaps some peace-love-and-mung-beans type drugs to induce philanthropy.

Yes, yes I know a lot of you are saying - hey I don't you see you trying an idea.

Well actually I do have an idea and I'm going to do my video and entry this week. I am truly motivated after what I have seen today!

Now I'll be interested to read people's comments and see how many think the above ideas I knocked the crap out of are actually brilliant and worthy of the Google project.

And how many don't know what sic means grammatically.

Has anyone else in Australia received in the mail the personally addressed brochure thingo about their Boffin School?

It's really weird and the link on the letter doesn't work.

I was listening to American Top 40 with Ryan Seacrest (in Australia so probably a few days behind?) and heard the tail end of an interview he was doing with a man who had written a book about managing your personal life so that work doesn't get in the way? Something like that.

Anyway, was wondering if anyone knows the name of the author or the book as it sounded very interesting.

...going to get teased horrifically with a name like Sunday Roast?

I mean, c'mon. Apple Paltrow/Martin, Peaches Geldof, Coco Cox-Arquette.

Nicole is just jumping on the food-naming bandwagon at the expense of her daughter's playground confidence.

We all remember the ad where the girl gave up a dinner with Tom Cruise for her mum's lamb roast, so maybe this is Nicole's revenge.

What do you think?

(and if for a moment you think I'm serious, please just leave the question...)

answer-ers to vote for their own answer in Voting?

Don't get me wrong, it's great for me! If the poster doesn't bother choosing a best answer, I get to nominate myself as best answer and if no one else bothers checking back to vote - I get the points for Best Answer.

But it does seem a little silly....

SO FRICKEN USELESS!!!!

How is it in this day and age when my Satnav can pinpoint my direction to within a centremetre of where I'm standing, can MS Word have SUCH problems with recognising that I want to move the left margin and not the hanging, left or first indent. There is the tiniest, most miniscule spot that the cursor must touch in order to do this and it's like microsurgery finding it.

Am I the only one that HATES this and thinks there MUST be a way of fixing this?????

Right margin - noooo problemo. Left one - ARGH!!!

Try it. Open up Word (any version) and move the right margin(grey panel along the top ruler) more to the right to widen your text page. A little double ended black arrow will show up and easily allow you to do this.

Now try the left side. Bet you can't get the double ended arrow first time. You'll move the indent and the tab, but getting that little double ended arrow up is HARD.

Hi all,

My Dad wants a GPS for the car. Key wants are:

- large screen as he doesn't wear his glasses when driving

- pinpoints speed cameras and red light cameras etc

- nothing too fancy

He already has bluetooth installed for his phone so he doesn't need that.

Any ideas?

Thanks!