(Since I typed this twice please forgive any typeo's) 

 

First I would like to thank Brooke and Stpeh for coming to lend some moral support I can't really express how much that means to me! Especially since I know you had to drive 30 miles about 39 minutes to get to the UU church.

 I think my geis has something to do with leaving a smidge late for something, and then there has to be a car accident. This ensures that I will be even later! If I leave on time or early nothing is wrong and I get REALLY early and have to listen to the radio for 30 minutes! I digress.

 Anyway I get there at 7:10pm... the event starts at 7:00pm. thank the gods for PST! The MC came over to interview me, she was just the cutest little ting! I think they made an excellent choice for her to host. Anyway she asks me what was something about me that my friends wouldn't know... Um... I dunno, I think that everyone knows jest about everything about me. So I said something about horse trick riding, and she says oh, you have a horse? So of course I was introduced with something about my horse. I gess it was a good thing to say but eh I didn't think it was that great

 So I say hit to Bethany and sit next to Paul. Brooke and Steph come rolling in and sit next to me. So I chatted with them a bit and then my name was called to go on...FIRST!!! I didn't have my bagpipe (goose) put together! Eeeep!

 Fortunately they mad some other announcements which gave me time to put the goose together. NOw I have to explain a bit on the goose. I don't have my 'real' pipes yet. So my instructor lent me the goose to use so it would at leas be a bit more exciting than the just the chanter. The goose is a bagpipe that doesn't have any drones. It's a practice instrument that is a step between the chanter and pipes.

 the goose that I have had a chanter on it this is way smaller than my chanter. So my finger placement would be messed up when moving between the chanter and the goose. So my instructor managed to fit the goose with a joint that would allow my chanter to fit in place of the smaller one.

Soo, I brought my chanter and the goose in sparate pieces, because I thought I might have some time to do some warm up iwth my chanter.

So I jumped up there and told everyone that I really didn't think I was going to go first. Then asked everyone how they were doing and if they were having fun. I started off with the ground of "Company's Lament" and moved to "Scots Wae Hae," "Balmoral," "Flower of Scotland," "A Man's a Man" and finished up with something I wrote. I ended with thanking the audience for not killine me! (for plaing the pipes at all).

I think I did alright, I know I missed a quarter of A Man's a Man and I goofed up on some of Company's Lament. All in all though I felt that I did pretty well! I guess I'll have to view the video later... If I can find out how to get a copy of the tape.

 When I sat down on of the judges said he coudln't get ove my boots. I don't know what the female jusge daid. The las judge who DID have a British sounding accent asked me how long it took the train the cat... I laughed and told him 1 1/1 years. I also got up behind the mic again to model my boots.

All the acts were good, you could tell everyone put in the time to do well. My favorite acts were; the lady who did the Frank Sinatra song "Witchcraft," The Native American man who played the A shaped flute and of course Linda's act. They all won too!

The woman who did the Frank Sinatra song came up to me and said that she thoguht I did treally well. I told her I thought she did very well, and I told Brooke that if I wasn't ing to vote for myself I would vote for her! The judge with the British accent came up to me while I was outside with Brooke and Steph, and said he really enjoyed my performace. I guess I must have done pretty well :).

I dont' know if this worked on my broad cast, however here it is again:

Click the link to view the video

 

Are mobile phones wiping out our bees?
Scientists claim radiation from handsets are to blame for mysterious 'colony collapse' of bees
By Geoffrey Lean and Harriet Shawcross
Published: 15 April 2007
It seems like the plot of a particularly far-fetched horror film. But some scientists suggest that our love of the mobile phone could cause massive food shortages, as the world's harvests fail.

They are putting forward the theory that radiation given off by mobile phones and other hi-tech gadgets is a possible answer to one of the more bizarre mysteries ever to happen in the natural world - the abrupt disappearance of the bees that pollinate crops. Late last week, some bee-keepers claimed that the phenomenon - which started in the US, then spread to continental Europe - was beginning to hit Britain as well.

The theory is that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees' navigation systems, preventing the famously homeloving species from finding their way back to their hives. Improbable as it may seem, there is now evidence to back this up.

Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) occurs when a hive's inhabitants suddenly disappear, leaving only queens, eggs and a few immature workers, like so many apian Mary Celestes. The vanished bees are never found, but thought to die singly far from home. The parasites, wildlife and other bees that normally raid the honey and pollen left behind when a colony dies, refuse to go anywhere near the abandoned hives.

The alarm was first sounded last autumn, but has now hit half of all American states. The West Coast is thought to have lost 60 per cent of its commercial bee population, with 70 per cent missing on the East Coast.

CCD has since spread to Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece. And last week John Chapple, one of London's biggest bee-keepers, announced that 23 of his 40 hives have been abruptly abandoned.

Other apiarists have recorded losses in Scotland, Wales and north-west England, but the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs insisted: "There is absolutely no evidence of CCD in the UK."

The implications of the spread are alarming. Most of the world's crops depend on pollination by bees. Albert Einstein once said that if the bees disappeared, "man would have only four years of life left".

No one knows why it is happening. Theories involving mites, pesticides, global warming and GM crops have been proposed, but all have drawbacks.

German research has long shown that bees' behaviour changes near power lines.

Now a limited study at Landau University has found that bees refuse to return to their hives when mobile phones are placed nearby. Dr Jochen Kuhn, who carried it out, said this could provide a "hint" to a possible cause.

Dr George Carlo, who headed a massive study by the US government and mobile phone industry of hazards from mobiles in the Nineties, said: "I am convinced the possibility is real."

The case against handsets

Evidence of dangers to people from mobile phones is increasing. But proof is still lacking, largely because many of the biggest perils, such as cancer, take decades to show up.

Most research on cancer has so far proved inconclusive. But an official Finnish study found that people who used the phones for more than 10 years were 40 per cent more likely to get a brain tumour on the same side as they held the handset.

Equally alarming, blue-chip Swedish research revealed that radiation from mobile phones killed off brain cells, suggesting that today's teenagers could go senile in the prime of their lives.

Studies in India and the US have raised the possibility that men who use mobile phones heavily have reduced sperm counts. And, more prosaically, doctors have identified the condition of "text thumb", a form of RSI from constant texting.

Professor Sir William Stewart, who has headed two official inquiries, warned that children under eight should not use mobiles and made a series of safety recommendations, largely ignored by ministers.

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/wildlife/article2449968.ece

It is a sad day at my house... one of my favorite bands will be no more by April 8th...

That's right, Tartanic. At least I had the joy of watching them in person and I have their CD's.