TOMS Shoes

For every pair of shoes purchased from TOMS Shoes, they will give a pair of shoes to a child in need. The founder of TOMS, Blake Mycoskie, befriended some children during a trip to Argentina and saw that they had no shoes to protect their feet. Therefore, he created TOMS to help put shoes on children around the world.

"The leading cause of disease in developing countries is soil-transmitted parasites which penetrate the skin through open sores. Wearing shoes can prevent this and the risk of amputation."

Over the past few years "TOMS has given over 140,000* pairs of shoes to children in need through the One for One model. Because of your support, TOMS plans to give over 300,000 pairs of shoes to children in need around the world in 2009."

Want to purchase a pair of TOMS Shoes? Click here to visit their website.

Electric Daisy Carnival

The Electric Daisy Carnival, a two-day music festival, is hosted in Downtown Los Angeles' Memorial Coliseum and Exposition Park. The dates for this year's EDC are: Friday June 26, open from 4pm- 2am and Saturday June 27, open from 4pm-4am.

There are five areas of music with performances by Paul Oakenfold, ATB, Fedde Le Grand, Paul Van Dyk, David Guetta, Benny Benassi, Kaskade, Mark Farina, Simian Mobile Disco, Diplo, DJ AM, and many more!

EDC's $99 2 day combo ticket is well worth its price. Did I mention there are carnival rides?

Click here to get your ticket now!

What's In a Name?

Click on the image above to see it clearer

The United States Census Bureau statistics state that there are "at least 88,799 different last names and 5,163 different first names in common use in the United States."

Every wonder how many people share your name? 

 Click here to find out

Interested in seeing the popularity of your name over the past 100 years? Click here

Want to see in which states your name is most popular? 

Click here

Where does your last name come from???

Surnames were generally derived from one of four sources: 

1) Patronymic (from the first name of father). 
Examples: 
Peters - son of Peter (English, German) 
Peterson - son of Peter (Swedish) 
Petersen - son of Peter (Danish) 
O'Reilly - grandson of Reilly (Ireland) 
Mc- /Mac- - son of (Scottish) 
d'- / di- - son of (Italian) 
-ez / -es - son of (Spanish / Portuguese) 
-wicz - son of (Poland) 
Fitz- - son of (Old English - sometimes incorrectly associated with being an illegitimate) 

2) Lives near locality or place. 
Examples: 
KirkPatrick - Church (kirk) of St. Patrick 
Cliff - steep hill 
Fairholm - the fair island 
Ashley - field surrounded by ash trees 

3) Occupation or social status. 
Examples: 
Cooper - barrel maker 
Wagner or Waggoner - wagon maker 
Knight - knighthood conferred by the king 
Smith - blacksmith 
Powers - poor or taken a vow of poverty 

4) Nicknames describing person or personality. 
Examples: 
Reid - red, ruddy complexion or red hair 
Stout - Body size 
Small - Body size 
Armstrong - strong arms 
Sharpe - sharp, smart 

Sidewalk Chalk

Julian Beever is an English artist famous for his sidewalk chalk drawings. His art can be found on sidewalks in England, Germany, Belgium, France, Australia, and the US. Scroll down to take a look at his drawings found across the world...

This is what the picture above looks like from a different angle....

Want to see more pictures like this? Click here to visit Julian's website.

Bonnaroo

Bonnaroo, a music and arts festival in Manchester, Tennessee, is a 4-day event from June 11-14. The lineup includes many artists like: Snoop Dogg, Citizen Cope, Paul Oakenfold, Girl Talk, Bruce Springsteen, Nine Inch Nails, Beastie Boys, and many more.

A limited number of general admission tickets for the 2009 Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival will be available for purchase starting at $224.50 plus applicable fees. Once these tickets are sold out, prices will go up.

Trippy Pictures

This is a Picture of a Public Toilet in Houston...


Here is the view from inside...

It is made entirely of one-way glass. No one can see you from the outside, but from the inside it's as though you are in a glass box!


Imagine you are in a high-rise building and enter a bathroom that looks like this....

No worries as this is a painted floor, but would it make you uneasy to walk on it?


This is a ceiling mural in a smoker's lounge...

Might make you want to put out that cigarette

Recession Geography

In March, The New York Times published an interactive map (based on data from January 2009) displaying the unemployment rates across the United States.

Click on the image above to see clearer

"Job losses have been most severe in the areas that experienced a big boom in housing, those that depend on manufacturing and those that already had the highest unemployment rates."

Living Electro

Living Electro "Home of House-Techno", is an awesome site that lets users post and download new house/techno/electronic music. The site is updated all day, every day so that you are never listening to the same songs. There is even a section of the website that allows users to request songs, and other members will fulfill your requests. Did I mention its completely free to be a member and download these mixes? Want to see what it's all about?

Click here to visit Living Electro