Three US amputee veterans have climbed Mt Kilimanjaro, enduring tumbles and sores to reach Africa’s highest peak with only one good leg among them.

The veterans – of Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq – hiked to the top of the 5,891m (19,330ft) high Tanzanian mountain in six days to show that disability need not lead to inactivity.

An incredible feat. Congratulations!

Congratulations to Adriano Malori, Italian rider on Lampre, for finishing the 2010 Tour de France – an accomplishment that 27 of the starters this year failed to achieve. He rode a total of 2,263 miles in 3 weeks at an average speed of 23.4 mph – and half the time he was riding faster than that! His pace over the course, finishing as Lanterne Rouge, was a mere 1.1 mph slower than the Tour winner. (tdflr)

The Big Picture has some great photographs from this year’s tour in two parts.

Everyone can attack when it is easy. You win races by attacking when it hurts, you attack when it is hard, when your legs are burning, when everyone else is breathing hard and you are suffering. That is when you attack.

Contador’s only valid rival in the race had stopped pedaling his bike and was futzing with his shifter when Contador attacked. I consider that attacking when it is easy.

I want to see that skinny bastard Schleck attack tomorrow like a demon. He will drop Contador, in anger. And it will hurt. He is gonna get those 8 seconds back and then some.

Andy is going to win this race.

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Take a look at this map. See that blue state in a sea of red and purple hues? It’s Colorado, the only state in the union with an adult obesity rate below 20%. (”Just” 19.1% of its residents are obese.)

There are signs posted in several spots around town that show a bicycle with a circle around it and a line across it; however if people miss it and didn’t read the section in the local newspaper talking about Black Hawk’s new law, most would have no clue riding in spots is illegal.

The city manager said the casino owners knew about the law and support it.

“It’s a choice,” said Copp. “We made our choice and now the bicyclist need to make his or her choice.”

WTF.

• The Deepwater Horizon oil rig was the most sophisticated in the world
• The Deepwater Horizon cost BP roughly $300 million
• To operate the rig, it cost BP $1 million per day, and it had been operating in the Gulf for 7 years before its sinking
• This oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is the equivalent of the Exxon Valdez spill every 4-7 days. It continues to leak.
• The spill is estimated to cost BP $25 million

This would be bad news for any company, excepting BP. The corporation formerly known as British Petroleum earned over $6 billion in profit during the first 3 months of this year.

Sports Illustrated Magazine:

When they resumed working out on Thursday, nine days before the NCAA championships were to begin, the women were missing the speedy and clever defender whose exuberance had made some describe her as the heart of the team, and the men were without the burly midfielder who, ironically enough, had been described in game programs as one of the Cavaliers’ fiercest attackers. And both groups were groping to understand what had just happened and why.

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What is it like to fall from space? According to Kittinger, who’s now working on the Stratos team, it’s surprisingly peaceful. With little air resistance, there’s almost no sensation of falling at high altitudes.

“There’s no sound, no movement,” Kittinger wrote in his autobiography. It’s like being suspended in the sky.

(via Matador)

At a White House press conference last [July], President Obama conceded that we may never achieve 100 percent health-insurance coverage without a single-payer system, “because there’s always going to be somebody out there who thinks they’re indestructible and doesn’t want to get health care … and then, unfortunately … they get hit by a bus, end up in the emergency room, and the rest of us have to pay for it.”

How did “getting hit by a bus” come to mean “unexpected tragedy”?. Juliet Lapidos explains.

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Craig Mod:

The GF1 is a near perfect travel camera.

For 16 days I lived with it strapped to me as I climbed through the valleys of central Nepal up to Annapurna Base Camp at 4,200 meters.

I covered the camera in sweat. I hit it against rocks (unintentionally). The air was often dusty and this dust, by the end of the trip, had worked its way into every nook of the GF1. And yet it performed flawlessly. Never once did it stutter or complain or fail to take an image when I asked it to. And only rarely did it take the wrong image.

The compact combination of Panasonic’s GF1 body and the 20mm f1.7 Lumix pancake lens works with you as a traveler. It’s a light, sturdy, capable, exceptionally well conceived photography kit that demands to be taken on adventures.

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Fliers nostalgic for the golden era of air travel might want to book a trip to to the garage of Anthony Toth’s Redondo Beach, Calif., condo, where he has built a precise replica of a first-class cabin from a Pan Am World Airways 747.

This is really, really neat. Don’t miss the slideshow accompanying the article.

(via daringfireball)

In Saratoga Springs, New York, reports The Saratogian, controversy has erupted over the Marino family’s desire to let son Adam ride his bike to Maple Avenue Middle School.

Before the first day of classes last week, officials actually placed calls telling parents not to permit kids to bike or walk. The Marinos, regular bike riders, defied the “rule” — school officials can’t dictate how kids get to school any more than they can tell parents which make of car to drive. They were greeted outside by school personnel and a New York state trooper.

World Changing continues with more ridiculousness.

The Marinos aren’t alone. A recent New York Times back-to-school piece profiles similar cases in which parents who permit their kids to walk and bike are met with raised eyebrows, or worse. One mother in Mississippi was threatened with a child endangerment charge for letting her 10-year-old walk a mile to soccer practice after passersby saw the boy and called 911. Another in Vancouver, British Columbia, was left waiting and worrying for her first grader after school officials prevented him from walking himself home — a distance of six houses.

I vividly remember walking to and from school each day from first to sixth grade with my younger brother, and loved every minute of it. Perhaps my mother was worried about the two of us being abducted. I know I’ll worry about Benjamin when it’s his turn. Looking back, it felt like a five mile walk. Google Maps tells me the route is only 0.6 miles — 12 quick minutes! The fresh New Hampshire air early in the morning was energizing as a little guy, and nothing felt better at the end of the day than breaking free from the nuns that taught us social studies and geometry.

It is sad to see schools feel the need to put these types of rules in place. These days, it’s more important than ever to get kids outside away from the dreaded television, video games, and Internet… walking, riding or chasing each other down the street. The trick, of course, is moving to a house that leads to school up-hill both ways.

(via kottke)

Three savvy women started 3B bags locally here in Denver. They saw a real need to try and eliminate the use of plastic produce bags – and they were subsequently featured on the local evening news. Just weeks before the bags appeared in the store, I remember thinking to myself that it would be so nice to have an alternative to plastic produce bags.

Order ‘em!

Author Colin Beavan, in research for his new book, began the No Impact Project in November 2006. A newly self-proclaimed environmentalist who could no longer avoid pointing the finger at himself, Colin leaves behind his liberal complacency for a vow to make as little environmental impact as possible for one year. No more automated transportation, no more electricity, no more non-local food, no more material consumption… no problem. That is, until his espresso-guzzling, retail-worshipping wife Michelle and their two year-old daughter are dragged into the fray. Laura Gabbert and Justin Schein’s film provides a front row seat into the familial strains and strengthened bonds that result from Colin’s and Michelle’s struggle with this radical lifestyle change.

It’s history in real time. It’s a glimpse into one of the most open and most private homes in the world. And best of all: the photographs are made by official White House photographer Pete Souza who also shot the president during Regan’s years. He knows where to be, how to be there, and knows history when he sees it.

Great signature, too.

The World Health Organization raised its pandemic alert to 5, its second-highest level Wednesday, indicating the outbreak of swine flu that originated in Mexico is nearing widespread human infection.

Any the NY Times has an infographic tracking what might possibly turn out to be “The Big One”.

[A Holocaust survivor's son] told the story of a college freshman in Southern California who stood up during a presentation his mother was giving and said she’d never heard of the Holocaust.

What are they teaching in history classes nowadays?

United Airlines is requiring extremely obese passengers who can’t fit in their seats to pay for a second seat when there is no other way to accommodate their girth.

United said Wednesday that it will charge obese, coach-class passengers for a second coach seat or for upgrading to a larger seat in business or first class, if necessary. The policy applies to United and United Express flights. United published its new policy on its website under “Passengers requiring extra space.”

So maybe instead of getting your company on twitter, paying marketers to mention you are on twitter, and paying people to blog about your company, forget all that and just make awesome stuff that gets people excited about your products, hire people that represent the company well, and when your stuff is so awesome that friends share it with other friends, you may not even need “social media marketing” after all.

(via DF)

A pet dog that fell overboard in rough seas off Australia has been reunited with its owners after surviving alone on an island for four months, reports said.

The dog was believed to have drowned and Griffith said the family was devastated.

But out of sight of the family, Sophie Tucker was swimming doggedly and finally made it to St. Bees Island, five nautical miles away, and began the sort of life popularized by the TV reality show “Survivor.”

And then on the other side of the bridge is Congo. The instant you cross, you’re hit by a riot of dazzling colors, loud music, drunken border policemen, and women hoisting just about every imaginable kind of fruit and vegetable onto their heads. The soil here is some of the most fertile on the planet. And then there are the minerals, Congo’s seemingly limitless supply of them — gold, diamonds, zinc, nickel, cassiterite, copper, cobalt and coltan, old-school and modern gems. But somehow, for the past 12 years and counting, Congo has been the theater of one of the worst civil wars in modern history, a truly continental disaster that has sucked in many of its neighbors and killed millions of people, a festering wound in the green heart of Africa.

Via The Times on a new book, “Africa’s World War” by Gérard Prunier.

As winter begins to wind down, we are still in the middle of sled dog racing season. The Iditarod in Alaska had its ceremonial start in Anchorage last Saturday (the 7th), the Yukon Quest race from Canada’s Yukon Territory to Alaska took place back in mid-February, and the Can-Am Crown races were held in Maine only a couple of weeks ago. The most well-known of the races, the Iditarod Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, covers 1,868 km (1,161 mi), and takes anywhere from 8 to 12 days for mushers and their teams of 16 dogs to complete. Collected here are several photos from recent sled dog races and training sessions around the Northern Hemisphere. (28 photos total)

• Cholera: 2,755 died since August
• Anthrax: Eight deaths since November
• HIV/Aids: Estimated 400 deaths a day
• Maternal mortality: Risen from 168 per 100,000 in 1990 to 1,100 in 2005

What Frank Sinatra taught me about art, innocence and experience.

In March 2009, Chris Waddell will attempt to summit Kilimanjaro. Sounds like a basic goal, until you consider that this star athlete and paralympian will conquer the 19,340 foot high mountain without the use of his legs. If successful, Waddell will become the first paraplegic to summit Kilimanjaro unassisted, the tallest freestanding mountain in the world.

I’ve been planning to climb Kili for 2 years. This is inspiring stuff.