Wedding Bells

Aside March 29, 2022 Markosun Human condition

Las Vegas weddings refers to wedding ceremonies held in Las Vegas, Nevada, which came to be known as the “Marriage Capital of the World” because of the ease of acquiring a marriage license and the minimal costs involved. The city continues to be known as a popular wedding destination for the same reasons, but also as a result of the various types of weddings available.

Nevada marriage licenses are considered notoriously easy to get; there is no blood test or required waiting period. Las Vegas has streamlined the process further. Once a short form is completed and submitted to the marriage license bureau along with $77.00 cash or money order and a government issued photo identification, a marriage license may be obtained within minutes until midnight every night.

Within one year of receipt of the marriage license a wedding ceremony must be performed in order to have a legal union, and marriages are legal and binding throughout the United States under the Full Faith and Credit Clause, as well as most other countries.

There are approximately 120,000 weddings in Las Vegas in a year. That is roughly 330 wedding ceremonies per day.

There are numerous options for wedding ceremonies in Las Vegas. The least expensive option, costing $75.00, is to marry at the Office of Civil Marriages.

Most weddings performed in Las Vegas may be a civil or religious service depending upon the wedding venue selected.

Most of the city’s major hotels have wedding chapels and many of the local restaurants offer wedding ceremonies. Weddings may also be performed in one of the local churches, synagogues, at one of the many golf courses, or at a free standing wedding chapel. Drive-thru weddings are also available.

A Drive-thru wedding

The majority of the newer wedding chapels are located on the Las Vegas Strip. A local law in the 1970s made it impossible to build a free standing wedding chapel on the Las Vegas Strip. The older wedding chapels will be found downtown.

Many chapels also offer themed weddings. Common themes include Hawaiian, Fairy Tale, Star Trek, Star Wars, Gothic, Halloween, and weddings with an Elvis impersonator or Michael Jackson impersonator. The Tropicana has offered a “rock star” wedding officiated by former Quiet Riot frontman Paul Shortino. Every year an electronic dance festival called Electric Daisy Carnival held at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway offers couples to marry during the festival with varied themes, these packages are an option when purchasing entry, prices range from $300-$700.

Graceland Wedding Chapel is a wedding chapel that has been the site of many celebrity weddings. It is one of the oldest wedding chapels in Las Vegas and claims to be the first chapel ever to conduct weddings performed by Elvis impersonators.

Uncharted Paintings

Aside March 29, 2022 Markosun Art

This is interesting. The guy painted a 98 windows pipedream screensaver.

Rodeo Art

Aside March 28, 2022 Markosun Art

German Teenager Makes Illegal Climb of The Great Pyramid of Giza

Aside March 28, 2022March 28, 2022 Markosun Archaeology, Geography

A German teenager found himself in hot water with Egyptian authorities after being arrested for climbing the Great Pyramid of Giza. Andrej Ciesielski scaled the legendary monument earlier this month in a daring daylight climb that amazingly only took him about 8 minutes to accomplish. Despite being spotted by police during his ascent, Ciesielski continued to the top of the pyramid to savor the once-in-a-lifetime view and document his incredible feat. Upon returning to ground level, the young man was arrested and could have faced up to three years in jail for the stunt. He was eventually released after agreeing to let authorities delete the footage and photos from his climb. Fortunately, Ciesielski had a way to recover the digital material and is now sharing the evidence of his awesome adventure with the world.

One slip and it’s going to be a head-over-heels crash that could cause permanent damage.

Here are some photos of Russian adventurers who climbed the pyramid a few years ago.

After a hard day of pyramid climbing, go to the KFC and indulge in deep fried Goat Stew. Available only at Egyptian KFC outlets.

Fascinating Suspension Railway in Germany

Aside March 28, 2022 Markosun Transportation

The Wuppertal Suspension Railway is a suspension railway in Wuppertal, Germany. Wuppertal is part of the massive metro area that includes, Frankfurt, Cologne, Bonn and Essen. Eleven million people live in the consolidated metro area.

Its full name is “Electric Elevated Railway (Suspension Railway) Installation, Eugen Langen System”, it is the oldest electric elevated railway with hanging cars in the world and is a unique system.

Designed by Eugen Langen to sell to the city of Berlin, the installation with elevated stations was built in Barmen, Elberfeld and Vohwinkel between 1897 and 1903; the first track opened in 1901. The Schwebebahn is still in use today as a normal means of local public transport, moving 25 million passengers annually (2008).

The suspension railway runs along a route of 13.3 kilometres (8.3 mi), at a height of about 12 metres (39 ft) above the river Wupper between Oberbarmen and Sonnborner Straße (10 kilometres or 6.2 miles) and about 8 metres (26 ft) above the valley road between Sonnborner Straße and Vohwinkel (3.3 kilometres or 2.1 miles). At one point the railway crosses the A46 motorway. The entire trip takes about 30 minutes.

Construction on the actual Wuppertal Suspension Railway began in 1898, overseen by the government’s master builder, Wilhelm Feldmann. On 24 October 1900, Emperor Wilhelm II participated in a monorail trial run.

In 1901 the railway came into operation. It opened in sections: the line from Kluse to Zoo/Stadion opened on 1 March, the line to the western terminus at Vohwinkel opened on 24 May, while the line to the eastern terminus at Oberbarmen did not open until 27 June 1903. Around 19,200 tonnes (18,900 long tons; 21,200 short tons) of steel were used to produce the supporting frame and the railway stations. The construction cost 16 million gold marks. The railway was closed owing to severe damage during World War II, but reopened as early as 1946.

The Wuppertal Suspension Railway nowadays carries approximately 80,000 passengers per weekday through the city. Since 1997, the supporting frame has been largely modernised, and many stations have been reconstructed and brought technically up to date. Kluse station, at the theatre in Elberfeld, had been destroyed during the Second World War. This too was reconstructed during the modernisation. Work was planned to be completed in 2001; however a serious accident took place in 1999 which left five people dead and 47 injured. This, along with delivery problems, delayed completion. In recent years (2004), the cost of the reconstruction work has increased from €380 million to €480 million.

On 15 December 2009 the Schwebebahn suspended its operations for safety concerns; several of the older support structures needed to be renewed, a process that was completed on 19 April 2010.

On 10 November 2011 Wuppertaler Stadtwerke (Wuppertal City Works) signed a contract with Vossloh Kiepe to supply 31 new articulated cars to replace those built in the 1970s. The new cars were built in Valencia, Spain. When they were introduced the line’s power supply voltage was raised from 600 to 750 V.

In 2012, the Wuppertal Suspension Railway was closed for significant periods to upgrade the line. The closing times were 7 to 21 July, 6 August to 22 October and weekends in September (15/16) and November (10/11).

The modernisation was completed and the line fully reopened on 19 August 2013.

The cars are suspended from a single rail built underneath a supporting steel frame. The cars hang on wheels which are driven by an electric motor operating at 600 volts DC, fed from an extra rail.

The supporting frame and tracks are made out of 486 pillars and bridgework sections. For the realization Anton Rieppel Head of MAN-Werk Gustavsburg invented 1895-96 a patented structural system. The termini at each end of the line also serve as train depots and reversers.

The current fleet consists of twenty-seven two-car trains built in the 1970s. The cars are 24 metres long and have 4 doors. One carriage can seat 48 with approximately 130 standing passengers. The top speed is 60 kilometres per hour (37 mph) and the average speed is 27 km/h (17 mph).

The Kaiserwagen (Emperor’s car), the original train used by Emperor Wilhelm II during a test ride on 24 October 1900, is still operated on scheduled excursion services, special occasions and for charter events.

On July 21, 1950 the Althoff Circus organised a publicity stunt by putting a baby elephant on a train at Alter Markt station. As the elephant started to bump around during the ride, she was pushed out of the car and fell into the river Wupper. The elephant, two journalists, and one passenger sustained minor injuries. After this jump, the elephant got the name Tuffi, meaning ‘waterdive’ in Italian. Both operator and circus director were fined after the incident.

Driving one of these things would be a great job.

Monsoon Dew

Aside March 28, 2022March 28, 2022 Markosun Offbeat

A store in Nepal.

Monsoon Dew, Fancy, Right, Jeeru and Club Cola. Where can I get some?

Getting High

Aside March 27, 2022 Markosun Buildings

Some people really have balls!

Changing a light bulb high above Detroit.

Doing the same on top of the Empire State Building.

Tom Silliman of Electronics Research Inc. changing the lightbulb atop New York City’s Empire State Building tower, 1,450 feet above sea level.

Standing on top of the spire of Wilshire Grand Tower in Los Angeles.

These guys are nuts. They don’t even have safety belts attached. Total confidence.

Changing light bulb on top of spire at One World Trade Center (Freedom Tower). 1,776 feet up.

QAnon convention in Las Vegas

Aside March 27, 2022 Markosun Bizarre

QAnon is a movement started on social media made up of conspiracy theorists who believe the wildest things. They are hardcore supporters of Donald Trump. And Trump said he doesn’t know much about them, “but they like me”. For Trump no matter how looney any group is, if they like him, he likes them.

Back to the convention:

The deadly Capitol siege was fueled by far-out conspiracy theorists, including Ashli Babbitt, a QAnon supporter fatally shot by police as she tried to breach a barricaded doorway. Meanwhile, federal investigators are still looking into the belief system of Anthony Quinn Warner, who made statements about a conspiracy of lizard people taking over the planet before the explosion that damaged 41 buildings and injured three people in Nashville, Tennessee, on Christmas Day.

Many are scratching their heads. Why are people embracing such bizarre ideas?

The notion of shape-shifting, blood-sucking reptilian humanoids invading Earth to

control the human race sounds like a cheesy sci-fi plot. But it’s actually a very old trope with disturbing links to anti-immigrant and anti-Semitic hostilities dating to the 19th century.

Bonkers? Sure. Harmless? Definitely not.

Law enforcement sources say Warner’s writings indicate his interest in a number of conspiracy theories — including the lizard people takeover. He may even have had a pastime of hunting such aliens in the park. Before the blast, Warner sent packages to friends filled with material expounding on his bizarre worldview. They included a letter that began “Hey Dude, You will never believe what I found in the park.”

The world-ruled-by-lizard-people fantasy shot to prominence in recent years in part through the ramblings of David Icke, a popular British sports reporter-turned-conspiracy theorist known for his eccentric ideas.

Icke would have you believe that a race of reptilian beings not only invaded Earth, but that it also created a genetically modified lizard-human hybrid race called the “Babylonian Brotherhood,” which, he maintains, is busy plotting a worldwide fascist state. This sinister cabal of global reptilian elites boasts a membership list including former President Barack Obama, Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan and Mick Jagger.

Mick getting medical attention in the Nevada desert after a very long jog.

This nonsense is espoused by a variety of internet conspiracy-mongers, including far-right, Trump-loving QAnon adherents, one of whom was accused in 2019 of murdering his own brother because he thought he was a lizard. As many as 12 million Americans believed in this lizard people conspiracy in a 2013 Public Policy Polling survey. It’s safe to assume the number is higher today.