Immortality

The elixir of life, from also known as the elixir of immortality or Dancing Water or Persian and sometimes equated with the philosopher's stone, is a legendary potion, or drink, that grants the drinker eternal life or eternal youth. Many practitioners of alchemy pursued it. The elixir of life was also said to be able to create life. It is related to the myths of Enoch (Jewish mythology), Thoth (Egyptian God), and Hermes Trismegistus, all of whom in various tales are said to have drunk "the white drops" or liquid gold and thus achieved immortality. It is also associated with the Qur'an's Al Khidr ('The Green Man'), and is mentioned in one of the Nag Hammadi (city in Upper Egypt) texts.

It is not clear that any such potion has ever been discovered though alchemists in ancient China, India, and the Western world spent a great deal of time and effort on it. In Ancient China, various emperors sought for the fabled elixir with various results. Some men who went for it never came back. In India Amrit or Amrut has been described in the Hindu scriptures which are the oldest compiled source of information known to humanity. Anybody who consumes even a tiniest portion of Amrut has been described to gain immortality. In the Middle East the term elixir is derived from the Arabic Al-Ikseer, which itself may have come from the Persian Aab-e-Hayaat . This was due to the efforts of Arab and Persian alchemists in the medieval Near East in finding an elixir of life. Though they never found it, they contributed to advances in Persian medicine.

In Europe the Comte de St. Germain, an 18th century nobleman of uncertain origin and mysterious capabilities, was also reputed to have the Elixir and to be several thousand years old.

In April 2008, a group of young scientists demonstrated, in a Portuguese television program that it is possible to immortalize yeast cells. Thanks to the expression of "immortality genes" that exists in a vegetable extract, they had proved that they can hinder the death of yeast in fatal conditions of stress. But immortality for humans still seems unattainable and the quest for the Elixir of Life continues.

By Nishita Aurnab

Great Writer
There was once a young man who, in his youth, professed his desire to become a great writer.
When asked to define "great" he said, "I want to write stuff that the whole world will read, stuff that people will react to on a truly emotional level, stuff that will make them scream, cry, howl in pain and anger!"
He now works for Microsoft, writing error messages.

The Haircut
A man and a little boy entered a barbershop together. After the man's haircut was done, he placed the boy in the chair.
"I'm going to buy a green tie to wear for the parade," he said. "I'll be back in a few minutes."
When the boy's haircut was completed and the man still hadn't returned, the barber said, "Looks like your daddy's forgotten all about you."
"That wasn't my daddy," said the boy. "He just walked up, took me by the hand and said, 'Come on, son, we're gonna get a free haircut!'"

Bush-sense
"Larry King asked President Bush if he lost any money in the crisis, and surprisingly, Bush said he has no idea where his money is because his money is in a blind trust managed by a Nigerian prince who is about to collect a huge inheritance."
-Jimmy Kimmel

All set up
"That was nice of you to set up a blind date for your exboyfriend."
"I know, but I don't hold any grudges."
"I'm surprised he trusted you enough to agree to go out with her."
"Well, I had to swear to him she's Jennifer Lopez's double."
"Wow! Is that true?"
"I wouldn't lie. She's twice her weight and twice her age.

Talking Dog
A guy sees a sign in front of a house: "Talking Dog for Sale."
He rings the bell and the owner tells him the dog is in the backyard. The guy goes into the backyard and sees a black mutt just sitting there.
"You talk?" he asks.
"Yep," the mutt replies.
"So, what's your story?"

The mutt looks up and says, "Well, I discovered my gift of talking pretty young and I wanted to help the government, so I told the CIA about my gift, and in no time they had me jetting from country to country, sitting in rooms with spies and world leaders, because no one figured a dog would be eavesdropping. I was one of their most valuable spies eight years running. The jetting around really tired me out, and I knew I wasn't getting any younger and I wanted to settle down. So I signed up for a job at the airport to do some undercover security work, mostly wandering near suspicious characters and listening in. I uncovered some incredible dealings there and was awarded a batch of medals. Had a wife, a mess of puppies, and now I'm just retired."

The guy is amazed. He goes back in and asks the owner what he wants for the dog.
The owner says, "Ten dollars."
The guy says, "This dog is amazing. Why on earth are you selling him, so cheap?"
The owner replies, "He's just a big liar. He didn't do any of that stuff.”

Now you almost know everything

"Fortnight" is a contraction of "fourteen nights." In the US "two weeks" is more commonly used. I always thought fortnight was a night spent inside a fort, possibly in a cellar.

A smaller unit of time is a 'jiffy' which is an actual unit of time for 1/100th of a second. So when people tell you they will be 'back in a jiffy', you just know they are lying because that's just not physically possible.

Speaking of time, if the sun stopped shining suddenly, it would take eight minutes for people on earth to be aware of the fact. Of course, when it does stop shinning, it will be followed by a really bright flare that will wipe us off the face off the earth. In fact, the face of the earth itself will be wiped off. Bet that's one situation that even cockroaches won't survive.

On a related note, light travels at the rate of 186,200 miles a second. Now someone please invent a car made of light.

While we are on the subject of time, space, continuum and more importantly dates, any month that starts on a Sunday will have a Friday the 13th in it. Now isn't that an amazingly useless piece of information. Unless of course, that's the day the sun suddenly stops shining. That would make it a very important day.

And if you've got any more time left, a bathometer is an instrument for indicating the depth of the sea beneath a moving vessel. And you thought it was supposed to measure how long it takes to take a bath? You use a watch for that.

By Sadia

Times when somebody breaks your heart into so many million pieces, you really hope that the person never came in your life, don't you. They say love does not deal with the brain, yet after analyzing the brain chemistry of mammalian pair bonding, Dr. Young predicts that it won't be long before there will be actual drugs that will trigger your brain to fall in love with anyone you want to!

That's just not the only good news! They can actually trigger this drug to make an anti love potion that can heal anybody from the agony of their sad lonely life.

In his Nature essay, Dr. Young speculates that human love is set off by a “biochemical chain of events” that originally evolved in ancient brain circuits involving mother-child bonding, which is stimulated in mammals by the release of oxytocin during labor, delivery and nursing. 'Some of our sexuality has evolved to stimulate that same oxytocin system to create female-male bonds,” he says.

This doesn't mean there will soon be magical elixirs causing you to instantly fall in love with anyone! These drugs are uncertain and might cause a lot of controversies in the future. Yet, just imagine a life without any pain and heart breaks and any drama…and no love!

By bloo somebody

Kid Star

Flower Power

Beside a great pool
Which looked like a giant drool,
Was a silver flower,
Beating inside it was a great power.

Absorbed all beauty and life
But also all sorrow and strife,
Was the great power the flower,
For the flower, it wasn't bad.

The great pool once dried
And with it the flower died,
Thus ended the life of the flower
Gifted by a great power.

By Zaid Idris
Aged 10 years