Dan Brown The Lost Symbol eBook

The book's story takes place over a period of 12 hours in Washington, D.C., with a focus on Freemasonry. Langdon is summoned to Washington to give a lecture, apparently by his mentor, a Mason named Peter Solomon. However instead of an audience for his lecture he finds the severed right hand of Peter Solomon. Langdon begins a rapid chase through the basement of the Capitol building, solving a series of cryptic clues. He joins forces with Solomon's sister, Noetic scientist Dr. Katherine Solomon, while matching wits with Mal'akh, a tattooed, self-castrated and brilliant villain who is in search of an ancient source of power. The climax takes place in a Masonic Lodge. Mal'akh believes he has the "lost symbol". His death minutes later has a description of his soul being received by devils. The final chapters reveal more about the "lost symbol", and the book ends with the word "Hope".

Click here to get a free e-book of The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown.

BANNED FROM WAL MART...

This is why women should not take men shopping against their will.

After I retired, my wife insisted that I accompany her on her trips to Wal-Mart. Unfortunately, like most men, I found shopping boring and preferred to get in and get out. Equally unfortunately, my wife is like most women - she loved to browse.

Yesterday my dear wife received the following letter from the local Wal-Mart:

Dear Mrs. St. Clair,


Over the past six months, your husband has been causing quite a commotion in our store. We cannot tolerate this behavior and have been forced to ban both of you from the store. Our complaints against Mr. Gilbert are listed below and are documented by our video surveillance cameras .

1. June 15: Took 24 boxes of condoms and randomly put them in people's carts when they weren't looking.

2. July 2: Set all the alarm clocks in Housewares to go off at 5-minute intervals..

3. July 7: Made a trail of tomato juice on the floor leading to the women's restroom.

4 July 19: Walked up to an employee and told her in an official voice, 'Code 3 in Housewares. Get on it right away.'

5. August 4: Went to the Service Desk and tried to put a bag of M&M's on layaway.

6. August 14: Moved a 'CAUTION - WET FLOOR' sign to a carpeted area.

7. August 15: Set up a tent in the camping department and told other shoppers he'd invite them in if they would bring pillows and blankets from the bedding department.

8. August 23: When a clerk asked if they could help him he began crying and screamed, 'Why can't you people just leave me alone?'

9. September 4: Looked right into the security camera and used it as a mirror while he picked his nose.

10. September 10: While handling guns in the hunting department, he asked the clerk where the antidepressants were.

11. October 3: Darted around the store suspiciously while loudly humming the ' Mission Impossible' theme.

12. October 6: In the auto department, he practiced his 'Madonna look' by using different sizes of funnels.

13. October 18: Hid in a clothing rack and when people browsed through yelled, 'PICK ME! PICK ME!'

14. October 21: When an announcement came over the loud speaker, he assumed a fetal position and screamed, 'OH NO! IT'S THOSE VOICES AGAIN!'

And last, but not least...

15. October 23: Went into a fitting room, shut the door, waited awhile, then yelled very loudly, 'Hey! There's no toilet paper in here!'
Sincerely,
Wal-Mart

Something Interesting

"Stewardesses"

is the longest word typed with only the left hand


And "lollipop"
is the longest word typed with your right hand..
(Bet you tried this out mentally, didn't you?)


No word in the English language rhymes with
month, orange, silver, or purple.




"Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".
(Are you doubting this?)



Our eyes are always the same size from birth,

but our nose and ears


never stop growing.



The sentence:
"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog"
uses every letter of the alphabet.
(Now, you KNOW you're going to try this out for accuracy, right?




The words 'racecar,'
'kayak'
and 'level'
are the same whether they are read
left to right or right to left (palindromes).
(Yep, I knew you were going to "do" this one.)



There are only four words in the English language which end in "dous":
tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.
(You're not doubting this, are you?)



There are two words in the English language that have all five vowels in order: "abstemious" and "facetious." (Yes, admit it, you are going to say, a e i o u)

TYPEWRITER is the longest word
that can be made using the letters only on one row of the keyboard.
(All you typists are going to test this out)



A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.



A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.
(Some days that's about what my memory span is.)



A "jiffy" is an actual unit of time for 1/100th of a second.



A shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes.



A snail can sleep for three years.
(I know some people that could do this too.!)




Almonds are a member of the peach family.



An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.
(I know some people like that also)




Babies are born without kneecaps.
They don't appear until the child reaches 2 to 6 years of age.

February 1865 is the only month in recorded history not to have a full moon.






In the last 4,000 years, no new animals have been domesticated.





If the population of China walked past you, 8 abreast,
the line would never end because of the rate of reproduction.




Leonardo Da Vinci invented the scissors





Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite!






Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.



he average person's left hand does 56% of the typing.





The cruise liner, QE 2

moves only six inches for each gallon of diesel that it burns.




The microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.
(Good thing he did that.)




The winter of 1932 was so cold that Niagara Falls

froze completely solid.




There are more chickens than people in the world.




Winston Churchill

was born in a ladies' room during a dance.




Women blink nearly twice as much as men.




Now you know more than you did before!! :p

Animated Sun rise and Sun set in Hong Kong

Move your cursor up and down over the image to see the transition from sun rise to sun set.

ONLY THE ENGLISH COULD HAVE INVENTED THIS LANGUAGE

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men,
Then shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?
If I speak of my foot and show you my feet,
And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?

Then one may be that, and three would be those,
Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,
And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!

Let's face it - English is a crazy language.
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger;
neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins weren't invented in England ..
We take English for granted, but if we explore its paradoxes,
we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square,
and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing,
grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?
Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend.
If you have a bunch of o! dds and ends
And get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
Sometimes I think all the folks who grew up speaking English
should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane.

In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?
We ship by truck but send cargo by ship.
We have noses that run and feet that smell.
We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.
And how can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same,
while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language
in which your house can burn up as it burns
down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out,
and in which an alarm goes off by going on.

And, in closing, if Father is Pop, how come Mother's not Mop?

AND IF PEOPLE FROM POLAND ARE CALLED POLES THEN PEOPLE FROM HOLLAND SHOULD BE HOLES AND THE GERMANS, GERMS!