July 25, 2006
Great Eleanor Roosevelt quote
My friend, Marcus Oliver, sent me this quote today. It speaks volumes.
"Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss
people."
– Eleanor Roosevelt
July 25, 2006
The joys of a clean home…
After a painstakingly long search, I recently found someone new to clean my home. The last three people I had lined up all fell through the cracks. It just so happens that this person is a slim 5’10" 26-year old Polish blonde woman named Jolanda. I pride myself on being an equal opportunity employer where hiring is done blindly of race, sex and body type. Since Jolanda was hired over the phone, I am confident the federal authorities will let this one pass. Needless to say though, I wasn’t upset when she arrived.
Since my search lasted so long, I was living the life of a bachelor in an apartment that hadn’t been properly cleaned for months. I forgot how nice it is to have a clean, fresh-smelling home. It brightens your entire day. I’ve posted a photo here to illustrate. For those of you who haven’t seen the new do, this photo serves a double purpose….look closely in the mirror.
July 24, 2006
Google customizable homepages
Google began offering customizable homepages recently and I think
they are fantastic. They’ve essentially taken what Yahoo did with
myYahoo and improved upon it. You can see snapshot views of your
google calendars, gmail, weather, news photos, popular videos and
hundreds of feeds from popular sources. There are also a bunch of
widgets that you can choose to appear on your homepage such as to-do
list, weather and driving directions. You can move modules simply by
dragging and dropping. I’ve posted a screenshot below, but you can get
your own at – http://www.google.com/ig .
July 21, 2006
Israel-Middle East situation – weighing in
Friends have been asking me for my opinions on the situation in Israel right now and I haven’t had much of an answer for them. What is there to say? This is a vicious cycle of violence that appears to have
no end in site – though you certainly didn’t need to login here to read that. It’s virtually identical
to the uprising that began in 1982 after a small assassination attempt on an Israeli diplomat in London. The result back then was years of war and the decimation of Beirut, one of the world’s special cities, from which the city, and Lebanon, had just begun to emerge. With at least another week of bombings planned, it appears that Beirut will again be set back. Honestly though, if Lebanon had any inkling of a government, this would have been stopped long ago. Lebanon has been harboring Hezbollah terrorists for decades and is spineless in standing up to them. Now, they have paid the price for their weakness. If they are being blindly led by Syria and Iran, then the same applies. Israel is responding to an “unprovoked attack on its sovereign territory” and in a location surrounded by neigbors who want their destruction, they need to take such attacks seriously. Yes, Syria and Iran are the larger problems, but let’s take one step at a time. As usual, the economist has some of the best and most balanced reporting on this subject, and today’s article entitled The Accidental War paints an informative picture. Also worth watching, the Arab woman on Al-Jazeera earlier this week, who condemns Muslim behavior. Incidentally, a missile landed in my family’s kibbutz – Shaar Haamakim – this week, though thankfully, nobody was injured. Let’s pray that no more innocent lives are lost to this conflict.
July 13, 2006
Dixieland band plays in Cobble Hill Park
Walking home today, I saw a Dixieland band in full regalia setting up for a
7pm set in Cobble Hill
S. Brooklyn in general) months ago, but it just keeps getting better and better and better…. 
July 11, 2006
Psychadelic mushrooms tested at Johns Hopkins
The Wall St Journal ran an article today entitled "Go
Ask Alice" on a study conducted by prominent doctors and medical
researchers at Johns Hopkins on the effects of psychedelic mushrooms – aka
psilocybe cubensis. The most interesting takeaway from this
carefully controlled study was the overwhelmingly positive experiences the
majority of participants reported. To quote the WSJ:
A third of the participants said the experience with psilocybin was the
single most significant experience of their lives, and an additional 38% rated
it among their top five such experiences — akin to, say, the birth of a first
child or the death of a parent. This was
the first known study of psychedelic drugs since 1962.
Interesting….
July 10, 2006
Puma v Adidas in world cup finals
In a sideplot that some may have missed, Adidas (France) was going up against arch-rival Puma (Italy) in the world cup final match. The two companies have a storied history, having been birthed in the same German factory by two brothers who later parted ways, leaving a lasting mark on the town. BBC’s coverage of the story was interesting.
June 22, 2006
“The Human Behavior Experiments” documentary on Sundance
A few nights ago, I caught a fascinating documentary on the
Sundance Channel entitled The
Human Behavior Experiments that revisits the question of why human beings
commit unethical acts under particular social conditions. It reviews Stanley
Milgram’s famous experiments on obedience to authority in the 1960s as well as
Stanford’s prisoner-guard study in the 1970s and Columbia’s work on group think. The
film is definitely worth the two hour investment for anyone interested in
psychology.
June 22, 2006
World cup – Who should I cheer for?
World Development Movement put together this ranking of countries competing in the world cup on ten separate economic and political issues. The data comes from recognised sources such as the UN and World Bank. From the WDM: "The issues themselves were chosen by WDM based on the criteria that we as globally concerned football fans might consider when choosing who to support when our home team isn’t playing (or if they didn’t qualify)." The data tables are particularly striking when you look at a country the size of Ghana and any superpower side by side.