Thoughts for Pennies...

Betsy And Loren Get Hitched

2011-10-23T20:32:00.001-07:00

Guys, if you want to see what love looks like, I know two people who can give you the general idea! After 5 years, Betsy and Loren are married and off on a life together!

It was a beautiful wedding filled with wonderful people!

Professional dog training system anyone? I love 'em!

2011-07-23T15:59:00.001-07:00

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I just put a hunting dog training collar on my dog, Jack for the first time.

He used to run away anytime he made it outside of the house without a leash. Now, he gets to play outside with his buddy, Ollie off the leash, and still comes back when he's supposed to.

It's awesome, and not too harsh. Also, it has a 2 mile range. Try running away now sucka! ;)

I have 2 other systems that I'm selling if you're interested (bought them by accident). They're Sportdog 3400 series, multi dog systems, and I'm asking 200 each.

They rock...you should buy one!

Jesus-is-coming clouds!

2011-07-19T17:52:00.001-07:00

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Driving home from work today, I saw these voluptuous Jesus-is-coming clouds.

Aren't they gloriously big and shiny?

I call them Jesus-is-coming clouds because that's how all the old church paintings picture it.

Cheers for big, fat Jesus clouds!

UFO in the house

2011-07-13T19:08:00.001-07:00

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My dad bought himself a birthday present.

It's pretty awesome!

Google iPhone controlled quad copter.

You use your iPhone as the remote using wifi and it takes off/lands by itself.

It also has 2 built-in cameras.

Check it out!

When It Comes To Spud Guns, Size Matters

2011-07-11T18:47:00.001-07:00

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Mike, Meeks, Brandon and Jen were shooting holes in through trash cans and oven doors when I got home.

The dogs and I hopped down to watch.

It was glorious!

Jack's summer haircut

2011-07-10T10:15:00.001-07:00

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Jack was so hot this summer that I took him to the groomer.

They asked me how I wanted him groomed.

Now, I've never gotten a dog groomed before. I didn't know what to tell them.

...so I told them to make him look like a Marine! ;)

Here's the results after a few weeks of hair growing time.

How A Summer Sunday Should Be

2011-07-10T09:55:00.001-07:00

Everyone is gone back to camp, and we're just about to start putting things in place for our Sunday open house.

This is the perfect calm before the new week rolls in.

This is a little bit funny

2011-07-06T16:20:00.001-07:00

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I drive past this little firestation on my way home from work and normally it's all quaint and quiet looking.

Today there was a guy standing on the shiny red firetruck with a giant sledgehammer trying to reshape a badly dented garage door.

I guess firemen can have bad driving days too! ;)

Gen Y Buying Habits

2011-07-06T11:10:00.001-07:00

By Andy Wibbels on October 18, 2010

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4th of July Movie With A Flustered Mr. Spork

2011-07-04T15:08:00.001-07:00

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Watching "Quantum of Solace" with a freshly bathed Mr. Spork glaring up at me from his cheerful yellow towel.

James bond has a habit of breaking pretty cars and making women look at him like Mr. Spork is looking at me now.

It's been a perfect day of rest filled with family, brisket, naps, sonic drinks and inter-nerding.

Happy 4th of July everyone!

Adventuring I go with the houndlies bold and brave!

2011-07-03T09:59:00.001-07:00

It's that Canton Trade Days time again.

We are off to find a "sky pencil" plant, a new Ollie collar and whatever else begs us to take it home.

Giant flea market FTW!

Meet Mr. Spork and Jackie O

2011-07-02T19:33:00.001-07:00

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He's curious, kind of cranky, talkative and loves to pull bark off of twigs...he's Mr. Spork!

His girlfriend, Jackie O, is a quiet gray gal who keeps to herself.

They are a pair of one year old cockatiels that were given to me a few days ago. Their owner didn't have time for them anymore, so they called the humane society, who called me. I picked them up, put them in a bigger cage, and now they are happy as clams...mostly.

We are working through the scared of people thing slowly, but they seem to be coning around.

If you guys have any tips for making friends with the feathered kind of creatures, let me know! ;)

‪Eric Whitacre: A virtual choir 2,000 voices strong from TED. (Thanks for sharing Eric Meeks!)‬‏

2011-06-30T20:21:00.001-07:00

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Snake Wrangling Is Just One Of The Many Services We Offer!

2011-06-29T09:13:00.001-07:00

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Eek!

A nice lady drove in to the VW dealership this morning with a slithery stowaway!

She noticed something on her floormat out of the corner of her eye, and leaned over for a closer look.

As her eyes started to discern one shape from another, she spied two gleaming little eyes staring back at her from beneath a pike of gleaming coils.

Quicker than she could say "Where's the crocodile hunter when you need him?", the little beastie slithered under the passenger seat.

She walked inside and got the attention of some of the service guys.

Our brave chaps piled out the door to rescue the lady (and the snake).

Phones were everywhere documenting the adventure as the snake was pulled from under the seat.

How's that for a lively morning? ;)

Margarita Night With The Cool Kids

2011-06-28T21:27:00.001-07:00

Tonight I got an invite to join the cool kids of Tyler for the illustrious "margarita night" at Gilbert's ElCharro.

I feel like this type of achievement deserves a merit badge.

My "the usual", a humble glass of club soda with lime was overshadowed by the greatness of their superb-looking Patron filled, blended beverages.

Conversation was excellent, and I left feeling truly blessed to have been invited. Tyler has some cool kids after all! ;)

Driving home, I spotted a telephone pole filled with birds...so I took a picture of it for you Internet buddies!

Goodnight, sleep tight, and don't let the bed bugs bite!

;)

Margarita Night With The Cool Kids

2011-06-28T21:03:00.001-07:00

Tonight I got an invite to join the cool kids of Tyler for the illustrious "margarita night" at Gilbert's ElCharro.

I feel like this type of achievement deserves a merit badge.

My "the usual", a humble glass of club soda with lime was overshadowed by the greatness of their superb-looking Patron filled, blended beverages.

Conversation was excellent, and I left feeling truly blessed to have been invited. Tyler has some cool kids after all! ;)

Driving home, I spotted a telephone pole filled with birds...so I took a picture of it for you Internet buddies!

Goodnight, sleep tight, and don't let the bed bugs bite!

;)

This is not wine and chocolate...

2011-06-24T22:09:00.001-07:00

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But really... It's not.

Ladies and gents, I give you my midnight snack...cranberry juice and an imitation chocolate bar wrapped iPhone 4.

;)

My case just came in the mail from EBay...it was like $2.00. You should buy one too...they're good for your whimsy!

As for the cranberry juice...don't judge me...but I like it! It's too strong to chug, so you're forced to sip it, and properly chilled, it has become my preggers alternative to a glass of wine.

Cheers!

Goodnight To The Internet

2011-06-20T20:39:00.001-07:00

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Feeding Bump a pretend bear while playing with the houndlies, then hitting the hay.

I'm a little bit addicted to the Sleep Cycle app on my phone. It makes healthy living habits easier. I've been getting more than 8 hours of rest a night.

Going to figure out how much sleep I need to function well...mostly so I know how much I'm missing when Bump gets here! ;)

Goodnight Internet. Sleep well. I've already checked your closets and under the bed for monsters and the coast is clear!

I'm mentally tucking you in, reading you a bedtime story about adventures far away, and making sure you have a glass of water...but one that's only half full...because everyone knows that you'll wet the bed if you dream of adventures far away on a full bladder. ;)

First Pedicure In The History Of Ever

2011-06-18T10:37:00.001-07:00

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It's true, 24 years old and I've never had a pedicure.

My sister Anna suggested it, and here we are.

Here's to being a real girl,

Meg

My Sister Can Drive A Tractor Like A Beast!

2011-06-05T15:20:00.001-07:00

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We're selling tractor attachments on Craigslist, and a nice gentleman swung by to pick up his brand new, very used box blade.

My sister Anna was gracious enough to load the box blade into the back of the nice gentleman's truck.

The catch was that she had never loaded anything into a truck before...and the box blade had less than an inch of room on either side of the truck bed.

It had to be perfect, and she rocked it!

Ollie Stepped On A Scorpion...Home Remedies?

2011-06-04T20:52:00.001-07:00

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Hey Internet, my dog Ollie just stepped on a sneakity scorpion and it stung him. Any ideas on what will make swelling go down?

I gave him half of a benedryl as per the Google suggestion, and have been icing it. Any other ideas?

We're out of meat tenderizer, but I'll pick some up tomorrow for any future run-ins!

P.S. Hide yo kids, hide yo wife...them scorpions stingin' everbody.

But seriously...wear shoes outside. 'tis the season!

Here's to a 3 legged bratwurst getting better soon!

Meg, Bump, Jack and Ollie

Craigslist Stuff For Sale.

2011-05-27T21:50:00.001-07:00

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Road bike, single speed bike and more McDonalds colored tractor implements than you can handle!

I spent an hour this evening listing these...if you want to get more info about anything, let me know!

Also included are the obligatory Jack and Ollie pictures.

You are welcome!

1974 Jeep CJ5 - who wants a $1500 Summer toy?

2011-05-27T16:07:00.001-07:00

1974 Jeep CJ5 - $1500 (Cunningham, Texas)

Date: 2011-05-27, 3:27PM CDT
Reply to: sale-wnwxy-2406413879@craigslist.org ^{[Errors when replying to ads?]}

304 V8, 3 speed manual transmission, warm lock in hubs. Call or text 903 486 2070.
----
Posted from Craigslist Mobile for iPhone
http://itunes.apple.com/app/id405656544?mt=8

Location: Cunningham, Texas
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Google Unveils Wallet And Offers: An Open Platform For Mobile Payments

2011-05-26T12:14:00.001-07:00

We’re here at Google’s massive New York City HQ (they own an entire block) for what Google was calling a “partner event” but everyone knew was really an “NFC event”. Sure enough, Stephanie Tilenius, Google’s VP of Commerce, has taken the stage to announce Google Wallet and Google Offers.

Right off the bat, Tilenius wanted to make it clear that this would be an open platform. She invited “payment networks, carriers, and banks to join us in creating tomorrow’s shopping experience”. And some of those partners are already on board. Citi, Mastercard, FirstData, and Sprint are the initial partners.

For Google Wallet, Tilenius says that the field trials will begin today and it will be official out this summer. As expected, it will be using NFC technology. By 2014, Tilenius notes that 50 percent of smartphones will have NFC built into them — that’s 150 million devices.

With Wallet, you’ll be able to add your existing credit cards (though only Citi-backed Mastercards are a partner right now of the major card companies). And it’s a wallet you can lock, Tilenius notes. There are multiple levels of security. There’s the phone lock, a required Google pin, credit card information encryption, and your credit card number is never fully displayed.

Right off the bat, Google Wallet will work with Mastercard Paypass. This means right now 300,000 merchants around the world and 120,000 in the U.S. are technically ready (though it’s not rolling out everywhere yet). It will initially work with “Gcard” a Google pre-paid card set up by Mastercard.

The initial trials will be in San Francisco and New York. Tilenius says this will expand nationally in the coming months.

The other component of the announcement is Google Offers. These work seamlessly with Google Wallet. You find an offer you want, save it to Wallet with a click and you’re ready. You can redeem them by tapping the phone at the point of sale. Or you can show the offer to a cashier.

Initially, Macy’s, Subway, Walgreens, Toys R Us, and more are partners. The first trial programs will be in San Francisco, New York, and Portland this summer.

Tilenius notes that the first offers will be “offer of the day” but notes that “this is just the tip of the iceberg.” Eventually, there will be check-in offers, offer ads (ads on Google that are really offers that you can easily transfer to Wallet), and others.

Coming this fall, Google notes that the ability to receive digital receipts will be a part of Wallet as well. This means no more paper receipts (awesome). And digital loyalty cards are another thing they’re working on. There were also hints of the gaming dynamics down the road to make mobile payments more engaging and fun.

Some other Googlers took the stage to show off a demo of how the system will work, and it looks good. But again, Google is really pushing the “open” aspect of this. They want and need more partners for this to really take off.

Google says that they don’t plan to charge for access to Wallet. It will be free to partners. They also say they want to make sure Wallet/Offers ensure a level playing field. Everyone from flower shop owners to massive chains should be able to use this in the same way.

There will be APIs eventually. And Google plans to work with partners to promote open standards. They say they’ll keep it “as open as possible” as long as that doesn’t sacrifice on security and user choice.

Yesterday at TechCrunch Disrupt, Tilenius said on stage that Google was making a huge bet on NFC as a company. Indeed.

Find out more here and here.

More: Google Wallet On iPhone, WP7, RIM: “We Will Partner With Everyone” (But Will *They*?)

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Who wants to bet this guy didn't have flood insurance? (Thanks for the find Mike Strout)

2011-05-26T09:43:00.001-07:00

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DIY of the Day: A makeshift levee keeps the rising waters of the Yazoo River from washing away a home near Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Despite the perilous swelling, authorities said Mississippi River waters were not expected to top the Yazoo Backwater Levee after it was reported today that the river had crested at 14 feet above flood stage. However, the water line could remain above flood stage until mid-June.

[getty via dyt / ap via seattletimes.]

Incorrect source or offensive?
2011 Mississippi River fl DIY Vicksburg

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This was posted on Friday, May 20th, 2011 at 11:30 am

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Pancakes, pretend beer, "The American" and a storm rolling in. My kind of night!

2011-05-24T20:20:00.001-07:00

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The air is still, but the clouds are giant and full of lightning as the storm rolls closer.

Leftover breakfast tacos (wrapped in pancakes instead of tortillas) from The Diner fill my stomach.

There is a half finished fake beer next to me, and club soda with lime to follow that.

I have The American playing in the background. It's a little slow, but good.

The dogs are full, happy and sleeping at my feet.

It's a good night to be holed up in a comfy apartment!

To everyone else braving the rainy part of the storm, good luck! ;)

What color is the letter "E"? A good write-up on synesthesia

2011-05-24T10:36:00.001-07:00

Monday, May 23, 2011 21:01 ET
What color is the letter "E"?

I was born with synesthesia, a condition that is fascinating to talk about -- but challenging to explain

By Jude Stewart, Imprint

Flickr/Montgolfier

This article originally appeared on Imprint.

It's prime time to discuss an old favorite of mine (and of many color fans): synesthesia, that curious trick of certain brains, mine included, that makes one "see" colors in letters and numbers in dry black-and-white, or see them in sounds, tastes or textures. Welcome to one of the more beautiful and strange wrinkles in the color-brain.

Number 9, number 9, number 9, number 9... on Flickr. Logo by Chermayeff & Geismar.

"The number 1, for example, is a brilliant and bright white, like someone shining a flashlight into my eyes. Five is a clap of thunder or the sound of waves crashing against rocks. Thirty-seven is lumpy like porridge, while 89 reminds me of falling snow ... In an interview with talk show host David Letterman in New York, I told David he looked like the number 117 -- tall and lanky. Later outside, in ... Times Square, I gazed up at the towering skyscrapers and felt surrounded by 9s -- the number I most associate with feelings of immensity."

That's Daniel Tammet speaking, one of 50 living savants worldwide and an unusually articulate synesthete -- a feat made more amazing by the fact that he's also high-functioning autistic. Daniel's book "Born on a Blue Day" chronicles the fascinating insides of his brain, how he finds not just color in numbers but the solace and particularities of old friends. Numbers reveal themselves to him in turn, complete with highly specific colors and shapes, and a specific location in his mental landscape.

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His super-charged synesthesia enables extraordinary feats of memory, like the time he recited pi to 22,514 decimal places or learned Icelandic, his ninth foreign language, to fluency within a week. (Wire your jaw shut before watching this Channel Four documentary about Tammet, "The Boy With the Incredible Brain".)

Something about synesthesia is devouringly fascinating, to the people who have it as much as the people who don't. I'm no savant, but I've seen colors attached to my numbers and letters forever. The knowledge of what this feels like is innate; it challenges language to explain it.

As kids, my brother and I argued matter-of-factly about the assignation of colors to graphemes -- his alphabet tends toward yellows, mine to various reds. We told my mother recently about this, who dismissed the whole thing as nonsense, until she didn't like -- or, more accurately, felt, primally wronged -- by the color-matches we were articulating. Of course, it turns out she has synesthesia too. When it became clear to her what the term meant (and how non-crazy she is to have it), we all chattered on happily about which colors go with which letters. My dad sat ping-ponging between the three of us, mystified.

Synesthesia from Flickr

Synesthesia has garnered enough headlines that most people know broadly what it is. (If you have it, you're likely already aware of that fact -- but this battery of psychological tests will help you pin the answer down.) So where does synesthesia come from?

It's a dreamy, harmless quirk arising from "cross-talk" between tangled areas of the brain. Usually baby-brains prune themselves over time, separating brain regions with differing functions. Pruning may be incomplete in synesthetes in the fusiform gyrus, where the regions responsible for graphemes (letters and numbers) lie snugly next to each other. Studies show synesthetes pack more connective "white matter" tissue between these brain areas than non-synesthetes do.

This 2007 TED talk by neuroscientist VS Ramachandran summarizes these origins nicely, while hinting at synesthesia's possible usefulness -- the whole talk is interesting, but skip to 17:00 for the synesthesia stuff.

So what's the usefulness of synesthesia -- is there evolutionarily any point? And what other avenues of brain investigation do scientists use synesthesia to explore? I'll save those answers in tantalizing style for my second post in this series. For now, suffice it to say: Synesthesia is famously, but not narrowly, helpful in boosting a brain's creativity. Ramanchandran ventures only that synesthetic brains are hard-wired to make unexpected leaps. But naturally that feels like a bloodless definition. To prime your color-mad pumps for next time, I'll leave you with this plummy evocation of creativity and synesthesia than this quote from synesthete Vladimir Nabokov's 1967 memoir, "Speak, Memory." Swoon!

"The long 'a' of the English alphabet ... has for me the tint of weathered wood, but a French 'a' evokes polished ebony. This black group also includes hard 'g' (vulcanized rubber) and 'r' (a sooty rag bag being ripped). Oatmeal 'n', noodle-limp 'l', and the ivory-backed hand mirror of 'o' take care of the whites. I am puzzled by my French 'on' which I see as the brimming tension-surface of alcohol in a small glass."

A Redbud on Ice on Flickr

P.S. Let's leave the record straight here. I picked that number 9 image leading this post because it's the proper color, a bold cherry red -- although my 9 tends toward brick. Nabokov is right on about on's limpid pallor, but he's mad if he thinks 'r' is sooty-brown, when it's so glossy licorice black. The color-squabble continues next time!

Copyright F+W Media Inc. 2011.

Salon is proud to feature content from Imprint, the fastest-growing design community on the Web. Brought to you by Print magazine, America's oldest and most trusted design voice, Imprint features some of the biggest names in the industry covering visual culture from every angle. Imprint advances and expands the design conversation, providing fresh daily content to the community (and now to Salon.com!), sparking conversation, competition, criticism, and passion among its members.

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The Boy With The Incredible Brain - Here is something to play in the background of your workday.

2011-05-24T10:32:00.001-07:00

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New Vocations Racehorse Adoption Program...this site gets me in trouble all the time...just look at those long legs! :)

2011-05-23T20:43:00.001-07:00

New VocationsRacehorse Adoption Program

Our Mission

Standing in the gap for retired racehorses providing a safety-net through rehabilitation, education, & placement in qualified, caring homes.

New Vocations News

Past Derby Contender Z Fortune Finds a Home

(read more...)

2011 New Vocations Charity Horse Show

05-18-11 (read more...)

Sponsors & Items Needed for Important Fundraiser. Can You Help?

04-16-11

New Vocations’ important Little Brown Jug Benefit is coming up Wednesday Sept 21 at the Delaware Co Fairgrounds in Delaware, Ohio. This event generates much needed funds for the care and retraining of retired racehorses. However, its success is totally dependent on items donated for the silent auction and on table sponsorships.
We seriously need help soliciting goods [...]

(read more...)

2011 New Vocations Charity Horse Show

03-03-11 (read more...)

Ulcer Gard only $32.95 @ Big Dee’s & NV gets 5%

03-01-11

5% of All Your Tack & Supplement Purchases Can Go To Support Retired Racehorses!

(read more...)

Special Thanks

Administration, Education, Promotion

Dot Morgan, Executive Director
3293 Wright Rd.
Laura, OH 45337
PH: (937) 947-4020
Fax: (937) 947-3201
dot@horseadoption.com

Applications, Admissions, Adoptions

Anna Ford, Program Director
13580 Leeper-Perkins Rd
Marysville, OH 43040
PH: (937) 642-3171
Fax: (937) 642-3177
anna@horseadoption.com

Michigan Facility

Regina Buter Kruger
10383 E. Austin Rd
Manchester, MI 48158
PH: (517) 404-9111
Fax: (734) 428-1076
regina@horseadoption.com

Chattanooga, Tennessee Facility

Angie Farrell DVM
527 Reads Lake Rd.
Chattanooga, TN 37415
Cell: 423-432-1271
angie@horseadoption.com

Lexington Facility

Lisa Molloy
West Wind Farm
4787 Haley Rd
Lexington, KY 40516
Cell:859-595-6660
lisamolloy72@yahoo.com

1966 Chrysler New Yorker-Barn Find! Very cool car...someone should buy this!

2011-05-23T19:28:00.001-07:00

1966 Chrysler New Yorker-Barn Find! - $1800 (Tyler, TX)

Date: 2011-05-20, 10:08PM CDT
Reply to: sale-zzsmt-2393651558@craigslist.org ^{[Errors when replying to ads?]}

1966 Chrysler New Yorker classic, one previous owner with 33,000 original miles. This car is fully loaded with a running 440 engine, auto transmission, AC, am radio, electric seats and windows. With a little TLC it could be a daily driver. Call Bobby 903-530-0649

Location: Tyler, TX
it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

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Advice to my daughter « Jodie Odie Via Alexis Bright

2011-05-22T16:36:00.001-07:00

The other day my beautiful 15 year old daughter asked me for some general advice on life. Luckily I was prepared for this moment – for years I had been writing down thoughts that occurred to me to tell her. This is the compilation:

Cooking something savory and want to add some veggies: Carrot, Celery and Onion.

Beware anyone who asks questions where you can’t answer “no”.

Have enough water. Have enough fun. Have enough sleep.

Beware people bearing surprise gifts that aren’t beautiful or useful.

If a boy/girl doesn’t call, forget it. You can find someone who will.

Ditch the levelers. They put you down to feel better. They suck.

Don’t worry about being the best. It’s really really really unlikely. Just do your thing. The world still benefits!

Marry someone who makes you smile. That’s a recipe for a good life.

Don’t panic if your life partner shits you sometimes. That’s normal. Marriage is about averages – if on the whole your life is better for them being there, that’s good!

When you are procrastinating, maybe the job is too big. Find a tiny bit of the job and do that.

95% of beauty is carriage. Stand tall and move with pride.

You cannot trust one word from an addict’s mouth. Ignore this at your peril.

Don’t give away YES’s easy. Agree to do stuff you are happy to.

Dragging out the boring stuff is crap. Chores – get in, do them just well enough, get out.

Credit is the party, debt is the hangover. And baby, this hangover can go on for DECADES. Be smart. NO CASH, NO BUY.

Stuff doesn’t make you happy. Ads manipulate you to buy stuff you don’t want.

High Status doesn’t make you happy, just lonely and unsatisfied

If you have a book in you, FOR GOD’S SAKE WRITE IT.

Don’t let the washing up get away from you. Sufficient unto the day is the washing up there in.

You probably can’t change other people.

A boy/girl who is wild and exciting will break your heart. But you’ll have a fun time first.

If you want to have sex with someone, go for it. Use a condom and have some fun. Also if you don’t want to do, then don’t. (Women fought so hard for the right for no to mean no under any circumstances. It’s your right.)

Psychologists have discovered kindness is the secret to happiness.

If you find a boy/girl who will do anything for you, don’t become high maintenance just because they’ll take it. Shameful behavior.

Remember to fuck shit up a little bit. Sometimes it’s important to stick it to the man just because rebellion keeps you young – it’s the sauce of life though – keep it in balance.

Don’t argue with the police. Be polite and don’t give them any more info than they ask for. (In fact same goes for anyone with a gun!)

Women can lose valuable life energy feeling that they are not attractive enough. No one will judge your looks as harshly as you do. Most people wont care what you look like and people who love you will think you have the most wonderful face on the planet.

Social elegance means making other people feel comfortable and welcome. It’s not about fancy place settings on tables. Real grace never goes out of style.

Some people who just don’t get it, are doing the best they can. They aren’t trying to be annoying – that’s just the way they are

Most stuff that happens has nothing to do with you. It just feels like it does. Even the way people treat you generally has very little to do with you.

Your gut knows. Gut instinct is a safety device.

Do your thing – follow your calling. In the end people can spend a lot of time worrying about whether or not they can earn money following their calling. Just do your thing. Pay the bills. If they coincide great. If they remain separate – that’s OK!

Sleep is essential to health. Anyone who tries to convince you that you don’t need to sleep is wrong. And you must wonder why they are spinning shit at you.

You will lose friends if you flirt with their boyfriends/husbands/lovers. Learn how to treat these people appropriately. You can absolutely control the signals you give out.

Walking. Hallelujah.

Buy good shoes. If your feet hurt you are stuck.

There are some people who are very successful in life – not through talent but through wheeling and dealing. It’s a good idea to keep your distance from these people, because they will use you to get ahead, in whatever way they need. On the other hand every now and then you need to be a little bit strategic yourself. People who believe all you need to do is be good, work hard and follow the rules and the universe will notice, care and reward them often end up burnt out and bitter. So you can learn something from observing these folks from a safe distance!

The grass is greener where you water it. If you neglect something it can be crap. It’s amazing what five minutes a day for a week can do for a neglected thing!

Not all drugs are the same and not all people are the same. Some drugs are much more addictive than others. And some people are more likely to become addicted than others. Alcohol, tobacco, heroin and ice are addictive. Stay away from speed. I’ve met too many speed freaks in my life – and they are screwy. Be careful with alcohol because it’s legal and most people drink, you can slide into an addiction without realizing.

When you’ve given too much to other people you are spent. The solution is simple. Be selfish for a while.

Be careful of dodgy seafood.

When you start at a new job or organisation of some sort, just sit back and get the vibe for a few months. Don’t go too berserk.

Work places don’t offer love. They take whatever you give, and give you a paycheck. Make sure you don’t give too much to work.

Your children’s grandparents are there to help. They took that job on when they had you. Never be ashamed to ask them for help.

Take cuppas seriously. Tea bags and instant coffee are an insult to civility. If you can’t make time for a proper cuppa then life is wrong and you need to fix it.

When you want something from other people the more you use humor the better negotiations will go.

As far as I can make out current post modernism is comprehensively stupid. But I suspect Foucault had some really good things to say.

Don’t Fuck with Centrelink. They put people in jail.

Remember how wealthy you are. Be grateful for the great work of generations and generations of humanity that have brought us to this place. safe drinking water on tap. Free health care. Suffrage. decent state provided primary secondary and tertiary education. The Internet!!! Electricity. Equal pay. Medicine. No one shooting at us. Shops brimming with beautiful, healthy food. Libraries. Civil liberties. Ladders. washing machines. pegs. clothes hangers. Bricks. toilets. Immunization. Language, poetry, literature. music music music. Bridges – we’d notice if they weren’t there!

Your dad is a really good man, and he’ll always look out for you.

via jodieodie.wordpress.com

How to spot a psychopath | Jon Ronson - Fascinating

2011-05-22T16:21:00.001-07:00

It was visiting hour at Broadmoor psychiatric hospital and patients began drifting in to sit with their loved ones at tables and chairs that had been fixed to the ground. They were mostly overweight, wearing loose, comfortable T-shirts and elasticated sweatpants. There probably wasn't much to do in Broadmoor but eat. I wondered if any of them were famous. Broadmoor was where they sent Ian Brady, the Moors murderer, and Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper.

The Psychopath Test

by Jon Ronson

Buy it from the Guardian bookshop

A man in his late 20s walked towards me. His arm was outstretched. He wasn't wearing sweatpants. He was wearing a pinstripe jacket and trousers. He looked like a young businessman trying to make his way in the world, someone who wanted to show everyone that he was very, very sane. We shook hands.
"I'm Tony," he said. He sat down.
"So I hear you faked your way in here," I said.
"That's exactly right," Tony said.
He had the voice of a normal, nice, eager-to-help young man.
"I'd committed GBH," he said. "After they arrested me, I sat in my cell and I thought, 'I'm looking at five to seven years.' So I asked the other prisoners what to do. They said, 'Easy! Tell them you're mad! They'll put you in a county hospital. You'll have Sky TV and a PlayStation. Nurses will bring you pizzas.'"
"How long ago was this?" I asked.
"Twelve years ago," Tony said.
Tony said faking madness was the easy part, especially when you're 17 and you take drugs and watch a lot of scary movies. You don't need to know how authentically crazy people behave. You just plagiarise the character Dennis Hopper played in the movie Blue Velvet. That's what Tony did. He told a visiting psychiatrist he liked sending people love letters straight from his heart, and a love letter was a bullet from a gun, and if you received a love letter from him, you'd go straight to hell.
Plagiarising a well-known movie was a gamble, he said, but it paid off. Lots more psychiatrists began visiting his cell. He broadened his repertoire to include bits from Hellraiser, A Clockwork Orange and David Cronenberg's Crash. Tony told the psychiatrists he liked to crash cars into walls for sexual pleasure and also that he wanted to kill women because he thought looking into their eyes as they died would make him feel normal.
"Where did you get that one from?" I asked.
"A biography of Ted Bundy," Tony replied. "I found it in the prison library."
I nodded and thought it probably wasn't a great idea for prison libraries to stock books about Ted Bundy.
"But they didn't send me to some cushy hospital," Tony continued. "They sent me to bloody Broadmoor!"
Tony said the day he arrived at the dangerous and severe personality disorder (DSPD) unit, he took one look at the place and realised he'd made a spectacularly bad decision. He asked to speak urgently to psychiatrists. "I'm not mentally ill," he told them. It is an awful lot harder, Tony told me, to convince people you're sane than it is to convince them you're crazy.
"When you decided to wear pinstripe to meet me," I said, "did you realise the look could go either way?"
"Yes," said Tony, "but I thought I'd take my chances. Plus most of the patients here are disgusting slobs who don't wash or change their clothes for weeks on end and I like to dress well."
I looked around the Wellness Centre at the patients, scoffing chocolate bars with their parents who, in contrast to their children, had made a great effort to dress well.
"I know people are looking out for 'nonverbal clues' to my mental state," Tony continued. "Psychiatrists love 'nonverbal clues'. They love to analyse body movements. But that's really hard for the person who is trying to act sane. How do you sit in a sane way? How do you cross your legs in a sane way?"
I suddenly felt self-conscious. Was I crossing my legs like a journalist?
"So for a while you thought that being normal and polite would be your ticket out of here?" I said.
"Right," he replied. "I volunteered to weed the hospital garden. But they saw how well behaved I was and decided it meant I could behave well only in the environment of a psychiatric hospital and it proved I was mad."
I glanced suspiciously at Tony. I instinctively didn't believe him about this. It seemed too catch-22, too darkly-absurd-by-numbers. But later Tony sent me his files and, sure enough, it was right there. "Tony is cheerful and friendly," one report stated. "His detention in hospital is preventing deterioration of his condition."
After Tony read that, he said, he started a kind of war of non co-operation. This involved staying in his room a lot. On the outside, Tony said, not wanting to spend time with your criminally insane neighbours would be a perfectly understandable position. But on the inside it demonstrates you're withdrawn and have a grandiose sense of your own importance. In Broadmoor, not wanting to hang out with insane killers is a sign of madness.
"The patient's behaviour is getting worse in Broadmoor," a report written during Tony's non co-operation period stated. "He does not engage [with other patients]."
Tony was funny and quite charming for most of my two hours with him, but towards the end he got sadder. "I arrived here when I was 17," he said. "I'm 29 now. I've grown up wandering the wards of Broadmoor. I've got the Stockwell strangler on one side of me and the Tiptoe Through The Tulips rapist on the other. These are supposed to be the best years of your life. I've seen suicides. I saw a man take another man's eye out."
Tony said just being there can be enough to turn someone crazy. Then one of the guards called out a word – "Time" – and with barely a goodbye, Tony shot from the table and across the room. All the patients did the same. It was a display of tremendous, extreme, acute good behaviour.
I didn't know what to think. Unlike the sad-eyed, medicated patients all around us, Tony had seemed perfectly ordinary and sane. But what did I know?
The next day I wrote to Professor Anthony Maden, the head clinician at Tony's unit at Broadmoor – "I'm contacting you in the hope that you may be able to shed some light on how true Tony's story might be."
A few days later a letter arrived from Tony. "This place is awful at night-time, Jon," he wrote. "Words cannot express the atmosphere."
Tony had included in the package copies of his files. So I got to read the exact words he used to convince psychiatrists back in 1998 that he was mentally ill. He'd really gone to town. He said the CIA was following him, that he enjoyed taking things that belonged to other people because he liked the idea of making them suffer, and that hurting people was better than sex.
I felt the ground shift under my feet. Suddenly I was a little on the side of the psychiatrists. Tony must have come over as extremely creepy.
There was also a description of the crime he committed in 1997. The victim was a homeless alcoholic called Graham who apparently made "an inappropriate comment" about the 10-year-old daughter of one of Tony's friends; something to do with the length of her dress. Tony told him to shut up. Graham threw a punch. Tony retaliated by kicking him. Graham fell over. And that would have been it – Tony later said – had Graham stayed silent. But Graham said, "Is that all you've got?"
Tony "flipped". He kicked Graham seven or eight times in the stomach and groin, returning later to kick him again. I remembered that list of movies Tony said he plagiarised to demonstrate he was mentally ill. A Clockwork Orange begins with a gang of thugs kicking a homeless man while he is on the ground.
My phone rang. I recognised the number. It was Tony. I didn't answer.
A week passed and then the email I had been waiting for arrived from Professor Maden.
"Tony," it read, "did get here by faking mental illness because he thought it would be preferable to prison."
"Oh!" I thought, pleasantly surprised. "Good! That's great!"
But then I read Maden's next line: "Most psychiatrists who have assessed him, and there have been a lot, have considered he is not mentally ill, but suffers from psychopathy."
I looked at the email. "Tony's a psychopath?" I thought.
I didn't know very much about psychopaths back then, but I did know this: it sounded worse.
Faking mental illness to get out of a prison sentence, Maden explained, is exactly the kind of deceitful and manipulative act you'd expect of a psychopath.
A psychologist friend, Essi Viding, agreed. "Classic psychopath!" she said when I described Tony's pinstripe suit.
Tony rang again. I took a breath and picked up the phone.
"Jon?" he said. He sounded small and far away and echoey.
"Yes, hello, Tony," I said, in a no-nonsense way.
"I haven't heard from you in a while," he said.
"Professor Maden says you're a psychopath," I said.
Tony exhaled, impatiently. "I'm not a psychopath," he said.
"How do you know?" I asked.
"They say psychopaths can't feel remorse," said Tony. "I feel lots of remorse. But when I tell them I feel remorse, they say psychopaths pretend to be remorseful when they're not. Trying to prove you're not a psychopath is even harder than trying to prove you're not mentally ill."
"How did they diagnose you?" I asked.
"They give you a psychopath test," said Tony. "The Robert Hare Checklist. They assess you for 20 personality traits. Superficial charm. Proneness to boredom. Lack of empathy. Lack of remorse. Grandiose sense of self-worth. That sort of thing. For each one they score you a 0, 1 or 2. If your total score is 30 or more out of 40, you're a psychopath. That's it. You're doomed. You're labelled a psychopath for life. They say you can't change. You can't be treated. You're a danger to society. And then you're stuck somewhere like this."
It was the French psychiatrist Philippe Pinel who first suggested, early in the 19th century, that there was a madness that didn't involve mania or depression or psychosis. He called it "manie sans délire" – insanity without delusions. He said sufferers appeared normal on the surface, but they lacked impulse controls and were prone to outbursts of violence. It wasn't until 1891, when the German doctor JLA Koch published his book Die Psychopathischen Minderwertigkeiten, that it got its name: psychopathy.
The consensus from the beginning was that only 1% of humans had it, but the chaos they caused was so far-reaching, it could actually remould society. And so the urgent question became, how could psychopaths be cured?
In the late 1960s, a young Canadian psychiatrist believed he had the answer. His name was Elliott Barker and he had visited radical therapeutic communities around the world, including nude psychotherapy sessions occurring under the tutelage of an American psychotherapist named Paul Bindrim. Clients, mostly California free-thinkers and movie stars, would sit naked in a circle and dive headlong into a 24-hour emotional and mystical rollercoaster during which participants would scream and yell and sob and confess their innermost fears. Barker worked at a unit for psychopaths inside the Oak Ridge hospital for the criminally insane in Ontario. Although the inmates were undoubtedly insane, they seemed perfectly ordinary. This, Barker deduced, was because they were burying their insanity deep beneath a facade of normality. If the madness could only, somehow, be brought to the surface, maybe it would work itself through and they could be reborn as empathetic human beings.
And so he successfully sought permission from the Canadian government to obtain a large batch of LSD, hand-picked a group of psychopaths, led them into what he named the "total encounter capsule", a small room painted bright green, and asked them to remove their clothes. This was truly to be a radical milestone: the world's first ever marathon nude LSD-fuelled psychotherapy session for criminal psychopaths.
Barker's sessions lasted for epic 11-day stretches. There were no distractions – no television, no clothes, no clocks, no calendars, only a perpetual discussion (at least 100 hours every week) of their feelings. Much like Bindrim's sessions, the psychopaths were encouraged to go to their rawest emotional places by screaming and clawing at the walls and confessing fantasies of forbidden sexual longing for each other, even if they were, in the words of an internal Oak Ridge report of the time, "in a state of arousal while doing so".
My guess is that this would have been a more enjoyable experience within the context of a Palm Springs resort hotel than in a secure facility for psychopathic murderers.
Barker watched it all from behind a one-way mirror and his early reports were gloomy. The atmosphere inside the capsule was tense. Psychopaths would stare angrily at each other. Days would go by when nobody would exchange a word. But then, as the weeks turned into months, something unexpected began to happen.
The transformation was captured in an incredibly moving film. These tough young prisoners are, before our eyes, changing. They are learning to care for one another inside the capsule.
We see Barker in his office, and the look of delight on his face is quite heartbreaking. His psychopaths have become gentle. Some are even telling their parole boards not to consider them for release until after they've completed their therapy. The authorities are astonished.
Back home in London, I felt terribly sorry for Tony. So many psychopathic murderers – fortunate to have been under Barker's radical tutelage – had been declared cured and freed. Why couldn't Broadmoor adopt some of his ideas? Of course, they seemed dated and naive and perhaps overly reliant on hallucinogenics, but they were surely preferable to locking someone up for ever because he happened to score badly on some personality checklist.
Then I learned that two researchers had in the early 90s undertaken a detailed study of the long-term recidivism rates of psychopaths who'd been through Barker's programme and let out into society. In regular circumstances, 60% of criminal psychopaths released into the outside world go on to reoffend. What percentage of their psychopaths had? As it turned out: 80%.
The capsule had made the psychopaths worse.
"They had psychopaths naked and talking about their feelings!" Bob Hare laughed, shaking his head at the idealism of it all. It was an August evening and we were drinking in a hotel bar in rural Pembrokeshire, west Wales, at one of Hare's three-day residential courses for psychiatrists, care workers and criminal profilers. It was exciting finally to meet him. While names such as Elliott Barker have all but faded away, Hare is influential. Justice departments and parole boards all over the world have accepted his contention that psychopaths are quite simply incurable and everyone should concentrate their energies instead on learning how to root them out using his PCL-R (Psychopathy Checklist-Revised), which he has spent a lifetime refining.
In the mid-60s, Hare was working as a prison psychologist in Vancouver. He put word around the prison that he was looking for psychopathic and non-psychopathic volunteers for tests. He strapped them up to various EEG and sweat- and blood pressure-measuring machines, and also to an electricity generator, and explained to them that he was going to count backwards from 10 and when he reached one they'd receive a very painful electric shock.
The difference in the responses stunned Hare. The non-psychopathic volunteers (theirs were crimes of passion, usually, or crimes born from terrible poverty or abuse) steeled themselves ruefully, as if a painful electric shock were just the penance they deserved. They were, Hare noted, scared.
"And the psychopaths?" I asked.
"They didn't break a sweat," said Hare. "Nothing." The tests seemed to indicate that the amygdala, the part of the brain that should have anticipated the unpleasantness and sent the requisite signals of fear to the central nervous system, wasn't functioning as it should. It was an enormous breakthrough for Hare, his first clue that the brains of psychopaths were different from regular brains.
He was even more astonished when he repeated the test. This time, the psychopaths knew exactly how much pain they'd be in, and still: nothing. Hare learned something that others wouldn't for years: psychopaths were likely to reoffend. "They had no memory of the pain of the electric shock, even when the pain had occurred just moments before," Hare said. "So what's the point in threatening them with imprisonment if they break the terms of their parole? The threat has no meaning for them."
He did another experiment, the startle reflex test, in which psychopaths and non-psychopaths were invited to look at grotesque images, such as crime-scene photographs of blown-apart faces, and when they least expected it Hare would let off an incredibly loud noise in their ear. The non-psychopaths would leap with astonishment. The psychopaths would remain comparatively serene.
Hare knew that we tend to jump a lot higher when startled if we're on the edge of our seats anyway. But if we're engrossed by something, a crossword puzzle, say, and someone startles us, our leap is less pronounced. From this Hare deduced that when psychopaths see grotesque images of blown-apart faces they aren't horrified. They're absorbed.
Thrilled by his findings, Hare sent them to Science magazine.
"The editor returned them unpublished," he said. "He wrote, 'Frankly we found some of the brain wave patterns depicted in your paper very odd. Those EEGs couldn't have come from real people.'"
Then, disastrously for Hare, electric shocks were outlawed in the early 70s. He was forced to change tack. How could psychopaths be rooted out in a more hands-off way? In 1975 he organised a conference on the subject, so experts could pool their observations on the minutiae of psychopaths' behaviour, the verbal and non-verbal tics. Were there patterns? Did they involuntarily use giveaway turns of phrase? Their conclusions became the basis for his now-famous 20-point Hare PCL-R . Which was this:
Item 1 Glibness/superficial charm
Item 2 Grandiose sense of self-worth
Item 3 Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom
Item 4 Pathological lying
Item 5 Cunning/manipulative
Item 6 Lack of remorse or guilt
Item 7 Shallow affect
Item 8 Callous/lack of empathy
Item 9 Parasitic lifestyle
Item 10 Poor behavioural controls
Item 11 Promiscuous sexual behaviour
Item 12 Early behaviour problems
Item 13 Lack of realistic long-term goals
Item 14 Impulsivity
Item 15 Irresponsibility
Item 16 Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
Item 17 Many short-term marital relationships
Item 18 Juvenile delinquency
Item 19 Revocation of conditional release
Item 20 Criminal versatility
Hare said if he were to score himself either 0, 1 or 2 on each item of his checklist, he'd probably get a four or a five out of the possible 40. Tony in Broadmoor had told me that on the three occasions they scored him, he got around a 29 or a 30.
Over the three-day course in Wales, my scepticism drained away entirely and I became a Hare devotee. I think the other sceptics felt the same. He was very convincing. I was attaining a new power, like a secret weapon. I felt like a different person, a hardliner, not confused or out of my depth as I had been when I'd been hanging around with Tony in Broadmoor. Instead, I was contemptuous of those naive people who allowed themselves to be taken in by slick-tongued psychopaths.
My mind drifted to what I could do with my new powers. If I'm being honest, it didn't cross my mind to become some kind of great crime fighter, philanthropically dedicated to making society a safer place. Instead, I made a mental list of all the people who over the years had crossed me and wondered which of them I might be able to expose as having psychopathic character traits. Top of the list was AA Gill, who had always been very rude about my television documentaries and had written a restaurant column in which he admitted to killing a baboon on safari.
"Item 8 Callous/lack of empathy," I thought, and smiled to myself.
After the conference, though, Hare seemed introspective. He said, almost to himself, "I shouldn't have done my research just in prisons. I should have spent some time inside the Stock Exchange as well."
"But surely stock-market psychopaths can't be as bad as serial-killer psychopaths," I said.
"Serial killers ruin families," shrugged Hare. "Corporate and political and religious psychopaths ruin economies. They ruin societies."
It wasn't only Hare who believed that a disproportionate number of psychopaths can be found in high places. Over the following months, I spoke to scores of psychologists who all said the same. Everyone in the field seemed to regard psychopaths in this same way: inhuman, relentlessly wicked forces, whirlwinds of malevolence, forever harming society but impossible to identify unless you're trained in the subtle art of spotting them, as I now was.
I met an American CEO, Al Dunlap, formerly of the Sunbeam Corporation, who redefined a great many of the psychopath traits to me as "business positives": Grandiose sense of self-worth? "You've got to believe in yourself." (As he told me this, he was standing underneath a giant oil painting of himself.) Cunning/manipulative? "That's leadership."
But I became incredibly disappointed whenever Dunlap said things to me that were reasonable. There had been – he swore – no early behavioural problems or juvenile delinquency: "I was a focused, serious kid. In school I was always trying to achieve." And he had a loyal wife of 41 years. There were no rumours of affairs. This would score him a zero on items 17 and 11: many short-term marital relationships, and promiscuous sexual behaviour.
Becoming a psychopath-spotter had turned me power-crazed and a bit psychopathic. I was starting to see the checklist as an intoxicating weapon that was capable of inflicting terrible damage if placed in the wrong hands. And I was beginning to suspect that my hands might be the wrong hands.
I met up with Hare again. "It's quite a power you bestow upon people," I said. "What if you've created armies of people who spot psychopaths where there are none, witchfinder generals of the psychopath-spotting world?"
There was a silence.
"I do worry about the checklist being misused," Hare said.
"Who misuses it?" I asked.
"Over here, you have your DSPD programme," he said.
"That's where my friend Tony is," I said. "The DSPD unit at Broadmoor."
Two years had passed since I'd first met Tony in Broadmoor. I hadn't heard from him in months, and then out of the blue he called.
"Jon!" he said. He sounded excited. "There's going to be a tribunal. I want you to come. As my guest."
"Ah," I said, trying to sound pleased for him. Tony was forever pushing for tribunals, year after year, for the 14 years he had been inside Broadmoor's DSPD unit. His optimism was tireless. But the outcome was always the same. They'd come to nothing.
Journalists hardly ever made it to a DSPD unit and I was curious to see inside. According to Maden, the chief clinician at Tony's unit, it wouldn't exist without Hare's psychopath check-list. Tony was there because he had scored high on it, as had all 300 DSPD patients. The official line was that these were places to treat psychopaths with a view to one day sending them back out into the world. But the widespread theory was the whole thing was in fact a scheme to keep psychopaths locked up for life.
The unit was a clean, bland, modern, calmingly pine-coloured fortress. Nurses and security guards came over to ask me who I was. I said I was a friend of Tony's.
"Oh, Tony," one nurse said. "I know Tony."
"What do you think of Tony?" I asked him.
"I do have strong thoughts about Tony," he said, "but it would not be appropriate for me to tell you what they are."
"Are your thoughts about Tony strongly positive or strongly negative?" I asked.
He looked at me as if to say, "I am not telling you."
And then it was time. We entered the tribunal room.
The hearing lasted all of five minutes, one of which involved the magistrates telling me that if I reported the details of what happened inside the room, I would be imprisoned. So I won't. But the upshot – Tony was to be free.
He looked as if he'd been hit by a bus. In the corridor his barrister congratulated him. The process would take three months – either to find him a bed for a transitional period in a medium-secure unit, or to get him straight out on to the street – but there was no doubt. He smiled, hobbled over to me, and handed me a sheaf of papers.
They were independent reports, written for the tribunal by various psychiatrists who'd been invited to assess him. They told me things I didn't know about Tony: how his mother had been an alcoholic and used regularly to beat him up and kick him out of the house; how most of her boyfriends were drug addicts and criminals; how he was expelled from school for threatening his dinner lady with a knife; how he was sent to special schools but ran away because he missed his mother.
I wondered if sometimes the difference between a psychopath in Broadmoor and a psychopath on Wall Street was the luck of being born into a stable, rich family.
I spotted Professor Maden. I thought he might seem disappointed, but in fact he looked delighted. I wandered over.
"Ever since I went on a Bob Hare course, I've believed that psychopaths are monsters," I said. "They're just psychopaths – it's what defines them, it's what they are." I paused. "But isn't Tony kind of a semi-psychopath? A grey area? Doesn't his story prove that people in the middle shouldn't necessarily be defined by their maddest edges?"
"I think that's right," he replied. "Personally, I don't like the way Bob Hare talks about psychopaths almost as if they are a different species."
Tony was standing alone now, staring at the wall.
"He does have a very high level of some psychopathic traits," Maden said. "He never takes responsibility, everything is somebody else's fault. But he's not a serious, predatory offender. He can be a bully in the right circumstances, but doesn't set out to do serious harm for its own sake. I would also say you can never reduce any person to a diagnostic label. Tony has many endearing qualities when you look beyond the label."
"The thing is, Jon," Tony said as I looked up from the papers, "what you've got to realise is, everyone is a bit psychopathic. You are. I am." He paused. "Well, obviously I am," he said.
"What will you do now?" I asked.
"Maybe move to Belgium," he said. "There's this woman I fancy. But she's married. I'll have to get her divorced."
"Well, you know what they say about psychopaths," I said.
"We're manipulative!" said Tony .
• This is an edited extract from The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson, published by Picador on 3 June.
Jon Ronson wears (main picture, left to right): T-shirt, by amesbrosshop.com. Dead Man Suit, by agiandsam.com; T-shirt, by Mantaray, from debenhams.com; Shoes, by hebymango.com. Suit, by huntsman.com; Tie, by aspinaloflondon.com; Cufflinks, culietta.com; Shoes, by Jeff Banks at debenhams.com. Linen suit and floral shirt, both by Jeff Banks at debenhams.com; Cravat, by aspinaloflondon.com; Shoes, by tandfslackshoemakers.com. Styling: Tara Sugar. Hair and make-up: Laurey Simmons.

via guardian.co.uk

Two Happy, Tired Houndlies

2011-05-21T10:11:00.001-07:00

See the full gallery on Posterous

Thanks to their fancy new zip line, the dogs now run and play to their heart's content!

I think all of us have been enjoying the breezes and

Conan O'Brien's Guide To Creativity | Fast Company

2011-05-21T00:01:00.001-07:00

When we visited his office on the Warner Bros. lot for this year's 100 Most Creative People in Business package, Conan O'Brien opened up about how he works. He's an analytical guy. He thinks a lot about the creative process, how to turn a half-baked idea from a morning brainstorm into comedy gold (or a diamond--see below) by the 4:30 p.m. taping of his TBS late-night show.
In addition to our story, a running account of O'Brien putting together a show last month, here he is talking at more length. For all the preparation he does, the best material often comes from going off-script and reacting in the moment. Which is like surfing. We’ll let him explain.
For audio from our Conan interview, click here. But these are his curated comments on creativity:

Creating a show is like playing the horses.
Creativity needs two ingredients, in comedy especially. It needs the sort of relaxing bull shitting, left-brain throwing ideas around where 99 percent of it is a waste of time. But then someone throws out a weird nugget or they're just riffing on something completely inconsequential and they come up with something great. And then the next day is about we're assembling them, we're putting it together. and you'll see rehearsal is really key, because rehearsal is where everything is put up… I can look at some things on paper and say it's going to be great. But you see it on its feet and you just know it's not there. … That's the thing I can't stress enough. In comedy, it's a little bit akin to the, there's the guy that goes down to the racetrack, looks at the horses, talks to the jockey, tastes the soil, measures the humidity. And he may do one percent better than the kooky old lady who shows up and says, "I like the color blue and I’m going to go for Blue Bottle in the fifth."

No, wait--it's really like making of a jewel.
It's almost like when you make a diamond. You need an incredible amount of pressure to turn carbon into a diamond, and I think as you get closer and closer to the show, the pressure increases, and you start running out of time and that's when more and more key decisions are made.

Prepare like crazy so you can wing it.

My formula has always been I'm big on preparing. Prepare like crazy. But then just as you're heading out, half an hour beforehand, forget all of it. It's there. It's in your reptile brain. Go out but feel loose enough to grab opportunities as they come up. Don't just stick to the plan if you see an opportunity. Now sometimes you go out there and the energy is such that you just stick to the plan and you do fine. But when you get out there and the energy is particularly good, I'm the first one to throw out things left and right and just go for it. The show is always best when it's just play. When you're playing, there's a tension, yin-yang tension between think beforehand and then just get out there, between preparation and improvisation. And that's been a lot of my career, finding the balance between those two.

Improvising is like surfing.

I'm very open to when things don't work. That becomes the fun. Obviously, Johnny Carson was really great at that. I've learned to really enjoy that. It's surfing. You don't know exactly how the wave is going to break. You get on it and then you improvise. And I think there's something, it's really inspiring actually, there's something in the human mind that knows when something is organic. That knows when something is happening in the moment. So the audience will laugh at our prepared stuff but whenever things go off the rails and I start shooting from the hip and then maybe going back and forth with Andy or a guest, and we're all shooting from the hip and we're making it up as we go along, the whole energy in the room changes. People know it. They know that this is the real thing. They know that these cookies are being made fresh right there in front of them. And it's exciting.

Creativity should be fun. Seriously.

I used to be very intense at rehearsals. I just found it wasn't helping. So I've tried to learn and say let's keep it light. Let's also not overcook things. Let's try and get things into rough shape. One of the qualities people like about what we're doing is that it can feel very loose. That's the biggest comment I get from everybody on this new show: You look like you've having so much fun. And the truth is you can't fake it. You can fake it a little bit, but you can't fake it day after day.

Fostering a collective comic sensibility is like cooking.

I do sympathize with how the batting average for writing good material is really tough, so at the very least I’m trying to create an atmosphere where failure is inevitable. And where everybody gets to make fun of everybody. Do you know what I mean? I like to screw around with them, try and make them laugh. One of my favorite things is to take out my iPhone and be pretending to read them reviews of the show we just did which all praise O'Brien's ability to rise above the writing. And all these different ways of insulting them. They know it's all a joke…I used to think I need people to marinate--this sounds disgusting--they need to marinate in the essence of Conan. So I make sure that I'm around a lot. I'm just here. I'm roaming the halls… So there's this sense that they can pick up on how I think. Now we've got so many people who have been with me for so long that some of them talk like me. But then there's also when someone comes up with something out of left field that's got a different energy and it's good. It's all of our excitement about that that sends the message that it's good to find those things.

What Conan has learned from CEOs.

The last year has been completely improvised from the time I sent out the ["People of Earth"] statement. And I think it's been one of my better years. I'm learning that not everything is in my control. I heard once years ago, they did a study and they found that really successful CEOs are good at knowing what's in their control and what's not in their control… And I have learned that there are new cycles that good for a show like mine. There are new cycles that bad for a show like mine. There are times when the guests, great guests are coming left and right. There are times when you're really in a flow, things come and go, your opportunities come and go. It rains. There's a drought. It rains. The show is not all coming from me. My job here is just to try and make the adjustments I can make, set a tone.

Conan’s pep talk to the staff.

My people tend to stick with me for a long time, and I tend to stick with them. What I try to tell them especially with this new show is, we've all been through a lot, we went through this tough time and made it through to the other side. There's a sense that it galvanized people here. We stuck together. We kept our heads. We're here, so let's enjoy this. The thing I keep telling them is the only way we can screw this up is by not being bold enough. There is nothing to lose. Let's just if we think of it, and we think it's funny let's just try and make it happen.
Follow Conan O’Brien on Twitter.
Follow Chuck Salter on Twitter.

via fastcompany.com

Derek Handley - I would like count this man among my friends someday.

2011-05-20T23:50:00.001-07:00

via vimeo.com

A High-Tech High Heel Worthy Of NASA - You'd be a shoe-in for the man-of-the-year award for constructing a pair of these for your lady.

2011-05-20T23:43:00.001-07:00

The carbon fiber Moon Life shoe by United Nude comes flat-packed, with assembly required.

Creating a product for lunar travel means ultimate attention paid to mass, volume, and versatility. The Moon Life, created by United Nude -- the shoe company of Rem D. Koolhaas, big Rem's nephew -- isn't rocket-bound anytime soon, but it makes you wonder what our earthly products would look like if every designer were so economical.

The shoe arrives flat-packed and disassembled, its constituent parts made of carbon fiber, leather, and thin-gauge wire. The customer assembles the parts using inserts corresponding to their shoe size, and spans the wire around the platform. Thus is formed a ghostly shoe for which a thick bed of moon dust is no obstacle.

According to United Nude, the shoe also functions well in "gravity rich" environments as well, and soon you'll be able to buy it. The final version of the product is still being refined in anticipation of a very small production run, which will be sold here, as well as at Museum gift shops and UnitedNude.com this summer.

Chris Dannen

Chris Dannen has written about innovation and technology for FastCompany, CBS, MIT Technology Review and The Atlantic. He is author of two ... Read more

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via fastcodesign.com

The Cause That Refreshes: Project Boosts Pepsi Brand, Not Sales - AKA, "Is there any way to be sure, going into a social media campaign, that it will actually help sell your product?"

2011-05-20T22:43:00.001-07:00

One year in, the Pepsi Refresh Project encapsulates both the potential of social media and some of its paradoxes: specifically, is there any way to be sure, going into a social media campaign, that it will actually help sell your product?

By all accounts, Pepsi Refresh has been a big success in its stated goals of raising Pepsi’s brand awareness and burnishing the brand’s image, by giving away millions of dollars of grants to charitable initiatives large and small, with individuals and organizations submitting ideas online, and winners chosen by online voting. Altogether Pepsi allotted $20 million to fund grants in the project’s first year, working out to about $1.3 million in grants per month.

Aside from some complaints about bigger organizations dominating the voting (which Pepsi has addressed with some tweaks to the submission categories and voting process) there’s no question that Refresh has created a lot of mostly positive buzz around the Pepsi brand — from social media mini-campaigns created by people submitting ideas, and media coverage of winners and their charitable projects, among others.

And the online metrics are indeed impressive: Pepsi tells the Wall Street Journal that the Pepsi Refresh Project has received more than 150,000 idea submissions in the last year and tallied 76 million votes from 17 million unique visitors over the same period. In addition to casting their votes, these visitors also left 1.6 million comments, suggesting a pretty high level of engagement with the site and the concept in general, while the Facebook page attracted more than three million “likes.”

The only problem: the incontrovertible success of the Pepsi Refresh Project as a social media campaign doesn’t seem to translate into actually, you know, selling more of the product — at least in the short term. The total volume of Pepsi sales slipped 8.6% in the first nine months of 2010 compared to the same period in 2009, according to figures from trade pub Beverage Digest cited by WSJ.

True, this was partly due to economic conditions (and probably growing concern about obesity and health eating): archrival Coca-Cola saw total sales volume decline 6.6% in the same comparison. But it’s hard to spin an 8.6% drop in sales as evidence of success for the brand’s main marketing effort in 2010.

Of course, this touches on the ever-present issue of social media ROI. If you’re inclined to be sympathetic to Pepsi (and supportive of bold social media experiments), you might argue that it’s too soon to judge the actual, long-term effect of the Pepsi Refresh Project. Sure, its sales may have taken a hit from recessionary pressures, but the positive associations engendered by Refresh will linger in the collective imagination for years to come, buoying brand awareness and sales in the long run.

If you’re a skeptic, on the other hand, you might argue that any marketing campaign which doesn’t bear some kind of fruit — quantifiable fruit, with dollar signs on it — in a year or less is basically useless. True, brands do conceive and execute multi-year marketing campaigns, but I imagine almost always with the expectation that some benefits will be realized immediately (within the first year) in terms of sales lift — thus justifying the continuing expenditures.

Source: Media Post

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via blog.converget.com

What to Do When the Rapture Doesn't Happen: A Guide for Believers - Gawker

2011-05-20T21:51:00.001-07:00

Adrian Chen —
Greetings, faithful reader. We assume you are reading this on Sunday, after the Rapture did not occur on Saturday as you believed it would. How do you deal with such a stunning turn of events? We're here to help.

We feel for you, rapture believers. You have endured years of ridicule and traveled the world to spread your message that Judgement Day would occur on May 21st, 2011. You've even risked your family's health and happiness. But now it's May 22nd and you have awoken to a normal, non-rapturous Sunday morning. You are confused, panicked, and running really low on groceries.

Dealing with this is going to be tricky. It's the existential equivalent of tripping on a curb and falling on your face. But you have a few options:

Act Casual

Now that the Rapture hasn't happened, the best way for believers to save face is to just play off the whole thing like it wasn't a big deal in the first place: "I mean, I am pretty surprised God didn't descend from the sky and call up His faithful to heaven yesterday. But I really thought the Pistons would make the playoffs, too."

Fake It

If you don't think you can face your family and friends after years of harping on about a Rapture that didn't happen, you could make your own Rapture. Hide in the attic and pretend you got raptured. If anyone tries to get you to come down just be like, "Na na na, can't hearrrrrr you 'cause I'm in heaven partying with the angels!" Live the rest of your life in the attic.

Pretend You Just Woke Up From a Years-Long Walking Coma

"Where am I? Who are you? Is M*A*S*H still on TV? I believed what would happen yesterday?"

Push It Back

The rapture has been delayed more than the opening of the Spider-Man musical. The guy who started this thing, 89-year-old Family Radio Worldwide founder Harold Camping, first predicted the Rapture would happen in 1994, but then revised it in light of new "research." Now that the Rapture didn't happen again, it's just a matter of a few minutes of Googling to figure out the real date of the Rapture. Tip: Pick May 21st, 2111 so you only have to change one number on all your signs.

Beat Up The Guy Who Told You There Would Be a Rapture

Show up early because there's going to be a line. Harold Camping's church has amassed a net worth of $72 million with this end-of-the-world scam, and he's not offering refunds.

Stop Believing In Fake Bullshit

This will never happen, of course.

[Photos via Getty]

via gawker.com

Interesting write-up.

Honestly, I haven't been following this much at all...except giggling at the post rapture looting event that sprung up.

I want to know where the $72 Million is going...that could do a lot of good to the hungry people out there.

What's more interesting is that it took people thinking that they were going to be raptured to give money. Why does benevolence require such drastic measures?

Here's to false prophets...

How to build a doggy trot line...Strout style

2011-05-20T16:28:00.001-07:00

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The houndlies got a trot line today instead of an invisible fence.

Jack is such an escape artist, and Ollie is so scrawny that I figured a 150 foot zip-line on a grassy hill might be a better place to start.

They are mostly inside dogs, so they're only out there to go to the bathroom and get their wiggles out before returning to the couches and air conditioning where they belong.

To make a trot line practical, it needed to be taller than the bucket of the tractor, so it didn't get in the way of any potential farmer-ing.

That being said, the bucket of the tractor was the ideal candidate for stringing up the line.

The result was grand...2 humans basking in the success of a successful project, two happy houndlies and one tractor approved trot line. Tadaaaa!

Hats off to my dad and sister Ruthie for being the engineers and muscle behind this extravaganza...you two seriously rock!

Camp in the City - Day Camp In Tyler For $60 Per week?

2011-05-20T11:42:00.001-07:00

Camp in the City

Camp in the City is a partnership between the Boys & Girls Clubs of East Texas and Pine Cove.

The Boys & Girls Clubs of East Texas exist to inspire and equip young people to reach their full potential. Pine Cove exists to be used by God to transform the lives of people for His purposes and His glory. Together, these two organizations will provide a phenomenal summer camp experience for your child(ren). Below you’ll see several frequently asked questions about the camp. Feel free to visit our websites: www.bgcet.org, www.pinecove.com. Still want to know more? Feel free to call 903-593-9211. See you this summer!

Click here for the Camp in the City flyer!

Click here for the Membership Application

FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions):

Who can come to camp? Students currently in Kindergarten through 5th grade are eligible to come to camp. (During the Summer, a student who has completed 5th grade will still be considered a 5th grader, not a 6th grader.)

Who will be supervising my child? Pine Cove staff members have gone through countless training hours to provide the best possible care for your child. There will be an 8:1 camper to staff ratio this summer. All staff members are CPR and first aid certified and have been background tested.

Do I need to pack a lunch for my child? No! Breakfast, lunch and a snack will be provided each day.

What will my child do during the day? Activities include worship time, Bible studies, outdoor education, swimming, basketball, dodgeball, volleyball, floor hockey, broomball, and a whole lot more.

Where is Camp in the City located? Camp will take place each day at the BGCET Main Campus at 504 W. 32nd St. in Tyler.

What time does Camp open? Camp starts at 7:30am each day and lasts until 6:00pm at the Main Campus.

The Main Campus is a long way from where I live/work, are there alternate drop-off locations? Yes. You can drop your child off each day at Cumberland Academy on Shiloh Road at 7:30am and pick him/her up there at 5:30pm. A BGC bus will transport your child each day.

How many weeks can I sign my child up? Camp in the City is offered for 10 full weeks, starting June 6 and ending August12. You can sign up for as many weeks as you like.

What's the cost? $120 per week per child with a one-time $20 membership fee for non BGC members.

Is there financial assistance? If so, how do I apply? Call 903-593-9211 and ask for Megan or Amy. Fax or email a copy of your 2010 tax statement to 903-593-5012 or amy@bgcet.org

My child takes medication; can you give it to him? No, if your child needs medicine during the day, a parent or guardian will need to administer it.

How do I sign up? Complete the attached application and email it back to amy@bgcet.org or you can fax it to 903-593-5012.

Sample Schedule for Camp in the City:

Monday Schedule (Opening Day):

7:30am Doors Open at Main Campus; Bus shows up at Cumberland Academy

7:30-8:30 Cluster station games (8 stations)

8:30-8:40 Orientation

8:40-9:20 Breakfast (Cabin Meetings)

9:20-9:25 Flush/Brush

9:25-9:40 JAM TIME (Activity class assignments, Worship, Skit)

9:40-10:05 Bible Study

10:05-10:15 Transition

10:15-11:00 Activity Class I

11:00-11:10 Transition

11:10-11:55 Activity Class II

11:55-12:00 Transition

12:00-12:55 Lunch (cabin challenges)

12:55-1:00 clean-up/bathrooms

1:00-1:25 Story time

Read Bible Stories

1:25-1:30 Transition

1:30-2:15 Activity Class III

2:15-2:20 Transition

2:20-3:05 "All CaGa" (All Camp Game)

3:05-3:40 Girls inside for snack/free time/1on1 (gym, and playground side)

Guys outside (fields)-cabin challenges

3:40-4:15 Guys inside for snack/free time/1on1 (gym, and playground side)

Girls outside (fields)-cabin challenges

4:15-4:25 Gather in hall for club (cheers, and club hype)

4:25-4:55 Club

4:55-5:10 Reflection time

5:10-5:15 Gather belongings/load bus (Cumberland)

5:15-6:00 Cluster free time (gym, art room, playground, slabs) (main Campus)

via bgcet.org

Moms, what are your plans for your kids this Summer?

Pine Cove and The Boys And Girls Club Of East Texas are teaming up to bring the legendary Pine Cove day camp experience to the middle of Tyler, for $60 per week.

The camps will be staffed by Pine Cove counselors at an 8:1 ratio, breakfast and lunch will be served, and your kids will come home happy and tired from all the playing. :)

Moms, if you want a week to yourself this Summer, this is your chance! Have little cousins coming into town? Sign them up too!

Working parents, you can sign up for all 10 weeks and your kids will play all day whole you're at work, rather than sitting in front of the TV or being dropped off at Day Care.

Call Amy Avants at 903-593-9211 or email her at Amy@bgcet.org to sign up!

Tyler Roses!

2011-05-20T10:50:00.001-07:00

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At $2.50 a dozen, Tyler roses are my junk food alternative.

Want a nasty, greasy, too sweet something?

Buy roses instead! ;p

Hooray for a happy junk food alternative!

Oh yeah, new haircolor!

2011-05-19T19:03:00.001-07:00

I was just looking through my iPhone pictures and realized that I've chameleoned again...my hair is about 6 inches shorter, and way darker.

Cheers for never looking the same 2 months in a row! ;)

Bathtime for the Houndlies!

2011-05-19T18:55:00.001-07:00

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Jack and Ollie have thoroughly enjoyed being country dogs...but they have started to look (and smell) like country dogs.

Bath time for them...err...bath for Ollie...Jack is more of a shower guy.

Now the apartment smells like wet dog with a shot of cleanliness!

To celebrate, we (the hounds and I) are having a RoboCop marathon. Netflix it to join us in spirit!

Happy (Internet) Mother's Day!

2011-05-08T11:46:00.001-07:00

When the whole family can't be together in person, Skyping in for brunch is the next best thing!

Happy Mother's Day my momma, you're the best role model a gal could ask for!

I Have Joined The iPad 2 Portable Nerd Club! ;)

2011-05-07T11:01:00.001-07:00

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My father is a wonderful man. It's true.

My laptop has slowly transformed itself into a desktop. It no longer holds charge, and needs to be plugged in to function. (It's battery has been changed once, and it lasted less than a year before giving up the ghost.)

When I moved to Tyler, a week ago, I did a swan dive back into consulting. My iPhone 4 became an extension of myself this past week as I went from presentation to meeting to training session.

After a few days of this, my iPhone began to come to it's limits as a presentation tool, and my thoughts drifted towards the iPad/laptop dilemma.

My Dad was about 3 steps ahead of me, and when I came home on Thursday, there was a surprise waiting on the counter.

His name is Martin, and he is excellent!

Thank you Dad, you're really wonderful!

Mercedes-Benz BIOME Concept Car - Want!

2011-05-06T20:08:00.001-07:00

Mercedes Biome a strange concept car that is designed to be grown from seeds. The designers envision that lab-grown car being made from a non-existent material named BioFibre, a material that is lighter than plastic and stronger than steel.

If used in a car, the car would weigh around 875.5 pounds and would also be entirely biodegradable.

Since BioFibre can be grown in a lab, Mercedes has been toying with the idea of growing its very own car based on the idea of symbiosis. Symbiosis in nature represents seamless efficiency between key players.

The idea is that the vehicle would collect energy from the sun and store it within the bonds of a fuel alternative, the only by-product of which is oxygen, appropriately nicknamed BioNectar4534.

The car would work with nature, and Mercedes has already developed technology to retrofit trees with receptors, which would allow us to harvest their excess solar energy into BN4534.

This initiative is suppose to be incentive to plant more trees and collect more energy to create a self sustaining example of symbiosis.

Apply those concepts to a car and the BIOME would not hurt the environment or be wasteful in any way, kind of like a “partnership with nature.”

“The interior of the BIOME grows from the DNA in the Mercedes star on the front of the vehicle, while the exterior grows from the star on the rear,” Mercedes-Benz explained.

But with the strong movement towards greener technology, perhaps the BIOME does stand a chance in the competitive automotive industry.

Thanks

Our Related News In This Topic
Mercedes-Benz A-Class Concept
A Car That Can Run On Water Too – sandYou

via thetechjournal.com

A Horsey Afternoon At High Pointe Stables

2011-05-05T16:49:00.001-07:00

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p371.mov Watch on Posterous

Canton Trade Days!

2011-04-30T20:41:00.001-07:00

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My Mom and I went to Canton Trade Days today. I forgot how crazy that place was!

Baby animals of all shapes and sizes, junk to be haggled for and fantastic people watching!

Who wants to join next time? It'll be fun!

I Am Leaving Austin...

2011-04-27T22:09:00.001-07:00

...on Friday.

I love this city, these people and life-loving community that makes it purr.

It breaks my heart to leave, but this is the best move for Bump (http://thebabyadventure.posterous.com) and myself right now.

Bump, the hounds and I will be relocating to Tyler, TX to be closer to my family...(I've gotta get the cooking-food-without-burning-it thing down before I become a mamma)!

I will be picking up my Interactive Marketing business again working with mid-sized companies in social media, event marketing, PR, and training.

If you know someone who could use a hand in any of these areas, I'm your gal.

Email me, I don't bite, and I love new challenges!

Meg.Strout@gmail.com.

;)

Bump and I shall return to Austin as soon as it makes sense, but it's going to be a while.

'till then, we'll always have the Internet.

Here's to the series of tubes,

Momma Meg and Baby Bump

My hot dinner dates tonight!

2011-04-26T21:29:00.001-07:00

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Rebecca and I leashed up all of our hounds and hopped to freebirds for done tasty tacos.

On our way back we saw this gloriously huge pink cloud.

You are welcome! ;p

Check out the friendly mannequins

2011-04-25T15:04:00.001-07:00

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I walked into Saks Fifth Avenue today and discovered two ladies whispering secrets. ;)

Hammocking On Town Lake with Narnia Is The Perfect Way To End Easter Sunday

2011-04-24T18:02:00.001-07:00

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Might I suggest an ENO hammock?

2011-04-21T16:03:00.001-07:00

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It's perfect for the summer, for reading in parks with roommates and for getting the hounds out of the house.

Make it happen. Live the dream.

Parents, don't dress your girls like tramps - CNN.com

2011-04-20T17:52:00.001-07:00

Parents, don't dress your girls like tramps

By LZ Granderson, CNN Contributor
April 19, 2011 -- Updated 1252 GMT (2052 HKT)

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
LZ Granderson: Some parents dress their young girls in provocative outfits
Retailers have encouraged this behavior by marketing inappropriate clothing
He says it's OK to blame retailers, but it's parents who are ultimately responsible
Children need parents who will set rules, not be their friends, he says
Editor's note: LZ Granderson writes a weekly column for CNN.com. A senior writer and columnist for ESPN The Magazine and ESPN.com, he has contributed to ESPN's "Sports Center," "Outside the Lines" and "First Take." He is a 2011 and 2010 nominee and the 2009 winner of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation award for online journalism and a 2010 and 2008 honoree of the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for column writing.

Grand Rapids, Michigan (CNN) -- I saw someone at the airport the other day who really caught my eye.

Her beautiful, long blond hair was braided back a la Bo Derek in the movie "10" (or for the younger set, Christina Aguilera during her "Xtina" phase). Her lips were pink and shiny from the gloss, and her earrings dangled playfully from her lobes.

You can tell she had been vacationing somewhere warm, because you could see her deep tan around her midriff thanks to the halter top and the tight sweatpants that rested just a little low on her waist. The icing on the cake? The word "Juicy" was written on her backside.

Yeah, that 8-year-old girl was something to see alright. ... I hope her parents are proud. Their daughter was the sexiest girl in the terminal, and she's not even in middle school yet.

Abercrombie & Fitch came under fire this spring for introducing the "Ashley," a push-up bra for girls who normally are too young to have anything to push up. Originally it was marketed for girls as young as 7, but after public outcry, it raised its intended audience to the wise old age of 12. I wonder how do people initiate a conversation in the office about the undeveloped chest of elementary school girls without someone nearby thinking they're pedophiles?

Push-up bikini controversy

What kind of PowerPoint presentation was shown to the Abercrombie executives that persuaded them to green light such a product?

That there was a demand to make little girls hot?

How young is too young to be sexy?

Push-up bikini controversy

RELATED TOPICS

Child Development

Culture and Lifestyle

Family

Parenting

Body Image and Self-Esteem

I mean, that is the purpose of a push-up bra, right? To enhance sex appeal by lifting up, pushing together and basically showcasing the wearer's breasts. Now, thanks to AF Kids, girls don't have to wait until high school to feel self-conscious about their, uhm, girls. They can start almost as soon as they're potty trained. Maybe this fall the retailer should consider keeping a plastic surgeon on site for free consultations.

We've been here with Abercrombie before -- if you recall, about 10 years ago they sold thongs for 10-year-olds -- but they're hardly alone in pitching inappropriate clothing to young girls. Four years ago the popular "Bratz" franchise introduced padded bras called "bralettes" for girls as young as six. That was also around the time the good folks at Wal-Mart rolled out a pair of pink panties in its junior department with the phrase "Who Needs Credit Cards" printed on the front.

I guess I've been out-of-the-loop and didn't realize there's been an ongoing stampede of 10-year-old girls driving to the mall with their tiny fists full of cash demanding sexier apparel.

What's that you say? Ten-year-olds can't drive? They don't have money, either? Well, how else are they getting ahold of these push-up bras and whore-friendly panties?

Their parents?

Noooo, couldn't be.

What adult who wants a daughter to grow up with high self-esteem would even consider purchasing such items? What parent is looking at their sweet, little girl thinking, "She would be perfect if she just had a little bit more up top."

And then I remember the little girl at the airport. And the girls we've all seen at the mall. And the kiddie beauty pageants.

And then I realize as creepy as it is to think a store like Abercrombie is offering something like the "Ashley", the fact remains that sex only sells because people are buying it. No successful retailer would consider introducing an item like a padded bikini top for kindergarteners if they didn't think people would buy it.

If they didn't think parents would buy it, which begs the question: What in the hell is wrong with us?

It's easy to blast companies for introducing the sexy wear, but our ire really should be directed at the parents who think low rise jeans for a second grader is cute. They are the ones who are spending the money to fuel this budding trend. They are the ones who are suppose to decide what's appropriate for their young children to wear, not executives looking to brew up controversy or turn a profit.

I get it, Rihanna's really popular. But that's a pretty weak reason for someone to dress their little girl like her.

I don't care how popular Lil' Wayne is, my son knows I would break both of his legs long before I would allow him to walk out of the house with his pants falling off his butt. Such a stance doesn't always makes me popular -- and the house does get tense from time to time -- but I'm his father, not his friend.

Friends bow to peer pressure. Parents say, "No, and that's the end of it."

The way I see it, my son can go to therapy later if my strict rules have scarred him. But I have peace knowing he'll be able to afford therapy as an adult because I didn't allow him to wear or do whatever he wanted as a kid.

Maybe I'm a Tiger Dad.

Maybe I should mind my own business.

Or maybe I'm just a concerned parent worried about little girls like the one I saw at the airport.

In 2007, the American Psychological Association's Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls issued a report linking early sexualization with three of the most common mental-health problems of girls and women: eating disorders, low self-esteem and depression. There's nothing inherently wrong with parents wanting to appease their daughters by buying them the latest fashions. But is getting cool points today worth the harm dressing little girls like prostitutes could cause tomorrow?

A line needs to be drawn, but not by Abercrombie. Not by Britney Spears. And not by these little girls who don't know better and desperately need their parents to be parents and not 40-year-old BFFs.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of LZ Granderson.

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Visualize Your Taxes - Fascinating infographics on where your tax dollars actually go.

2011-04-19T20:19:00.001-07:00

Visualize Your Taxes

Business Buzz Today is tax day, but you probably have absolutely no idea where your hard-earned cash is going, do you? Enter Eyebeam and their Visualize Your Taxes challenge — these charts n' graphs will make it clear where those tax dollars go once they leave your bank account.

scott lamb posted about a day ago

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1. Where Did My Tax Dollars Go?

The winning entry, from Anil Kandangath, elegantly and quickly illuminates where your tax dollars went based on your annual salary. You made $50,000? The contributed $1,867 to the national defense.

2. Every Day Is Tax Day

Fred Chasen's Every Day Is Tax Day breaks down what your daily contribution is the to U.S. government. How many hours did you spend working for the Defense Department today?

3. What Do You Work For?

This runner-up is a simple calendar that breaks down your year by whether you're working for a government agency or yourself.

4. Visualize Your Taxes

Another runner-up presents the U.S. budget as compared to your personal priorities on national spending. Plenty of info to explore.

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Amazing! The KO Hip-Hop Cello-Beatbox Experience: Julie-O (Thanks for sharing Alissa Schram!)

2011-04-18T22:09:00.001-07:00

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Tired hounds after a day of play.

2011-04-17T15:20:00.001-07:00

See the full gallery on Posterous

This is super creative...you guys are going to love it! Thanks to @MattLantz for sharing!

2011-04-13T22:39:00.001-07:00

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Any idea what these little guys are?

2011-04-09T13:32:00.001-07:00

The neighbors found these little birdlets this morning and they were wondering what kind they are...any ideas? I'm thinking bluejays.

Sonic with the Wiley hounds!

2011-04-09T12:17:00.001-07:00

Frozen yogurt with ruthie!

2011-04-02T13:50:00.001-07:00

Frozen Yogurt With Ruthie!

2011-04-02T13:49:00.001-07:00

Frozen Yogurt With Ruthie

2011-04-02T13:44:00.001-07:00

Off to college station!

2011-04-01T07:17:00.001-07:00

And happy good morning to everyone!

New Phone! ;)

2011-03-31T18:45:00.001-07:00

Ok, I did it...and my Craigslisted iPhone 4 is simply splendid!

My poor old phone was limping through life and little Waldo 2.0 is safely retired to his old box. His screen was cracked...in 5 places and had no molding left. The touch screen didn't work except by switching it from landscape to portrait for each letter typed. The back casing was cracked down the middle, and had a chunk missing. It went swimming...twice. It wouldn't go on vibrate. The camera hasn't worked for a year. It wouldn't change from the voicemail screen to call people. It wouldn't hold much charge, and would die without warning.

All hail the trusty phone that withstood years of travel, adventure and accidental abuse!

The fact that Waldo 3.0 types without having to flip my phone around is reason enough to spend the $360.

Huzzah!

War Horse in the West End - Here's the trailer for the production...very cool!

2011-03-06T23:57:00.001-08:00

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"War Horse" Life-sized Puppet (Thanks to Allen Beuershausen for sharing!)

2011-03-06T23:55:00.001-08:00

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Drifting rubber duckies chart oceans of plastic

2011-03-06T23:38:00.001-08:00

PARIS
Theirs is an epic tale of resilience and pluck, a seafarer's yarn of high-seas adventure that has seen them brave some of the world's wildest waters in their 11-year odyssey from the Pacific Ocean toward landfall in Europe.

They have bobbed through storms that would have wrecked larger vessels, to drift deliberately down the Bering Strait. They have patiently borne a four-year spell trapped in Arctic ice packs, to float freely into the Atlantic.
And now, buoyed perhaps by the prospect of an end to their pelagic paddling, a flotilla of yellow bathtub rubber ducks, lost at sea when they fell off a container ship in the North Pacific in 1992, is about to wash up on Europe's western shores, according to an oceanographer who has been tracking them for years.
More of the much-traveled toys are thought to be heading down the Eastern Seaboard of the United States, where their arrival would offer new data on ocean currents and wind patterns. And the US company that made the ducks is offering $100 in savings bonds to anyone who finds one.
Nobody has actually seen one of these ducks in the Atlantic yet, says Curt Ebbesmeyer, a retired oceanographer and the international dean of beachcombers, who has put out a global call for sightings. But their presence there "is a prediction based on the drifts of thousands of other objects in my files," he says.
The plastic ducks were part of a consignment of 29,000 bathtub toys, including beavers, turtles, and frogs, that ended up in the Pacific when a container ship en route from China to the United States lost some of its deck cargo in heavy seas.
An Alaskan landing
A number of the critters ended up on the beaches of Alaska, but from those latitudes there is only one way out of the Pacific - through the Bering Strait, past towering icebergs and the curious gaze of walruses, around the northern coast of Greenland, and into the Atlantic.
Some marine experts, including Capt. Charles Moore, founder of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation in California, doubt there is anything of the wandering waterfowl left to be found after 11 years. And Captain Moore knows a thing or two about the subject: He describes himself as having "dedicated his time and resources to understanding and remediating the ocean 's plastic load."
"I think it's a bit of a fraud to suggest they are going to find ducks in a whole duck shape," he says. More likely, he adds, the flock has broken up into fragments. "If anyone finds a whole duck, it will be very brittle," he predicts. "They may have to glue it together to claim their reward."
But if the ducks - sold by The First Years, of Avon, Mass. - are as sturdy as their friends the beavers, that may not be the case. Last weekend, at a beachcombers' fair in Sitka, Alaska, Mr. Ebbesmeyer said a boy showed him a sun-bleached beaver he had found nearby just the other week.
"It was quite pliable, just faded," says Ebbesmeyer, who lives in Seattle. "The amazing thing about these toys is that they are very hardy."
Computer models of ocean currents and wind directions developed by a friend of Ebbesmeyer's, Jim Ingraham, accurately predicted the arrival of the ducks off the Washington State coast in 1995, after they had been round the Pacific's circular current three times, in a 45,000 mile journey.

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Friendly Floatees - The rubber duckies who traveled the ocean!

2011-03-06T23:36:00.001-08:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Route taken by the Friendly Floatees initially lost in the Pacific Ocean in 1992.

Oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer with flotsam (including some Friendly Floatees) that he observes to monitor ocean currents.

Friendly Floatees are plastic bath toys marketed by The First Years, Inc. and made famous by the work of Curtis Ebbesmeyer, an oceanographer who models ocean currents on the basis of flotsam movements including those of a consignment of Friendly Floatees washed into the Pacific Ocean in 1992.

Contents
[hide]

1 Oceanography

2 See also

3 References

4 External links

[edit] Oceanography

A consignment of Friendly Floatee toys, manufactured in China for The First Years Inc., departed from Hong Kong on a container ship destined for Tacoma, Washington, U.S.. On 10 January 1992, during a storm in the North Pacific Ocean close to the International Date Line, twelve 40-foot (13.3 m) intermodal containers were washed overboard. One of these containers held 28,800 Floatees,^[1] a child's bath toy which came in a number of forms: red beavers, green frogs, blue turtles and yellow ducks. At some point, the container opened (possibly due to collision with other containers or the ship itself) and the Floatees were released. Although each toy was mounted in a plastic housing attached to a backing card, subsequent tests showed that the cardboard quickly degraded in sea water allowing the Floatees to escape. Unlike many bath toys, Friendly Floatees have no holes in them so they do not take on water.

Seattle oceanographers Curtis Ebbesmeyer and James Ingraham, who were working on an ocean surface current model, began to track their progress. The mass release of 28,800 objects into the ocean at one time offered significant advantages over the standard method of releasing 500–1000 drift bottles. The recovery rate of objects from the Pacific Ocean is typically around 2%, so rather than the 10 to 20 recoveries typically seen with a drift bottle release, the two scientists expected numbers closer to 600. They were already tracking various other spills of flotsam, including 61,000 Nike running shoes that had been lost overboard in 1990.

Ten months after the incident, the first Floatees began to wash up along the Alaskan coast. The first discovery consisted of ten toys found by a beachcomber near Sitka, Alaska on 16 November 1992, about 2,000 miles (3,200 km) from their starting point. Ebbesmeyer and Ingraham contacted beachcombers, coastal workers, and local residents to locate hundreds of the beached Floatees over a 530 mile (850 km) shoreline. Another beachcomber discovered twenty of the toys on 28 November 1992, and in total 400 were found along the eastern coast of the Gulf of Alaska in the period up to August 1993. This represented a 1.4% recovery rate. The landfalls were logged in Ingraham's computer model OSCUR (Ocean Surface Currents Simulation), which uses measurements of air pressure from 1967 onwards to calculate the direction of and speed of wind across the oceans, and the consequent surface currents. Ingraham's model was built to help fisheries but it is also used to predict flotsam movements or the likely locations of those lost at sea.

Using the models they had developed, the oceanographers correctly predicted further landfalls of the toys in Washington state in 1996 and theorized that many of the remaining Floatees would have travelled to Alaska, westward to Japan, back to Alaska, and then drifted northwards through the Bering Strait and become trapped in the Arctic pack ice. Moving slowly with the ice across the Pole, they predicted it would take five or six years for the toys to reach the North Atlantic where the ice would thaw and release them. Between July and December 2003, The First Years Inc. offered a $100 US savings bond reward to anybody who recovered a Floatee in New England, Canada or Iceland. More of the toys were recovered in 2004 than in any of the preceding three years. However, still more of these toys were predicted to have headed eastward past Greenland and make landfall on the southwestern shores of the United Kingdom in 2007. In July 2007, a retired teacher found a plastic duck on the Devon coast, and British newspapers mistakenly announced that the Floatees had begun to arrive.^[2]^[3] But the day after breaking the story, the Western Morning News, the local Devon newspaper, reported that Dr. Simon Boxall of the National Oceanography Centre in Southampton had examined the specimen and determined that the duck was not in fact a Floatee.^[4]

Bleached by sun and seawater, the ducks and beavers had faded to white, but the turtles and frogs had kept their original colours.

Two children's books have been written about the ducks, and the toys themselves have become collector's items, fetching prices as high as $1,000.

[edit] See also

Drifter (floating device)

Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Marine debris

[edit] References

^ Hohn, Donovan (January 2007). "Moby-Duck: Or, The Synthetic Wilderness of Childhood". Harper's Magazine. http://mysite.verizon.net/donovanhohn/Moby-Duck.html.

^ "First of the plastic duck invasion fleet makes landfall on the Devon coast". London: The Times. 2007-07-14. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article2072458.ece.

^ Coles, John (2007-07-14). "The First of the Duck Armada". The Sun. http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article246146.ece.

^ "Expert rules out toy duck as lost ocean adventurer". Western Morning News. 2007-07-14.

Curtis C. Ebbesmeyer and W. James Ingraham Jr. (1994-10). "Pacific Toy Spill Fuels Ocean Current Pathways Research". Earth in Space 7 (2): 7–9, 14. Archived from the original on 5 October 2006. http://web.archive.org/web/20061005100806/http://www.agu.org/sci_soc/ducks.html. Retrieved 15 November 2006.

"Ducks embark on a scientific journey". The First Years Inc.. 2003. Archived from the original on 1 October 2003. http://web.archive.org/web/20031001221100/http://www.thefirstyears.com/duckies.html. Retrieved 15 November 2006.

"Rubber Duckies Map The World". CBS News. 2003-07-31. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/07/31/eveningnews/main566138.shtml. Retrieved 15 November 2006.

Ed Perry, Ed. (05-2005). "The Drifting Seed newsletter" (PDF). http://www.seabean.com/newsletters/vol11-1.pdf. Retrieved 15 November 2006.

Curtis C. Ebbesmeyer. "Beachcombing Science from Bath Toys". http://www.beachcombers.org/RubberDuckies.html. Retrieved 15 November 2006.

Simon de Bruxelles (2007-06-28). "Plastic duck armada is heading for Britain after 15-year global voyage". The Times (London). http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1996553.ece. Retrieved 28 June 2007.

[edit] External links

Keith C. Heidorn, 'Of Shoes And Ships And Rubber Ducks And A Message In A Bottle', The Weather Doctor (March 17, 1999).

Kevin Krajick, 'Message in a Bottle', Smithsonian Magazine, July 2001.

Jane Standley, 'Ducks' odyssey nears end', BBC News, (12 July 2003).

Duck ahoy, The Age, (August 7, 2003)

Marsha Walton, 'How Nikes, toys and hockey gear help ocean science', CNN.com (26 May 2003).

"Journey of the Floatees", Spiegel magazine (July 1, 2007)

"Timeline of Rubber Duck Voyage", Rubaduck.com

Donovan Hohn, "Moby-Duck: Or, The Synthetic Wilderness of Childhood," Harper's Magazine, January (2007), pp. 39–62.

Wired Science: Flotsam Found

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendly_Floatees"

Categories: Water pollution | Waste disposal incidents | Physical oceanography | Ocean currents | Toys of the 1990s

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Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior - Your thoughts?

2011-03-06T23:11:00.001-08:00

By AMY CHUA
A lot of people wonder how Chinese parents raise such stereotypically successful kids. They wonder what these parents do to produce so many math whizzes and music prodigies, what it's like inside the family, and whether they could do it too. Well, I can tell them, because I've done it. Here are some things my daughters, Sophia and Louisa, were never allowed to do:

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Erin Patrice O'Brien for The Wall Street Journal
Amy Chua with her daughters, Louisa and Sophia, at their home in New Haven, Conn.

• attend a sleepover

• have a playdate

• be in a school play

• complain about not being in a school play

• watch TV or play computer games

• choose their own extracurricular activities

• get any grade less than an A

• not be the No. 1 student in every subject except gym and drama

• play any instrument other than the piano or violin

• not play the piano or violin.

I'm using the term "Chinese mother" loosely. I know some Korean, Indian, Jamaican, Irish and Ghanaian parents who qualify too. Conversely, I know some mothers of Chinese heritage, almost always born in the West, who are not Chinese mothers, by choice or otherwise. I'm also using the term "Western parents" loosely. Western parents come in all varieties.

Ideas Market

The Tiger Mother Responds to Readers

Chua's Daughter Sophia Explains What Life is Really With her 'Tiger Mom'

An Asian Father's GIft: Permission to Fail

Ms. Chua answers questions from Journal readers who wrote in to the Ideas Market blog.

All the same, even when Western parents think they're being strict, they usually don't come close to being Chinese mothers. For example, my Western friends who consider themselves strict make their children practice their instruments 30 minutes every day. An hour at most. For a Chinese mother, the first hour is the easy part. It's hours two and three that get tough.

When it comes to parenting, the Chinese seem to produce children who display academic excellence, musical mastery and professional success - or so the stereotype goes. WSJ's Christina Tsuei speaks to two moms raised by Chinese immigrants who share what it was like growing up and how they hope to raise their children.

More Parenting Videos

Teaching Math to Spark Creative Thinking

Can Bilingualism Make Preschoolers Smarter?

Despite our squeamishness about cultural stereotypes, there are tons of studies out there showing marked and quantifiable differences between Chinese and Westerners when it comes to parenting. In one study of 50 Western American mothers and 48 Chinese immigrant mothers, almost 70% of the Western mothers said either that "stressing academic success is not good for children" or that "parents need to foster the idea that learning is fun." By contrast, roughly 0% of the Chinese mothers felt the same way. Instead, the vast majority of the Chinese mothers said that they believe their children can be "the best" students, that "academic achievement reflects successful parenting," and that if children did not excel at school then there was "a problem" and parents "were not doing their job." Other studies indicate that compared to Western parents, Chinese parents spend approximately 10 times as long every day drilling academic activities with their children. By contrast, Western kids are more likely to participate in sports teams.

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What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you're good at it. To get good at anything you have to work, and children on their own never want to work, which is why it is crucial to override their preferences. This often requires fortitude on the part of the parents because the child will resist; things are always hardest at the beginning, which is where Western parents tend to give up. But if done properly, the Chinese strategy produces a virtuous circle. Tenacious practice, practice, practice is crucial for excellence; rote repetition is underrated in America. Once a child starts to excel at something—whether it's math, piano, pitching or ballet—he or she gets praise, admiration and satisfaction. This builds confidence and makes the once not-fun activity fun. This in turn makes it easier for the parent to get the child to work even more.

Chinese parents can get away with things that Western parents can't. Once when I was young—maybe more than once—when I was extremely disrespectful to my mother, my father angrily called me "garbage" in our native Hokkien dialect. It worked really well. I felt terrible and deeply ashamed of what I had done. But it didn't damage my self-esteem or anything like that. I knew exactly how highly he thought of me. I didn't actually think I was worthless or feel like a piece of garbage.

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Chua family
From Ms. Chua's album: 'Mean me with Lulu in hotel room... with score taped to TV!'

As an adult, I once did the same thing to Sophia, calling her garbage in English when she acted extremely disrespectfully toward me. When I mentioned that I had done this at a dinner party, I was immediately ostracized. One guest named Marcy got so upset she broke down in tears and had to leave early. My friend Susan, the host, tried to rehabilitate me with the remaining guests.

The fact is that Chinese parents can do things that would seem unimaginable—even legally actionable—to Westerners. Chinese mothers can say to their daughters, "Hey fatty—lose some weight." By contrast, Western parents have to tiptoe around the issue, talking in terms of "health" and never ever mentioning the f-word, and their kids still end up in therapy for eating disorders and negative self-image. (I also once heard a Western father toast his adult daughter by calling her "beautiful and incredibly competent." She later told me that made her feel like garbage.)

Chinese parents can order their kids to get straight As. Western parents can only ask their kids to try their best. Chinese parents can say, "You're lazy. All your classmates are getting ahead of you." By contrast, Western parents have to struggle with their own conflicted feelings about achievement, and try to persuade themselves that they're not disappointed about how their kids turned out.

I've thought long and hard about how Chinese parents can get away with what they do. I think there are three big differences between the Chinese and Western parental mind-sets.

Chua family
Newborn Amy Chua in her mother's arms, a year after her parents arrived in the U.S.

First, I've noticed that Western parents are extremely anxious about their children's self-esteem. They worry about how their children will feel if they fail at something, and they constantly try to reassure their children about how good they are notwithstanding a mediocre performance on a test or at a recital. In other words, Western parents are concerned about their children's psyches. Chinese parents aren't. They assume strength, not fragility, and as a result they behave very differently.

For example, if a child comes home with an A-minus on a test, a Western parent will most likely praise the child. The Chinese mother will gasp in horror and ask what went wrong. If the child comes home with a B on the test, some Western parents will still praise the child. Other Western parents will sit their child down and express disapproval, but they will be careful not to make their child feel inadequate or insecure, and they will not call their child "stupid," "worthless" or "a disgrace." Privately, the Western parents may worry that their child does not test well or have aptitude in the subject or that there is something wrong with the curriculum and possibly the whole school. If the child's grades do not improve, they may eventually schedule a meeting with the school principal to challenge the way the subject is being taught or to call into question the teacher's credentials.

If a Chinese child gets a B—which would never happen—there would first be a screaming, hair-tearing explosion. The devastated Chinese mother would then get dozens, maybe hundreds of practice tests and work through them with her child for as long as it takes to get the grade up to an A.

Chinese parents demand perfect grades because they believe that their child can get them. If their child doesn't get them, the Chinese parent assumes it's because the child didn't work hard enough. That's why the solution to substandard performance is always to excoriate, punish and shame the child. The Chinese parent believes that their child will be strong enough to take the shaming and to improve from it. (And when Chinese kids do excel, there is plenty of ego-inflating parental praise lavished in the privacy of the home.)

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Chua family
Sophia playing at Carnegie Hall in 2007.

Second, Chinese parents believe that their kids owe them everything. The reason for this is a little unclear, but it's probably a combination of Confucian filial piety and the fact that the parents have sacrificed and done so much for their children. (And it's true that Chinese mothers get in the trenches, putting in long grueling hours personally tutoring, training, interrogating and spying on their kids.) Anyway, the understanding is that Chinese children must spend their lives repaying their parents by obeying them and making them proud.

By contrast, I don't think most Westerners have the same view of children being permanently indebted to their parents. My husband, Jed, actually has the opposite view. "Children don't choose their parents," he once said to me. "They don't even choose to be born. It's parents who foist life on their kids, so it's the parents' responsibility to provide for them. Kids don't owe their parents anything. Their duty will be to their own kids." This strikes me as a terrible deal for the Western parent.

Third, Chinese parents believe that they know what is best for their children and therefore override all of their children's own desires and preferences. That's why Chinese daughters can't have boyfriends in high school and why Chinese kids can't go to sleepaway camp. It's also why no Chinese kid would ever dare say to their mother, "I got a part in the school play! I'm Villager Number Six. I'll have to stay after school for rehearsal every day from 3:00 to 7:00, and I'll also need a ride on weekends." God help any Chinese kid who tried that one.

Don't get me wrong: It's not that Chinese parents don't care about their children. Just the opposite. They would give up anything for their children. It's just an entirely different parenting model.

Read More

A Cartoonist on Tiger Parenthood
In China, Not All Practice Tough Love
The Juggle: Are U.S. Parents Too Soft?

Here's a story in favor of coercion, Chinese-style. Lulu was about 7, still playing two instruments, and working on a piano piece called "The Little White Donkey" by the French composer Jacques Ibert. The piece is really cute—you can just imagine a little donkey ambling along a country road with its master—but it's also incredibly difficult for young players because the two hands have to keep schizophrenically different rhythms.

Lulu couldn't do it. We worked on it nonstop for a week, drilling each of her hands separately, over and over. But whenever we tried putting the hands together, one always morphed into the other, and everything fell apart. Finally, the day before her lesson, Lulu announced in exasperation that she was giving up and stomped off.

"Get back to the piano now," I ordered.

"You can't make me."

"Oh yes, I can."

Back at the piano, Lulu made me pay. She punched, thrashed and kicked. She grabbed the music score and tore it to shreds. I taped the score back together and encased it in a plastic shield so that it could never be destroyed again. Then I hauled Lulu's dollhouse to the car and told her I'd donate it to the Salvation Army piece by piece if she didn't have "The Little White Donkey" perfect by the next day. When Lulu said, "I thought you were going to the Salvation Army, why are you still here?" I threatened her with no lunch, no dinner, no Christmas or Hanukkah presents, no birthday parties for two, three, four years. When she still kept playing it wrong, I told her she was purposely working herself into a frenzy because she was secretly afraid she couldn't do it. I told her to stop being lazy, cowardly, self-indulgent and pathetic.

Jed took me aside. He told me to stop insulting Lulu—which I wasn't even doing, I was just motivating her—and that he didn't think threatening Lulu was helpful. Also, he said, maybe Lulu really just couldn't do the technique—perhaps she didn't have the coordination yet—had I considered that possibility?

"You just don't believe in her," I accused.

"That's ridiculous," Jed said scornfully. "Of course I do."

"Sophia could play the piece when she was this age."

"But Lulu and Sophia are different people," Jed pointed out.

"Oh no, not this," I said, rolling my eyes. "Everyone is special in their special own way," I mimicked sarcastically. "Even losers are special in their own special way. Well don't worry, you don't have to lift a finger. I'm willing to put in as long as it takes, and I'm happy to be the one hated. And you can be the one they adore because you make them pancakes and take them to Yankees games."

I rolled up my sleeves and went back to Lulu. I used every weapon and tactic I could think of. We worked right through dinner into the night, and I wouldn't let Lulu get up, not for water, not even to go to the bathroom. The house became a war zone, and I lost my voice yelling, but still there seemed to be only negative progress, and even I began to have doubts.

Then, out of the blue, Lulu did it. Her hands suddenly came together—her right and left hands each doing their own imperturbable thing—just like that.

Lulu realized it the same time I did. I held my breath. She tried it tentatively again. Then she played it more confidently and faster, and still the rhythm held. A moment later, she was beaming.

"Mommy, look—it's easy!" After that, she wanted to play the piece over and over and wouldn't leave the piano. That night, she came to sleep in my bed, and we snuggled and hugged, cracking each other up. When she performed "The Little White Donkey" at a recital a few weeks later, parents came up to me and said, "What a perfect piece for Lulu—it's so spunky and so her."

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discuss

“ I am in disbelief after reading this article. ”
—James Post
Even Jed gave me credit for that one. Western parents worry a lot about their children's self-esteem. But as a parent, one of the worst things you can do for your child's self-esteem is to let them give up. On the flip side, there's nothing better for building confidence than learning you can do something you thought you couldn't.

There are all these new books out there portraying Asian mothers as scheming, callous, overdriven people indifferent to their kids' true interests. For their part, many Chinese secretly believe that they care more about their children and are willing to sacrifice much more for them than Westerners, who seem perfectly content to let their children turn out badly. I think it's a misunderstanding on both sides. All decent parents want to do what's best for their children. The Chinese just have a totally different idea of how to do that.

Western parents try to respect their children's individuality, encouraging them to pursue their true passions, supporting their choices, and providing positive reinforcement and a nurturing environment. By contrast, the Chinese believe that the best way to protect their children is by preparing them for the future, letting them see what they're capable of, and arming them with skills, work habits and inner confidence that no one can ever take away.
—Amy Chua is a professor at Yale Law School and author of "Day of Empire" and "World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability." This essay is excerpted from "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother" by Amy Chua, to be published Tuesday by the Penguin Press, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Copyright © 2011 by Amy Chua.

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National Headache Foundation Migraine Diet - Meh, I eat all the wrong things. Time to change the diet.

2011-03-06T22:41:00.001-08:00

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National Headache Foundation Migraine Diet - Meh, I eat all the wrong things. Time to change the diet.

2011-03-06T22:39:00.001-08:00

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You Are Not a Photographer

2011-03-05T23:18:00.001-08:00

Photo

March 06, 2011

5 Comments

Mary Anne: “The only part of this picture that says “Senior” to me is the text. The rest of it reads middle-aged guy on vacation.”

Ginger: “I can appreciate the from the back shot if it’s done right, THIS is not one of those times. As a SENIOR picture this has disaster written all over it. You would definitely have to have your name embossed on the wallets you passed out to friends and family or nobody would have a clue who you were. This shot might have been saveable if maybe we could have at least seen his profile!”

You Are Not a Photographer

Text

March 05, 2011

33 Comments

7 notes

Comment Fail

As a “pro,” she kinda asked for it. From an observant reader.

Mistie May…commenter, or your next post?

In browsing the comments, I noticed Mistie McDonald has a LOT to say about other photographers…but when she commented that the angel wings/ultrasound shot could be “done right” I raised an eyebrow. I present to you her facebook page (linked by way of her comments). You’re welcome.

https://www.facebook.com/mistiemaystudios

Remember the ultrasound-superimposed-on-a-woman-with-angel-wings-belly picture? It should never “be done.”

Comment Fail

Photo

March 04, 2011

6 Comments

2 notes

Excuse the lack of snark (or maybe you’re welcome for the lack of snark), was just sent this and had to share.

You Are Not a Photographer

Link

March 04, 2011

5 Comments

4 notes

Russian Photoshopped Wedding Photography

From our comments: “When it comes to wedding photos, nobody can beat the Russians.” This is so bad that it’s pretty much awesome at the same time.

Tags: Photoshop Gone Bad

You Are Not a Photographer

Photo

March 04, 2011

6 Comments

2 notes

Ginger: “If you can’t tell that it’s a belly bump YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG!!! I’m fairly certain that if I were pregnant I could take better belly bump pictures of myself in my bathroom with my eyes closed.”

Mary Anne: “I agree with Ginger, the classic self-portrait in front of the bathroom mirror baby bump pictures are better than these. Horrible unflattering angles. That poor momma-to-be must want to burn these.”

Tags: Maternity Gone Wrong

You Are Not a Photographer

Text

March 03, 2011

36 Comments

4 notes

Hate Mail

“Ok, well what’s going so wrong in your life that YOU have nothing better to do than troll the internet picking at what other people choose to do with their days? If you don’t like it, and you want them to feel bad that they’re making fun of people, DON’T FREAKIN’ LOOK! Go somewhere else, there ARE other sites to fill your days. You’re wasting everybodies time.”

…

Everybodies is not a word. It’s bothering me so I’ve decided to officially kick off our hate mail section. Perhaps a list of commonly misspelled hate mail words is in order?

Also, can we talk for a minute about the grammar some “professionals” use on photo business fan pages?

Tags: Hate Mail

Hate Mail

Photo

March 03, 2011

27 Comments

4 notes

If you advertise photography services, a photo might be nice. I guess if you’re only charging a $15 sitting fee, you can’t afford to take the time to upload a photo.

Tags: Craigslist finds

You Are Not a Photographer

Link

March 02, 2011

5 Comments

1 note

The New Face of Photography

“All it takes is a digital camera some editing software and a shop light from Home Depot and You are a Professional Photographer too!”

You Are Not a Photographer

Photo

March 02, 2011

35 Comments

13 notes

Ginger: “Just because you CAN do things in Photoshop doesn’t mean that you SHOULD. I personally find this photo a little disturbing and am really not okay with the angel wings. I thought that storks delivered babies, I wasn’t aware that angels were now delivering the babies.”

Mary Anne: “I get it. She’s pregnant with Skeletor and has a transparent stomach. So obvious.”

You Are Not a Photographer

Photo

March 02, 2011

16 Comments

7 notes

Ginger and I have been rolling on the floor laughing since we opened our email to this. If you use PRO in all caps in the same breath as saying your client picks up her own pictures at Wal-Mart AND manage to misspell copyright, you might want to rethink your photography career.

You Are Not a Photographer

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