According to the Star Tribune, Starbucks recently decided to resurrect its original bare-breasted mermaid logo, much to the dismay of the Christian group, "The Resistance," who is calling for a national boycott. The logo, based on a 16th Century Norse woodcut, will be on Starbucks cups for at least a few more weeks and will be the permanent logo for Pike Place bags of coffee. According to the Christian group, the logo "has a naked woman on it with her legs spread like a prostitute," and that "the company might as well call themselves Slutbucks." We didn't even know that mermaids had legs. More, inside...
The article says,
The image is a less-revealing version of what the chain used for many years, starting when it first opened in Seattle in 1971. That original logo was resurrected in its Northwest outlets for a time in 2006 to mark the chain's 35th anniversary.
Company spokeswoman, Bridget Baker said the newly revived logo was "modified a bit [from the original] based on feedback" from Starbucks customers during its 2006 appearance. "We feel it's appropriate," she said. Howard Shultz, Starbucks' founder, said in his book, "That early siren, bare-breasted and Rubenesque, was supposed to be seductive as coffee itself."
We seriously doubt this logo is obscene enough to deter anyone from their morning cup. From what we know of coffee drinkers, still photos from German scheissen porn wouldn't separate them from their hot liquid crack.
Group finds Starbucks logo too hot to handle [Star Tribune]
(Photo: Star Tribune)
Saturday, June 14, 2008
Disgruntled Northwest Airlink Flight Attendant Sets Fire Inside Plane [Disgruntled Employee]
According to the AP, 19 yr-old flight attendant Eder Rojas of Woodbury, Minn., was arrested on Wednesday for intentionally setting a fire inside a paper towel compartment in the rear bathroom of the plane. Rojas told officials that he was was upset at Compass Airlines for making him work that particular route. He allegedly boarded the plane that day with extra paper towels and a lighter. Details, inside...
The article says,
Compass is a subsidiary of Northwest Airlines. Northwest spokesman Rob Laughlin said Rojas has been fired.
Rojas made his initial court appearance in Minneapolis on Thursday and was ordered held without bail pending another court date Monday, prosecutors said. The charge of setting fire aboard a civil aircraft carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.
His public defender did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
Authorities said Rojas asked for extra paper towels and tissue before the plane left Minneapolis. He allegedly took a lighter from another flight attendant's home earlier that day and had it with him when he went through the security checkpoint.
"Rojas further stated that he was preparing his cart to serve the passengers, he set the cart up, went back to the lavatory and reached in with his right hand and lit the paper towels with the lighter," court documents say.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Lynn Jordheim, who is prosecuting the case in Fargo, would not comment.
Pilot Steve Peterka told authorities that an indicator light came on about 35 minutes into the flight, showing smoke in the rear bathroom.
The court documents say Peterka called Rojas, who was assigned passengers in the back of the flight, and asked him to check the bathroom. Rojas, another flight attendant and a passenger were credited with quickly putting out the flames with fire extinguishers, authorities said.
Investigators later found a lighter in one of the overhead bins.
FBI agent Ralph Boelter said Compass Airlines officials showed "extraordinary cooperation" in the investigation.
Ever hear of calling in sick??
Flight attendant accused of setting fire on airplane [AP] (Thanks to Jeffrey!)
The article says,
Compass is a subsidiary of Northwest Airlines. Northwest spokesman Rob Laughlin said Rojas has been fired.
Rojas made his initial court appearance in Minneapolis on Thursday and was ordered held without bail pending another court date Monday, prosecutors said. The charge of setting fire aboard a civil aircraft carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.
His public defender did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
Authorities said Rojas asked for extra paper towels and tissue before the plane left Minneapolis. He allegedly took a lighter from another flight attendant's home earlier that day and had it with him when he went through the security checkpoint.
"Rojas further stated that he was preparing his cart to serve the passengers, he set the cart up, went back to the lavatory and reached in with his right hand and lit the paper towels with the lighter," court documents say.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Lynn Jordheim, who is prosecuting the case in Fargo, would not comment.
Pilot Steve Peterka told authorities that an indicator light came on about 35 minutes into the flight, showing smoke in the rear bathroom.
The court documents say Peterka called Rojas, who was assigned passengers in the back of the flight, and asked him to check the bathroom. Rojas, another flight attendant and a passenger were credited with quickly putting out the flames with fire extinguishers, authorities said.
Investigators later found a lighter in one of the overhead bins.
FBI agent Ralph Boelter said Compass Airlines officials showed "extraordinary cooperation" in the investigation.
Ever hear of calling in sick??
Flight attendant accused of setting fire on airplane [AP] (Thanks to Jeffrey!)
McDonald's: Drink What We Say Or No Free Southern Chicken Sandwich
Reader "Thunderpants" says that she was in McDonald's yesterday during their free chicken sandwich promotion. The deal: Buy a medium or large drink and the sandwich itself is on the house. For some reason, however, this particular McDonald's declared that only soft drink purchasers qualified for sandwiches. Nothing, not even a customer who claimed to have written the actual ad copy for the promotion, could convince them otherwise.
Yesterday, McDonald’s was giving away free southern-style chicken sandwiches if you purchased a medium or large drink. I went down to the location in my office building, where there were three lines. It was busy, but nowhere near riot status.
As I stood in line, I repeatedly heard the employees telling customers that purchasing a “Sweet Tea” didn’t count for the free sandwich. Some left, some rolled their eyes and ordered a “drink” instead, but all of them were pretty peeved about it.
As it happens, someone in the line ahead of me worked for the ad agency that McDonald’s uses and said she WROTE THE AD COPY. She asked to talk to the manager, because she said that Sweet Tea was part of the promotion.
They made her wait. By the time I had ordered and was waiting for my food, two managers came out from the back looking decidedly hostile. When the ad exec tried to explain the ad to them, they immediately cut her off and shouted “No, No, No” and pretty much told her to get lost.
My curiosity was piqued, so I called McDonald’s customer service hotline to find out who was right. Guess what? The managers were completely wrong. The CSR told me “you could buy a milk chug and get a free sandwich. Any drink!” She offered me free coupons for more chicken sandwiches, but I declined because I didn’t want to give my name and address, especially since I wasn’t directly involved.
So, BOO to the local franchise managers, but way to go Customer Service Rep.
Sincerely,
Thunderpants
Nice investigative reporting, Thunderpants. It's good to know that ad agency people are forces for justice, trying to keep McDonald's honest, but it's too bad they didn't listen to her.
Yesterday, McDonald’s was giving away free southern-style chicken sandwiches if you purchased a medium or large drink. I went down to the location in my office building, where there were three lines. It was busy, but nowhere near riot status.
As I stood in line, I repeatedly heard the employees telling customers that purchasing a “Sweet Tea” didn’t count for the free sandwich. Some left, some rolled their eyes and ordered a “drink” instead, but all of them were pretty peeved about it.
As it happens, someone in the line ahead of me worked for the ad agency that McDonald’s uses and said she WROTE THE AD COPY. She asked to talk to the manager, because she said that Sweet Tea was part of the promotion.
They made her wait. By the time I had ordered and was waiting for my food, two managers came out from the back looking decidedly hostile. When the ad exec tried to explain the ad to them, they immediately cut her off and shouted “No, No, No” and pretty much told her to get lost.
My curiosity was piqued, so I called McDonald’s customer service hotline to find out who was right. Guess what? The managers were completely wrong. The CSR told me “you could buy a milk chug and get a free sandwich. Any drink!” She offered me free coupons for more chicken sandwiches, but I declined because I didn’t want to give my name and address, especially since I wasn’t directly involved.
So, BOO to the local franchise managers, but way to go Customer Service Rep.
Sincerely,
Thunderpants
Nice investigative reporting, Thunderpants. It's good to know that ad agency people are forces for justice, trying to keep McDonald's honest, but it's too bad they didn't listen to her.
Meet Crissy, The High Priestess Of Coupon Clippers [Coupons]
Crissy Thompson (pictured left) is among the coupon clipping elite. 11Alive News followed her around one day to learn some of her secrets. At a local Publix, Crissy managed to get two-thirds off her grocery bill and at CVS picked up $140 worth of goods for $5. Often, she spends only $10 a week on groceries and that's with 3 kids and a husband. Check out some of her techniques and her favorite coupon web sites, inside...
Crissy's incredible results don't come without preparation. She usually spends an hour week getting prepared for her shopping trip which takes her 3 to 4 hours and includes 3 to 7 local stores.
Like any good soldier, Crissy starts by gathering her ammunition. She does this by buying 2 copies of the Sunday double paper which renders 4 sets of coupons. Next she hits her favorite web sites which include: gottadeal.com and hotcouponworld.com
Crissy decided to show the news crew a sampling of what she does and they proceeded to hit CVS and a Publix, two of her favorite stores.
At Publix, Crissy made good use of the buy 1 get 1 free coupons. Most grocery stores will also let you buy just one item and get 50% off. If you can then pair a coupon with that you can get the item for free or next to nothing.
Crissy also explained that when a coupon reads "1 coupon per purchase" you are not actually limited to using it only once. For example she took 2 boxes of cereal that were buy 1 get 1 free for $3.79 a box. Crissy also had 2, $3 off coupons to go with each of the boxes of cereal. Crissy made over $2 on the cereal. At checkout Crissy's total was $15.38, she saved $36.22.
Next they went to CVS. Crissy says the best deals there are coupons and Extra Care Bucks. Extra Care Bucks are given on specially marked items. You receive the bucks at checkout and use them on a following purchase. Most people would simply use these Extra Care Bucks the next time they came to the store, or forget about them altogether. However, Crissy uses them the same visit by splitting up her purchase into separate transactions.
They arrived at the checkout counter where Crissy proceeded to split her checkout into 5 transactions. She took the Extra Care Bucks from each transaction and applied it to each following transaction. Apparently, CVS has no problem doing this for Crissy. All said and done, Crissy bought approximately $140 worth of merchandise for under $5. Crazy, huh?
It looks like the Crissy-craze is catching on, she will even have her own website soon. What are your favorite little-known coupon tricks?
If I Didn't See It With my Own Eyes [11 Alive] (Thanks to Josh!)
Crissy's incredible results don't come without preparation. She usually spends an hour week getting prepared for her shopping trip which takes her 3 to 4 hours and includes 3 to 7 local stores.
Like any good soldier, Crissy starts by gathering her ammunition. She does this by buying 2 copies of the Sunday double paper which renders 4 sets of coupons. Next she hits her favorite web sites which include: gottadeal.com and hotcouponworld.com
Crissy decided to show the news crew a sampling of what she does and they proceeded to hit CVS and a Publix, two of her favorite stores.
At Publix, Crissy made good use of the buy 1 get 1 free coupons. Most grocery stores will also let you buy just one item and get 50% off. If you can then pair a coupon with that you can get the item for free or next to nothing.
Crissy also explained that when a coupon reads "1 coupon per purchase" you are not actually limited to using it only once. For example she took 2 boxes of cereal that were buy 1 get 1 free for $3.79 a box. Crissy also had 2, $3 off coupons to go with each of the boxes of cereal. Crissy made over $2 on the cereal. At checkout Crissy's total was $15.38, she saved $36.22.
Next they went to CVS. Crissy says the best deals there are coupons and Extra Care Bucks. Extra Care Bucks are given on specially marked items. You receive the bucks at checkout and use them on a following purchase. Most people would simply use these Extra Care Bucks the next time they came to the store, or forget about them altogether. However, Crissy uses them the same visit by splitting up her purchase into separate transactions.
They arrived at the checkout counter where Crissy proceeded to split her checkout into 5 transactions. She took the Extra Care Bucks from each transaction and applied it to each following transaction. Apparently, CVS has no problem doing this for Crissy. All said and done, Crissy bought approximately $140 worth of merchandise for under $5. Crazy, huh?
It looks like the Crissy-craze is catching on, she will even have her own website soon. What are your favorite little-known coupon tricks?
If I Didn't See It With my Own Eyes [11 Alive] (Thanks to Josh!)
Friday, June 13, 2008
CHAIRman Mao
Artist Gerald Scarfe created this chair/sculpture that looks like Chairman Mao (by way of Jabba the Hutt), so you can be cushioned by the gentle curves of the Great Helmsman as you play on your Xbox. Link
Lost mechanical servant of 1961
In July, 1961, Popular Mechanix brought its readers "a life-size, remote-controlled servomechanical robot built by Vienna engineer Claus Scholz. The MM47 can do almost anything from housework to handling radioactive materials or fighting fires from the inside while the operator stays at a safe distance. The 105-pound plastic robot cost about $760 to build."
Another one lost to the ages. Link
Another one lost to the ages. Link
Really gonna miss you
Really gonna miss you Its really gonna be different without you Time is gonna be hard and slow For the rest of my life Gonna be thinking about you (yes I am) Time came when you had to go I’ll miss you my buddy I’ll miss you my friend I promise my love for you will never end In your finest hour I was there with you And without you things wont be the same But there’s a higher power that we answer to And you heard him calling your name Really gonna miss you Everything about you your smiling face I know you want us all to be strong Really gonna miss you I know your going to that magic place Singing you a brand new song I’ll miss you my buddy I’ll miss you my friend I promise my love for you will never end
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Lai mot ngay nua troi qua.......
Ngay hon nay that la cang thang qua,Cai do an nay lam Minhton tho mat.oi!met moi qua,thiet ke mai ma khong xong?Met moi that.Minh sap phat dien len mat.Hom truoc Ban MInh cho Minh muon mot to bao"Blog trai tim"That buon vi Minh chua kip doc ma da khong rhay dau roi ?BUon qua di mat Minh tim mai nhung khogn thay dau ...chan het cho noi.Nhuc het ca dau...Met qua,troi oi.
Chiec La Cuoi Cung
Trong một quận nhỏ phia đông Washington, các con đường chạy ngoằn nghoèo một cách điên dại, cắt quãng thành những dải nhỏ gọi là "vùng". Những "vùng" này lọt thỏm trong những góc và đường cong lạ kì. Một con đương cắt ngang với chính nó một, hai lần. Một hoạ sĩ đã có lần khám phá là con đường có thể có giá. Ví dụ như khi một nhân viên thu ngân cầm hoá đơn của mầu vẽ, giấy và vải, sau khi đi dọc theo đường này bỗng thấy mình đã đi vòng lại chỗ cũ mà không hề thu được một xu nào cả!
Thế nên đám hoạ sĩ chẳng bao lâu đã kéo đến phường Greenwich, săn lùng phòng cho thuê có cửa sổ thông ra hướng bắc, góc mái kiểu thế kỷ 18, gác lửng kiểu Hà Lan, và giá thuê lại rẻ. Sau đấy họ mang vào vài lọ hợp kim thiếc, một hai cái chảo nấu ăn dã chiến, và thế là một "quần cư" thành hình.
Hai cô Sue và Johnsy cùng thuê chung một căn phòng đơn giản ở tầng trên cùng của một toà nhà ba tầng lụp xụp. "Johnsy" thực ra là tên thân mật của California. Họ đã gặp nhau tại một hiệu ăn trên đường Số Tám, và khám phá ra là họ có những sở thích tương đồng về nghệ thuật, rau diếp xoắn trộn dấm, và thời trang với tay áo giám mục. Thế là họ cùng thuê chung một căn phòng.
Đấy là vào Tháng 5 . Vào tháng 11, có một kẻ ngoại nhập mang theo giá lạnh nhưng vô hình, mà các bác sĩ gọi là Viêm Phổi, rình rập trong "quần cư", móng vuốt giá băng quệt vào đây đó. Tên giặc đã ngang nhiên hoành hành khu phía đông, hạ gục nhiều nạn nhân, nhưng hắn chỉ mới đặt chân chầm chậm qua các lối ngõ như bàn cờ của mấy "vùng" nhỏ hẹp phủ đầy rêu.
Bạn sẽ không xem Thần Viêm Phổi như một quân tử già đầy hào hiệp. Người con gái nhỏ vốn đã mất máu vì những trận gió ở Califỏnia thì lẽ ra không đáng cho một kẻ bất tài già nua bận tâm đến. Nhưng hắn đã tấn công Johnsy. Thế là cô nằm bẹp, không mấy cử động, trên chiếc giường sắt, xuyên qua khung cửa sổ kiểu Hà Lan nhìn ra bức tường trơ trụi của căn nhà gạch kế bên.
Một buổi sáng, vị bác sĩ đầy bận rộn mời Sue ra hành lang. Ông đang vẩy cái nhiệt kế thăm bệnh để mực thuỷ ngân trong đó hạ xuống.
- Cơ may khởi bệnh của cô ấy áng chừng chỉ một phần mười. Và cơ may này là tuỳ vào việc cô ấy có ý chí muốn sống hay không. Với cách con bệnh chỉ ngóng chờ công ty mai táng đến thì sách thuốc nào cũng vô dụng. Cô bạn nhỏ của cô đã bị ám ảnh là cô ấy sẽ không qua khỏi. Cô ấy có ý định gì không?
- Chị ấy... chị ấy muốn có ngày nào đó vẽ tranh phong cảnh vịnh Naples.
- Vẽ tranh à? Thật là điên rồ! Cô ấy có bận tâm nặng nề về việc gì không, chẳng hạn về một người đàn ông nào đó?
Cô Sue khịt mũi:
- Một người đàn ông à? Một người đàn ông thì có thể... mà không, bác sĩ ạ, không có chuyện như thế.
Vị bác sĩ nói:
- Thế thì là do cô ấy quá yếu rồi. Tôi sẽ cố làm mọi cách mà khoa học cho phép. Nhưng mỗi khi con bệnh của tôi bắt đầu nhẩm tính số lượng xe trong chuyến đưa đám của họ thì xem như hiệu lực của thuốc men chỉ còn một nửa. Nếu cô có cách khiến cho cô ấy hỏi han cô về thời trang mua đông thì tôi có thể đoán chắc cơ may là một phần năm, thay vì là một phần mười.
Sau khi vị bác sĩ đi khỏi, Sue đi vào phòng vẽ và khóc cho đến khi cái khăn giấy Nhật tơi tả thành bột giấy. Rồi cô đường bệ đi vào phòng của Johnsy với cái giá vẽ, miệng huýt sáo một điệu dân ca Mỹ rộn ràng.
Johnsy vẫn nằm bẹp, xem chừng không động đậy chút nào dưới tấm vải giường, mặt hướng về cái cửa sổ. Sue ngưng huýt sáo, nghĩ là bạn mình đang ngủ. Cô sắp xếp giá vẽ và bắt đầu dùng viết và mực để vẽ hình minh hoạ cho một truyện để đăng trong một tạp chí. Trong khi các hoạ sĩ trẻ tuổi phải dọn đường cho Hội Hoạ bằng cách vẽ tranh cho truyện ấy để dọn đường cho Văn Chương. Khi Sue đang phác hoạ cái quần bảnh bao và gọng kinh một tròng của một anh hùng (một tay cao bồi bang Idaho), cô nghe một tiếng nho nhỏ, lặp lại vài lần.
Cô đi vội đến bên mép giường. Johnsy đang mở mắt, nhìn ra cửa sổ, và đang đếm, đếm ngược: "mười hai", và ít lâu sau: "mười một", và sau đấy "mười", rồi "chín", rồi "tám" và "bảy" gần như liền nhau.
Sue nhìn chăm chú bên ngoài cửa sổ. Có gì ở ngoài đấy đâu mà đếm? Chỉ có một khoảng sân trống buồn nản, và bức tường trơ trụi của một căn nhà gạch xa hơn chừng mười thước. Một dây thường xuân thật già cỗi, gốc vặn vẹo mục nát, leo đến giữa bức tường gạch. Ngọn gió thu lạnh đã làm rơi rụng đám lá, phơi bầy các nhánh gần như trơ trụi bám vào mấy mảng gạch vụn vỡ. Sue hỏi?
- Cái gì vậy hở bồ?
Johnsy nói, gần như thì thầm:
- Sáu. Bây giờ rơi nhanh quá. Ba ngày trước còn gần cả trăm, đếm muốn nhức đầu. Nhưng giờ thì dễ rồi. Thêm chiếc nữa. Giờ chỉ còn lại năm.
- Năm cái gì, noi cho Sue của bồ nghe nào!
- Năm chiếc lá. Trên cây thường Xuân. Khi chiếc lá cuối cùng rụng thì mình cũng sẽ ra đi. Minh đã biết như thế ba ngày nay rồi. Bác sĩ không nói cho bạn biết à.
Sue càu nhàu, với giọng khinh miệt cao quý.
- Ô hay! Minh chưa bao giờ nghe có chuyện điên khùng như vậy. Mấy cái lá thường Xuân thì có liên hệ gì đến việc bồ khỏi bệnh đâu nào? Và bồ vẫn thích cái cây này, cô nàng hư đốn ơi! Đừng có ngốc nghếch. Sáng nay ông bác sĩ nới với mình là cơ may của bồ khỏi bệnh hẳn... xem ông ấy nói gì nào... ông ấy nói cơ may chính xácd là mười trong một! Đấy cũng bằng với cơ may chúng mình có ơ New York để đáp tầu điện hay đi qua một toà nhà mới. Bây giờ ăn một tí cháo, rồi mua ít tượu vang poóc-tô cho cô bé đang bệnh, và thịt lợn cho chính tác giả ăn.
Johnsy vẫn dán mắt ra ngoài cửa sổ:
- Không cần phải mua rượu vang. Thêm một chiếc nữa. Không, mình không muốn ăn cháo. Thế là còn có bốn. Mình muốn xem chiếc lá cuối cùng trước khi trời tối. Khi ấy mình cũng sẽ ra đi.
Sue nghiêng mình trên cô:
- Johnsy ơi, bồ có thể hứa nhắm mắt lại và không nhìn ra ngoài cửa sổ khi mình làm việc được không? Ngày mai mình phải đi giao mấy bức vẽ. Minh cần ánh sáng, nếu không mình phải kéo rèm xuống.
Johnsy hỏi, giọng lạnh tanh:
- Bạn có thể vẽ trong phòng kia được không?
- Mình muốn ở kề bên bồ. Hơn nữa, mình không muốn bồ cứ nhìn mãi mấy chiếc lá thường Xuân vô duyên đó.
- Cho mình biết khi nào bạn làm xong, vì mình muốn xem chiếc lá cuối cùng rụng xuống. Mình chán chờ đợi rồi. Mình chán suy nghĩ. Mình muốn buông xuôi tất cả, và thả người trôi xuống, xuống nữa, như là một trong mấy chiếc lá mệt mỏi kia.
Johnsy nhắm mắt lại, mặt tái nhợt, năm yên như la một cái tượng bị sập đổ.
- Ráng ngủ đi. Mình muốn kêu ông Behrman lên để ngồi mẫu cho mình vẽ một ông thợ mỏ già cô độc. Mình chỉ đi một phút. Đừng cựa quậy cho đến khi mình trở lại.
Ông già Behrman là một hoạ sĩ sống ở tầng trệt bên dưới phòng của họ. Ông đã quá sáu mươi, và có một chòm râu rậm như ông Moses hiện thân trên bức điêu khắc của Michael Angelo. Behrman là cả một sự thất bại trong nghệ thuật. Trong bốn mươi năm ông vung vẩy chiếc cọ mà không hề chạm gần đến vạt áo của Người Tình. Ông luôn luôn muốn vẽ nên một kiệt tác, nhưng chưa bao giờ bắt đầu. Trong vài năm nay ông không vẽ được gì ngoại trừ thỉnh thoảng ít nét quấy quá cho giới thương mại và quảng cáo. Ông kiếm tiền chút đỉnh bằng việc ngồi làm mẫu cho các hoạ sĩ trẻ trong quần cư khi họ không muốn trả theo giá của người mẫu chuyên nghiệp. Ông uống rượu gin lu bù, và vẫn nói đến kiệt tác sắp đến của ông. Còn lại thì Behrnam là một ông già nhỏ thó nhưng dữ tợn, hay chửi như té tát người nào tỏ ra yếu đuối, và xem mình như là con chó giữ nhà để bảo vệ cho hai hoạ sĩ trẻ sống ở tấng trên.
Sue tìm gặp behrman khi ông nồng nặc mùi rượu dâu trong căn phòng nhỏ tối tù mù. Trong một góc là cái giá vẽ với khung vải trống trơn, suốtt hai mươi lăm năm vẫn chờ đợi đường nét đầu tiên của một kiệt tác. Cô nói cho ông nghe về chuyện hão huyền của Johnsy, về việc cô nàng – quả thật nhẹ tênh và mỏng manh như một chiếc lá - sẽ trôi đi khi sự bám víu của cô vào trần thế vốn đã yếu sẽ yếu thêm.
Ông già Behrman, với cặp mắt đỏ sòng sọc, lớn tiếng kinh thường và chế diễu cho những điều tưởng tượng ngốc nghếch:
- Khốn khổ! ở đời sao lại có người ngu xuẩn muốn chết vì mấy cái lá rụng từ một dây leo vô duyên như vậy? Tao chưa bao giờ nghe có chuyện này. Không tao sẽ không ngòi làm mẫu cho một đứa ẩn cưa ngu ngốc như mày. Tại sao mày lại để ý tưởng khùng điên đấy đi vào đầu của nó? Ôi dào, cái con nhỏ Johnsy khốn khổ!
- Chị ấy đang yếu lắm, và cơn sốt làm cho đầu óc chị ấy trở nên bệnh hoạn đầy những mơ tưởng kỳ quái. Được rồi, nếu ông không muốn ngồi làm mẫu cho tôi cũng được. Nhưng tôi nghĩ ông là một ông già xấu tính – già vô tích sự.
Ông Behrman tru tréo lên:
- Mày đúng là đàn bà! Ai bảo tao không muốn ngồi làm mẫu? Đi lên đi. Tao sẽ đến. Cả nửa giờ đồng hồ rồi tao đã nói là tao sẵn sàng ngồi. Trời ơi! Đây không phải là chỗ cô Johnsy có thể năm bẹp dưỡng bệnh được. Một ngày nào đấy tao sẽ vẽ nên một kiệt tác, và bọn mình sẽ rời đi nơi khác. Trời ơi! Đúng là phải như thế.
Johnst đang ngủ khi họ lên. Sue buông cái rèm cửa xuống, ra dấu bảo Behrman đi vào phòng kia. Trong đấy, xuyên qua khung cửa sổ họ nhìn dây thường
Xuân với nỗi lo sợ. Rồi họ nhìn nhau một lúc, không nói lời nào. Một cơn mưa giá lạnh đang ập xuống dai dẳng, pha cùng với tuyết. Trong chiếc áo xanh cũ kỹ, Behrman ngồi làm mẫu, giả làm một thợ mỏ ẩn cư, ngồi trên một cái ấm lật ngược giả làm một tảng đá.
Khi Sue thức giấc vào buổi sáng sau giấc ngủ kéo dài một giờ, cô thấy Johnsy đang vô hòn nhìn cái rèm màu sậm đã buông xuống. Johnsy thì thào:
- Kéo rèm lên. Mình muốn nhìn.
Sue mệt mỏi làm theo bạn.
- Nhưng xem kìa! Sau trận mưa vùi dập và những cơn gió xoáy dữ tợn suốt một đêm dài, vẫn còn một chiếc lá thường Xuân dựa trên bức tường gạch. Đấy là chiếc lá cuối cùng. Vẫn còn có mầu xanh thẫm gần cuống, nhưng với phần rìa te tua pha mầu vàng của sự tàn tạ, chiếc lá vẫn dũng cảm bám vào cái cành cao dăm bảy mét cách mặt đất.
Johnsy nói:
- Đấy là chiếc lá cuối cùng. Mình nghĩ chắc chắn nó đã rụng đêm qua. Mình nghe tiếng gió. Nó sẽ rụng hôm nay, và mình sẽ chết cùng lúc với nó.
Sue nghiêng khuôn mặt tóp của cô kề cận cái gối:
- Cưng ơi là cưng! Nếu cưng không nghĩ đến chính bản thân cưng thì nên nghĩ đến mình đây. Mình sẽ làm được gì chứ?
Nhưng Johnsy không trả lời. Nỗi cô đơn cùng cực nhất trên thế gian là một linh hồn chuẩn bị tiếp tục cuộc hành trình bí ẩn, xa thẳm. Điều mộng tưởng dường như đã ảm ảnh cô mạnh mẽ hơn khi những dây nối buộc cô với tình bạn và với trần thế đã bị lơi lỏng.
Ngày dần trôi, và dù qua khoảng không xám xịt, họ vẫn thấy chiếc lá đơn độc bảm vào cuống của nó, dựa vào bức tường. Và rồi, khi màn đêm buông xuống, gió bắc lại thổi, trong khi mưa vẫn đập vào các cửa sổ, chảy ồng ộc xuống theo rìa mái nhà kiểu Hà Lan.
Khi đã có đủ ánh sáng buổi tinh sương, Johnsy, con người vô cảm, lại ra lệnh kéo cái rèm xuống.
Chiếc lá thường Xuôn vẫn còn đấy.
Johnsy nằm một hồi lâu nhìn nó. Và rồi cô gọi Sue, đang quậy nồi cháo ga trên cái bếp ga. Cô nói:
- Minh là đứa hư, Sue à. Có cái gì đó đã khiến chiếc lá vẫn ở đấy để cho thấy mình quả là độc ác. Muốn chết là một cái tội. Bây giờ bồ có thể mang cho mình chút cháo, và ít sữa pha chút rượu vang póc-tô, và... không, mang trước cho mình cái gương soi cầm tay, rồi chèn ít cái gối quanh mình, rồi mình sẽ ngồi lên để xem bồ nấu nướng.
Một giờ sau, cô nói:
- Sue à, một ngày nào đấy mình sẽ vẽ cảnh vịnh Naples.
Ông bác sĩ đến vào buổi xế chiều, và khi ông trở ra Sue có cớ để đi ra ngoài hành lanh. Ông nắm lấy bàn tay gầy, run rẩy của Sue đặt trong tay ông.
- Cơ may ngang bằng. Với công chăm sóc tận tuỵ của cô, cô sẽ thắng. Và giờ tôi phải đến thăm một ca khác ở tầng dưới. Người bệnh là Behrman – tôi nghĩ chừng đâu là một hoạ sĩ. Cũng viêm phổi. Ông ta già cả, yếu đuối, cơn bệnh lại là cấp tính. Không có hi vọng gì, nhưng tôi sẽ đưa ông đến bệnh viện để được thoải mái hơn.
Ngày kế, ông bác sĩ bảo Sue:
- Cô ấy qua khỏi cơn nguy rồi. Cô đã thắng. Bây giờ chỉ cần dinh dưỡng và chăm sóc – chỉ có thế thôi.
Buổi chiều ấy, khi Johsy đang đan một cái khăn quàng len mầu lam thật đậm và xem vẻ rất vô dụng, Sue đến bên giường cô, đặt cánh tay quanh cô và cũng quanh mấy cái gối.
- Mình có chuyện này nói cho bồ biết, cái con chuột trắng ơi. Ông Behrman qua đời hôm nay ở bệnh viện vì chứng viêm phổi. Ông ấy nhuốm bệnh chỉ trong có hai ngày. Người gác dan tìm thấy ông sáng ngày đầu tiên trong căn phòng tầng dưới, thất thủ với cân đau đớn. Đôi giầy và quần áo ông ấy bị ướt cả, lạnh như nước đá. Họ không thể hiểu nổi ông đã đi đâu trong một đêm kinh hoàng như thế. Và rồi họ tìm thấy cái đèn bão, vẫn cháy, và một cái thang đã bị rời khỏi nơi cất giữ, vài cây cọ tơi tả, và nghiên mầu mới ít mầu xanh và vàng, bồ nhìn ra ngoài cửa sổ xem, nhìn chiếc lá thường Xuân cuối cùng trên bức tường đấy. Bồ có đặt nghi vấn tại sao nó không bao giờ bay lất phất khi có gió thổi không? Cưng ơi, đó là kiệt tác của ông Behrman đấy - ông đã vẽ nó đúng vào đêm chiếc lá cuối cùng rơi rụng.
Story about sex (časť 1.)
Do izby prenikalo mesačné svetlo. Na kraji postele sedel Richard a ostýchavo sa pozeral do zeme. Sedel tam mlčky už hodnú chvíľku a premýšľal nad svojou zajtrajšou svadbou. Nad svojím životným rozhodnutím, ktoré ho malo pripútať k žene. Malo ho pripútať k zodpovednosti. Nebál sa. Bol statný chlap, na tvári mal týždňovú bradu, ale v očiach stále nevinný a detský pohľad. Taký bol Richard – večné dieťa. Rodičmi milovaný a vychovaný. Trestaný i chválený. To veľké chlapisko bývajúce na okraji mesta v dome po svojich rodičoch. Otec umrel ako prvý. Na starobu, povedali lekári. Bol to prísny chlap. Bol politikom v mestskej rade a neustále požadoval od Richarda 'adekvátne správanie'. Tak to vždy vravieval. „Správaj sa adekvátne Richard!"
Aj po troch rokoch mu to vie ešte preblysnúť hlavou. Bohužiaľ, vždy v tých najnevhodnejších situáciach. Najčastejšie so ženami. Teda sa snaží dostať do ich prítomnosti a pozornosti, keď zrazu počuje túto kreténsku vetu a niečo sa v ňom pohne a on sa zodvihne a odíde. Richard je pekný chlap. Skutočne, nezavádzam. Je to predsa úspešný burzový maklér, budúci manžel a otec minimálne tridsiatich detí. Správal sa adekvátne. Mal uhladené vlasy i správanie. V spoločnosti jednička, v posteli jedna veľká nula. Krásny kontrast. Možno len čakal, kedy sa to stane zelenú a bude žiť svoj život. Veštci vlastne na to čakáme. Opona spadne a my môžeme ísť konečne vydýchnuť a žiť. Lenže ako žiť?
Takú istú dilemu zažívala i Matilde. Bývala asi o štyri ulice ďalej, ale Richarda stretla pred pol rokom na jednom benefičnom večierku. Jej telom prechádzali nekontrolovateľné vlny strachu a napätie zo zajtrajšieho dňa. Keď si Richard pred ňu minulý mesiac kľakol, skoro zamdlela. Nechcela sa vydávať, nechcela sa viazať. Jej matka sa od šťastím, ešte ten deň takmer zbláznila. Obtelefonovala všetky svoje kamarátky a oznamovala im tú úžasnú novinu. Matilde len plakala vo svojej izbe. Nikdy nepochopí, prečo povedala áno. Bola to scénka, ktorú nechcela pokaziť. Bol to omyl. Zodvihla sa z postele a otvorila šatník. Vyhodila zopár kusov oblečenia až našla starú ošúchanú krabicu, z ktorej vytiahla denník. Začala si ho písať už v sedemnástich. Na prvej strane bol zoznam toho, čo by chcela v živote dosiahnuť. Hneď prvá vec na zozname, bola najstaršia túžba našej Matilde, hrať sólo v národnom orchestri na husle. Chcela byť virtuózkou, chcela byť umelkyňou, ktorá má svoje sólo v orchestri. Nechcela byť úbohou ženou za šporákom a zásterou upackanou od múčnika. Chcela byť niekym a žiť svoje sny. Lenže ako žiť?
How to tie cravat .
Mấy hôm trước đang đi học thì nhận được điện thoại của đứa bạn gọi về dự một buổi lễ quan trọng. Tưởng chỉ đến dự thôi ai ngờ lại phát sinh ra nhiều chuyện, đáng nói nhất là cái vụ thắt cà-vạt (cravat-tie). Hồi nhỏ đến giờ có biết thắt cravat bao giờ đâu, đi học toàn quần jean áo pull thôi, cùng lắm mặc áo trắng đóng thùng là là lịch sự lắm rồi, thế mà bây giờ . . . . :eyes: so confuse.
Chạy đến hỏi Omoni thì Omoni nói đến gặp Apochi mà hỏi, lúc này Apochi đang ngủ đánh thức Apochi thì hơi phiền, thế là lên Google search một hồi thì lạc vô cái diễn đàn kia chỉ cách thắt cravat :yikes: .... mừng húm :D down về liền :p . Chiều nay là đi rồi nên lấy cái cravat ra làm luôn, quả thật hơi bị khó, thắt xong nhìn lại thì y như vừa thực tập băng cổ bệnh nhân vậy :D . Tới phút thứ 89' thì mới thắt được tàm tạm thế là "tròng" vô cổ đi luôn. Thế là từ nay lại biết thêm skill thắt cravat :) so pround of me
Tiện thể mình up hình lên đây, ai muốn học thắt cravat thì go on nhé.
Good luck !
Alien intro to Earth culture movie mixed from old public-domain industrial films
Stefan sez,
The Prelinger Archives is an incredible collection of old films, many of them accessible via its website.LinkIn addition to old industrial films, quaint hygiene lessons for teenagers, and jaw-dropping things like footage of pre-1906 quake San Francisco, the site now features contributed mashups.
I particularly like "Planet Earth: Our Response," a dreamy mix of archive footage (assembled to look like an introduction to Earth culture) and shots of a guy mucking around with an alien probe.
All-mechanical "digital" watch
De Grisogono Meccanico DG is an all-mechanical "digital" watch that uses a wind-up mechanism to rearrange the "pixels" on its face to update the time. Only 177 will be made, which lets me out, but it doesn't stop me from drooling. Link (Thanks, Dan!)
Movie Plot Threat contest -- scare us into buying!
Bruce Schneier's launched his annual "Movie Plot Threat Contest," in which he challenges his readers to come up with ridiculous threat-scenarios (think of blowing up an airplane armed with nothing but some optimistic misapprehensions about organic chemistry, Tang, and hydrogen peroxide). A condition of the competition is that your weird-ass threat has to be preventable by means of a snake-oil security product that you want to sell us (bonus points if deploying your product makes our lives hell -- shoe-removing, liquid-confiscating indiginities!).
There's a ton of great entries already -- I like this one, from R. Serrano:
PROTECT your family!, SERVE your country!Link (Thanks, Bruce!)Would you LIKE some terrorist bombing your son's school with YOUR VERY OWN just stolen and filled with EXPLOSIVES car?
Don't let this happen with CURARE SHOTS! An easy to mount hypodermic syringe hidden beneath the seat of your car prevents burglars, thieves and TERRORISTS to MISUSE your car in ways YOU COULD NEVER IMAGINE by literally stopping them on the seat of your car while a wireless silent alarm* warns the closest police station and a text message is sent to your cell phone**.
PROTECT your family AND SERVE your country well with CURARE SHOTS.
* Alarm sold separately.
** Text message service only available with selected providers.
Comic Book Legal Defense Fund pre-ComicCon events in NYC next week
JahFurry sez,
I'm a proud donor to the CBLDF and I only wish I could make some of these boss events. Link (Thanks, JahFurry!)
CBLDF Presents New York Comics Week!Next week the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund celebrates comics in New York City with a week of events leading up to the New York Comic Con!
Tuesday, April 15.
CBLDF's DRINK & DRAW! Tax Day is Over! Now drink up with NYC's best cartoonists and party for a good cause! Featuring Jeffrey Brown, Molly Crabapple, David Finch, Dan Goldman, Dean Haspiel, Alex Maleev, Paul Maybury, and dozens of NY's Finest Cartoonists. Sponsored by ComicSpace.com and Image Comics, premiering Paul Maybury's graphic novel AQUA LEUNG. Additional support provided by ACT-I-VATE, The Daily Crosshatch, SMITH Magazine & JahFurry
7:00 to 11:00 PM at Village Pourhouse
64 3rd Avenue at 11th St, Drink Specials all night!, $5 Suggested Donation; $20 for VIP Schwag BagWednesday, April 16.
RASL Premiere Party! Come meet Jeff Smith in person at his only New York City appearance of the season, enjoy an open bar, and get a takeaway bag of tons of exclusive RASL goodies. Only 100 general admission tickets and 26 VIP tickets are available so get your ticket now!
8:00 to 11:00 PM at Coolture Spain, 409 W 39th St (between 9th and 10th),Friday, April 18.
An Evening With Neil Gaiman! Experience the magic of Neil Gaiman at an exclusive reading to benefit the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. Gaiman presents the reading at New York Comic-Con! Seating is limited and going fast.
Penn and Teller make thousands of bees appear out of "nothing"
Scott sez, "This is a video of Penn and Teller subverting the old 'pull an animal out of the hat' trick by instead producing thousands of bees, including hundreds while ripping apart a stuffed rabbit--take that, kids! I thought of this after seeing the urban beekeeper post. If you want to see loads of bees stinging Penn and Teller, you won't be disappointed." Link (Thanks, Scott!)
Home movie of contest-winning family vacation to Disneyland in 1956
Dan "Ride Theory" Howland sends in a link to a stupendous Internet Archive video entitled "Disneyland Dream," noting: "This would be interesting if it were merely a 1956 home movie of Disneyland, but it becomes great when the skinny, dorky, goofy dad (think Dennis the Menace's pop) not only documents the actual trip, but shows us how they got there -- by winning a Scotch Tape vacation contest. Highlights: the family's matching 1950's 'Wild West' fringe jackets with their names stitched between the shoulders, and the kids repeated insistence they have to change hats to enter different parts of the park."
Every second of this footage is pure gold, from the cornball jokes, the lingering shots of the "tickertape parade" the suburban Connecticut neighbors throw as the family gets into their gigantic land-yacht to drive to the airstrip, the runway footage from Idlewild, and the trips around Pasadena, Knott's Berry Farm and Universal Studios in 1956. The humor is pure "dad" -- loving and corny and just right.
Link (Thanks, Dan!)
In July 1956, the five-member Barstow family of Wethersfield, Connecticut, won a free trip to newly-opened Disneyland in Anaheim, California, in a nationwide contest. This 30-minute amateur documentary film tells the fabulous story of their fun-filled, dream-come-true, family travel adventure, filmed on the scene at Walt Disney's "Magic Kingdom" by Robbins Barstow.
Steampunk Star Wars modded action figures -- woah!
Sillof (he of the badass Justice League of America steampunk action figure mods) has just unveiled his latest: a deeply awesome range of steampunk Star Wars action figures. Link (Thanks, Sillof!)
Hello Kitty sander
The folks at Sanrio have achieved total Hello Kitty liftoff with this Hello Kitty Sander (unless it's a joke or a bootleg, in which case, it's time for Sanrio to copy the pirates and get into production). I don't have anything that needs sanding and I still want one.
Link (via Make)
Before the words were even completely out of my mouth, I knew I had guaranteed new depths of Hello Kitty Hell upon myself. Not only will my wife be looking for a Hello Kitty power sander, I'm sure I will also end up with a Hello Kitty tool set and Hello Kitty tool belt. My only hope is that I also receive a Hello Kitty nail gun (most likely with Hello Kitty nails included) that I can use to shoot nails into my head and put me out of my misery. It's only a matter of time before they end up on our doorstep and Hello Kitty Hell takes on deeper and darker dimensions…
Update:: it's a racing power-tool! It comes from Global Cat-astrophe's Flickr stream. Well spotted, Meerkat!
Michael Milken, Act II
Michael Milken throws a helluva party. His Milken Institute global conference in LA last week attracted such luminaries as Nobel Peace prize winner Muhammad Yunus, human genome sequencer Craig Venter, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and no fewer than four winners of the Nobel prize in economics. Business guys Eric Schmidt, Sam Zell, Eli Broad, Steve Wynn and T. Boone Pickens all spoke, as did tennis great Andre Agassi, music legend Quincy Jones and comedian, writer and actor John Cleese. There was no way to see and hear it all, but here are some things that struck me as interesting…
On the U.S. economy: The four Nobel laureates in economics—A. Michael Spence, Myron Scholes, Gary Becker and Edmund "Ned" Phelps—more or less agreed that the economy, while slumping, is not nearly as bad as it might be, given the credit crunch, the massive losses on Wall Street and the ongoing housing slump. They vigorously disagreed with the bleak outlook voiced recently by Joseph Stiglitz, another Nobel laureate, who said this is going to be one of the worst economic downturns since the Great Depression.
"The American economy is performing remarkably well in light of the financial turmoil," said Spence. The Great Depression "was a horrible episode," Becker said. "We're nowhere near that." The unemployment rate is currently 5.1% and unlikely to top out any higher than 9%–compared with 25% levels during the 1930s. But housing prices are going to fall further, according to Spence, because homeowners who are waiting for prices to rise before selling "are going to lose their optimism after a while and throw in the towel." That with further depress home values.
The most serious consequence of the current slump may turn out to be the reputational damage done to big business and the financial markets. Top execs of the big Wall Street firms continue to enjoy fat paydays, despite their reckless behavior and the resulting damage to the economy. Said Phelps: "Our friends in the financial sector have given capitalism a black eye."
On the power of innovation: Yunus, Venter and Schmidt shared a panel, moderated by Milken, about the power of ideas and creativity to change the world. Venter talked about the genome, and about his current efforts to develop a synthetic biofuel to replace gasoline. "If we can't do something about the environment," he said, somewhat facetiously, "there's no point in trying to cure cancer. We have to come up with new sources of food, fuel and water to sustain human existence." For hist part, Schmidt talked about how Google is "chaotic by design" as it seeks to use the power of information to attach big problems in such fields as health care and energy. But it was Yunus who stole the show.
His brainchild—microcredit–has taken Bangladesh-based Grameen Bank to a scale where it has 7.5 million borrowers, about $1 billion a year in loans with an average loan of about $150 and, still, no lawyers or contracts with borrowers. Grameen America recently began operations in Queens, N.Y. Dozens of other microfinance institutions have followed his path.
Instead of worrying about whether "people are credit-worthy," Yunus told the group, we should ask whether banks and other credit institutions are "people-worthy." He talked about how Grameen recently began making loans to beggars, giving them about $10 or $12 each so they could but and then sell candy, snacks or small toys as they go from house to house. About 11,000 of them have been turned from beggars into door-to-door salesmen, and another 90,000 or so "are in the process of closing down their begging division," he said.
"It will take them a bit of time," he joked. "After all, begging was their core business."
On strategies to fight global poverty: Michael Spence, the Nobel laureate, began with an encouraging data point: Thirteen countries since World War II have managed to achieve sustained high growth—defined as 7% annual GDP growth over a period of 25 years. The result is that today nearly 4 billion people live above the poverty level; the number was closer to 1 billion in 1980. Success stories unfolded in countries that took advantage of "inbound knowledge transfer" (meaning they learned from the developed world) and capitalized on global demand. China's the classic example of a country that adopted western manufacturing techniques and then became the world's most productive factory nation.
But many other poor countries are moving in the wrong direction. Richardo Hausmann, an international development expert at the Kennedy School at Harvard, noted that all of the world's 24 rich industrial countries had their peak per capita income since 2000; they are, despite fits and starts, growing their economies. But only 58% of the 112 developing countries have had their peak per capita income in the 21st century. Others peaked in the 1960s, 1970s or early 1980s, often because they relied on an export product that fell out of favor. "Most growth collapses coincide with export collapses," he said. Countries need to aim for more "sophisticated" export packages to insure against commodity price fluctuations.
Maria Eitel, who runs Nike's Foundation, said the company, with help from Spence, thought through its role in fighting global poverty and decided to focus on adolescent girls. More education for girls means later marriage, fewer children, lower rates of HIV, more income that is returned to families than when men work. According to Nike, women do 66% of the work in the world, produce 50% of the food but earn 5% of the income and own just 1% of the property.
On green business: Thanks to my friend Betsy Zeidman, who works at Milken, I moderated a panel called "Green is Green" with Rand Waddoups of Wal-Mart, Eli Halliwell of Jurlique, Dave Haft of Frito Lay, Deborah LaFranchi of investment fund Strategic Development Solutions and Kevin Wall, the founder and CEO of Live Earth. Waddoups is yet another impressive Wal-Martian, obviously excited about the company's far-reaching efforts while acknowledging (as Lee Scott has) that WMT is far from a green company and has a long, long way to go to reach its goals of generating no waste and powering itself with 100% renewable energy. Haft talked about Frito-Lay's "net zero" plant in Arizona, which aims to get nearly all of its electricity from renewable sources. (That will enable the company to claim that its Sun Chips are made with solar power.) He also disclosed that Frito-Lay plans to dig into its supply chain to see whether its suppliers can be persuaded to grow, say, potatoes in ways that are less harmful to the environment. Since 1999, Frito-Lay companywide has reduced its water use by 38 percent, natural gas by 27 percent and electricity by 21 percent, cutting $55 million a year in utility costs, according to this report in The New York Times. To be sure, this is eco-efficiency (and not true sustainability) but it is a step in the right direction.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Dumping iron
If you take the threat of global warming seriously, all potential solutions—nuclear power, so-called clean coal, even geoengineering—need to be on the table. That's why today's Sustainability column at fortune.com looks at the intriguing, albeit controversial, idea of ocean iron fertilization.
The question: Should we try to pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere by sprinkling massive amounts of iron dust on the ocean? Dan Whaley is the founder and CEO of a startup company called Climos that wants to do just that. Here's how the column begins:
“Give me a half tanker of iron, and I will give you an ice age.”
So said a scientist named John Martin, after he discovered that sprinkling iron dust in the ocean could set off plankton blooms, suck carbon dioxide out of the air and cool a warming planet.
This was 20 years ago, and oceanographers have debated what’s called “ocean iron fertilization” ever since. Never mind that Martin, who died in 1993, later said he was only half-serious. The debate rages on, as a startup company called Climos prepares to build a business by fertilizing the ocean with iron.
Dan will speak next week at FORTUNE's Brainstorm: Green. We have more than 400 people coming to the first-ever Fortune conference devoted to business and the environment. We've got the most important leaders of the environmental movement in America, big-time CEOs, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, a brand-new electric car for people to test drive, the west coast’s hottest organic chefs, Shawn Colvin to sing and Chuck Leavell to play the piano and talk about American forests. It's going to be great!
Carbon finance comes of age
Carbon finance may be the most interesting business that I've ever written about, and it is surely the most important. It is also incredibly complicated and hard to turn into a compelling story. I've spent the last few months trying to understand the business, and my first major story about carbon finance appears in the current issue of FORTUNE (cover date: April 28, cover boy: Warren Buffett), which includes a special section on "The Business of Green." The story was posted on fortune.com today and you can read it here.
There were many challenges in putting this story together, not the least of which was trying to explain the industry to those who know very little about it—most of the U.S. audience of FORTUNE, I'd guess—without dumbing-down the issues for more sophisticated readers. As usual, I would have liked more space but this is an industry that's still relatively small and Eurocentric. It will probably be reinvented when climate-change legislation passes Congress, most likely in 2009. There will, in other words, be many more opportunities to revisit the world of carbon finance.
In the months ahead, the challenge for corporate America will be to work with Congress and NGOs to make sure that we get climate-change legislation "right"—that means coming up with an effective way to create the economic incentives, by putting a price of greenhouse gas emissions, that are needed to move to the U.S. away from fossil fuels and towards a clean-energy economy.
Here's how the story begins:
If all goes according to plan, the business of buying and selling rights to pollute the atmosphere with carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases - carbon trading, as it is known - will curb global warming and save the world. That is its only purpose. Along the way, a lot of people will get rich.
Last year traders bought and sold about $60 billion worth of emissions allowances, mostly in Europe and Japan, where governments regulate greenhouse gases. If, as expected, regulation comes to the U.S., this country’s carbon-trading market is expected to be worth $1 trillion annually by 2020. That’s why investment banks, utilities, industrials, and hedge funds - among them GE (GE, Fortune 500), Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500), J.P. Morgan Chase (JPNV.L), and AES (AES) - are rushing into the business of carbon finance. To succeed they will have to master what is surely the most bizarre, complicated, and controversial new industry of the 21st century. We’ll try to break it down, beginning with a couple of things any Fortune reader can understand: a pile of pig manure and a private jet.
You can read the rest here.
Loose Lips []
Anthony Minghella's rep has announced that the writer/director died from a brain hemorrhage after undergoing a "routine operation" on his neck. So sad. • Mariah Carey comes across as shockingly down to earth in an interview with Allure. She says she knows people think she's a "ditzy moron" and, of her tumultuous love life, Mariah explains, "Not to quote Swingers, but 'we all have stories.' I got a freakin' miniseries in me." • Heather Mills has hired celebrity lawyer Gloria Allred to be her "advocate" in the United States. [TMZ, Us, DListed]
Monday, May 12, 2008
3 Great Ways to Set an Example for Your Children
Image by freeparking.
Note: This is a guest post by David B. Bohl of SlowdownFAST.
Children are like little sponges. Without us even realizing it, they soak up every last thing we say and do. Much to our chagrin, they usually disclose the most embarrassing or intimate details to total strangers, at the most inappropriate moments. They seem to just have a natural gift for it.
If we pay attention to what our children say to us, though, we realize just how much they pay attention to us. They look to us to set the example, to be their guidance, and to teach them right from wrong. They want us to establish boundaries for them, and they learn from us how to behave, and how to treat others.
As we go about our busy lives it is important to ask ourselves what kind of example we are setting for our children. What we do and say shapes the people they will become, so we need to stop for a moment and take into account what kind of future adults we are creating.
The push to create work life balance has been gaining momentum. It is important to maintain this balance for the emotional well being of your children, as well as for yourself.
1. Take Time to Play.
Playing is a good thing. As responsible adults, we forget how to laugh and be silly, and our children teach us important lessons in enjoying life and cherishing simple pleasures.
Take the time to run, giggle, tickle, and be goofy. Put your adult self away for a while and allow your inner child to come out and play. You will develop a bond with your own child in a way that nothing else can accomplish. You will be building memories that both of you can cherish for a lifetime, and you will be tending your relationship with your child so that it remains healthy.
Playing also nurtures your own well being. It reaffirms your work life balance is being maintained, and allows your mind freedom from its daily chains to the working world. After all, how serious can you be when you are rolling around on the grass, being taken advantage of by a four-year-old in the world's greatest tickle fight?
2. Be Kind to Others.
Our children look to us to set the example in learning how to deal with others. You are directly responsible for teaching them manners, gratitude, acceptance, friendship, and a whole host of other behaviors that will determine their future success, both in the working world and in personal relationships.
Make sure you are teaching them habits that will serve them well as you interact with other people in your life. Telling your child to treat people a certain way does not carry nearly the same weight as demonstrating it.
3. Keep a Positive Outlook.
Your own mental outlook on life will carry over to your child's. If you view life as fraught with insurmountable challenges, bad luck, and impossible goals, that is likely how your child will grow to view life.
Why not start him out with a mindset that will lead him to success by teaching him to be positive, optimistic, and hopeful. Teach him that life is full of wonderful possibilities waiting to be explored, and that he can achieve anything as long as he believes in himself. Do this by practicing it yourself, and you will both experience tremendous fulfillment.
As we travel through life with our children, we become responsible for so much more than our own happiness and success. Our actions not only affect our childrens' lives right now, but will directly affect the outcome of their lives many years from now. Our children are our legacy, and what we leave behind when our turn here is done is precious.
Set the stage for their success, and leave a living legacy behind that you can be proud of. Invest in your children now, and every single day for the rest of your life. You will reap rewards in terms of a more satisfying life, and you will develop deeper bonds with your children. You will build a relationship that will sustain you both throughout the remainder of your days, and when you look back on your life, you will have no regrets.
David B. Bohl writes about living your vision at his own blog: SlowdownFAST. If you enjoyed this article, you may like to subscribe to his feed, or read one of his most popular articles, Conflicting Desires: Knowing That We Have Enough vs. Always Wanting to Better Ourselves.
If you like this article, please give it a thumb up in Stumbleupon. Thanks a lot! =)
Further reading:
- How to Improve Your Social Skills
- Stephen King’s Top 7 Tips for Becoming a Better Writer
- 16 Practical Tips for Solving Your Problems More Easily
Sunday, May 11, 2008
How You Can Use Proposals to Achieve Your Goals
Note:This is a guest post by Loren Blinde of Writing Power.
The proposal format is one of the most formidable tools in the writer's toolbox. Although normally relegated to the professional/business realm, the proposal is also useful in many academic and personal writing situations.
Its variability aside, the proposal's real magic is that its effectiveness is not limited to written communication. With a little ingenuity, you can unlock the proposal format's power and use it to accelerate your progress toward dreams and goals. Master the logic of the proposal, and you'll get more out of your personal and professional interactions.
What is a proposal? At its most basic level, a proposal is an offer. You are offering something of value to a person or group in exchange for something you value, such as money or time.
Although specific proposal requirements can vary, they generally follow a simple structure. Let's consider each part of the proposal structure separately and analyze how we can apply a proposal-style approach to getting more out of life.
1. Introduction.
A strong proposal's introduction doesn't mince words. Rather, the introduction clearly and concisely states what you propose to do.
For example, if an employee writes a proposal designed to negotiate a remote working agreement with his or her employer, the introduction should state that aim.
Living Proposal Style – Be Direct
The lesson from the Introduction – be direct – is simple to state but difficult to do. Yet think about how much of our communication could be streamlined if we all worked to be more clear and concise. It would change modern life dramatically. For proof, try the following for one week:
- State your precise reason for writing in each email's subject line. The key here is "precise." For example, instead of sending an email labeled "Party?" in the subject line, replace it with, "Invitation to Loren's Housewarming Party on May 3rd."
- State an opinion or a preference each time someone asks for one. For example, when someone asks you what you want to do today, don't respond with, "I don't know. What do you want to do?" Instead, offer a suggestion. You'll be amazed at how much time this saves. (For an entertaining primer on this technique, see Tim Ferriss's book The 4-hour Work Week.)
2. Description of the Problem.
Before you can convince the reader to accept your proposed solution, he or she has to be convinced that there is a problem that needs to be solved. The problem section should vividly describe an undesirable condition; further, the problem section should highlight reasons why the reader should care about this problem.
Returning to our remote work proposal, the employer may not understand why the employee needs to work from home. To make the employer understand, the employee would explain the problems he or she has faced while working in the office: commuting stress, commuting cost, office distractions. But to make the employer take a serious interest in this proposal, the employee should also explain that these factors are decreasing his or her productivity and motivation. Considered from this angle, keeping the employee working in the office is actually costing the employer money.
Living Proposal Style – Adapt your Behavior to Suit the Situation
People can be stubborn creatures, intent on proving their perspective's validity at the expense of another's. Unfortunately, people also don't like to be proven wrong. This means that the more rigidly one person defends his or her position, the more the other person is going to dig his or her heels in. Often, taking a less rigid tack would be much more effective. When it comes down to everyday interactions like these, would you rather be right or happy?
3. Solution.
After reading the problem section, the reader should be concerned about the problem you have described and motivated to do something about it. In the solution section, you describe the solution you have proposed in detail. A strong solution section will assure the reader that the solution will fix the problem. Moreover, the writer should provide details to give the reader confidence in the solution's efficacy.
Continuing the above example, the employee should focus on how working at home will increase the employee's motivation and productivity in this section. The employee should also provide some specifics to increase the employer's confidence that the solution will work. The employee should not highlight how much more convenient or desirable it would be to work in his or her pajamas, even though that may be a significant benefit from the employee's perspective.
Living Proposal Style – Step Into Someone Else's Shoes
Writers in particular often struggle to communicate because they fail to step into their readers' shoes. They don't consider whether the piece meets the readers' needs, focusing instead on saying what they want to say. Writers don't always think about what would make it easier for readers to understand the message, and their writing suffers as a result.
There's a simple, yet powerful, psychological reason that considering another person's perspective works so well. People love to win. It doesn't matter whether they're winning an argument or a carnival prize. It just feels good.
When you highlight a plan's benefits for others rather than yourself, it demonstrates compassion. A compassionate gesture, in turn, builds goodwill. And if a person feels goodwill toward you, they're more likely to agree to your suggestion. And if they agree to your suggestion – that's right – you win.
4. Plan of Action.
This section flows naturally from your solution. Your reader has many questions about how you will implement the solution, and you must convince the reader that you have the knowledge, skills, and resources to turn the solution from a good idea into reality. For example, the employee might explain how he or she would attend meetings, complete projects, and meet with clients from home.
Living Proposal Style — Concreteness Inspires Confidence
What prevents people from making changes in their lives or environments when they know that their lives would be better if they made the change? A common problem is that their desires are too abstract. The sentence, "I wish I could get organized" They are much more likely to make changes if they have specific, actionable steps to complete. This is one reason that many of us (myself included) never seem to tire of reading organizing and decluttering tips.
A concrete plan not only tells what steps need to be taken, but it also provides a clear vision of the result. It's the vision that empowers change.
5. Costs.
Worry over how much it will cost to put the proposal into action is the major obstacle for most proposals. Like the other sections, this section needs to have specifics. Specific numbers give the reader needed information and help to convince the reader that your proposal is well researched.
But the crux of this section is rhetorical, not economic. Whatever the specific costs are, the cost section should aim to convince the reader that the proposal's benefits are well worth the implementation cost.
Living Proposal Style – Consider Both Absolute and Relative Costs
When considering an expenditure of any kind, it's easy to focus on the price tag alone. But this is only half of the information: you must also consider whether its cost is reasonable given its value to you. I am not suggesting that you use the concept of relative cost to rationalize unneeded expenditures or a wasteful lifestyle. But "frugal" and "cheap" are not the same thing. Being frugal means getting the maximum value, use, and joy from each dollar you spend.
6. Conclusion.
A strong proposal concludes with a stirring call to action. The writer wants to propel the reader out of his or her chair. Passion for the outcome is a proposal writer's secret weapon.
Living Proposal Style – Passion is Everything
Modern life can wear anyone down. Many of us have forgotten what it is like to have dreams. Too often, we trade the-sky's-the-limit dreams for five-year plans. If there is one thing to learn from the proposal, it's that it is never too late to recapture our excitement for life. The time is now. The proposal has concluded; now, get out of that chair.
This is a guest post by Loren Blinde of Writing Power. Loren teaches college English and helps people enrich their lives by improving their writing. Her recent articles include Seek And Destroy Your Writing Style Enemies and Well Dressed Writing: Tips For Effective Page Design. Feel free to contact her at loren@writingpower.net
If you like this article, please give it a thumb up in Stumbleupon. Thanks a lot! =)
Further reading:
- How to Improve Your Social Skills
- Stephen King’s Top 7 Tips for Becoming a Better Writer
- 16 Practical Tips for Solving Your Problems More Easily
Picasso’s Top 7 Tips for Creating an Exciting Life
"The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web."
"Some painters transform the sun into a yellow spot, others transform a yellow spot into the sun."
Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter, sculptor and creator in many creative fields. He's perhaps the most well-known painter from all of the 20:th century.
He also had some interesting things to say about life. Here are my 7 favourite tips from him.
1. You have to believe to be able to do.
"He can who thinks he can, and he can’t who thinks he can’t. This is an inexorable, indisputable law."
This is a great quote because it doesn't just say that you should "believe in yourself!". It explains why you need to believe in yourself and your ability to do something to actually do it.
The funny thing is that it's hard to see how much your beliefs control your performance and how you see your world when you are used at looking at things from just one perspective.
When you think you can do something instead of not your perception of that thing changes. And your perception of yourself too. Without those changed perspectives it will be hard to find the courage, motivation, enthusiasm and whatever else you may need. And then there are self-fulfilling prophecies.
If you think you'll fail you are likely to hold you self back or even trip yourself up (sometimes unconsciously). If you on the other hand think you can do something your mind will start to find solutions and focus on fixing things instead of whining about them. From all of the stimuli around you things, solutions and opportunities will just start to pop up. Without that focus on the right thing, on your ability to do, your mind may not find the resources and solutions that are needed.
2. Push your limits.
"I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it."
Pushing yourself and stretching is necessary to grow. And the more you push yourself the quicker you can grow.
But it can be scary. My best tip so far: stay present as much as you can while doing something you cannot yet do.
This can greatly decrease possible negative feelings that are holding you back. And with those feelings out of your mind and body it becomes easier to focus, to feel positive feelings and actually perform well and learn to do whatever you have set your mind upon.
For tips on that check out 8 Ways to Return to the Present Moment. My three favourites among that bunch are at the moment: focus on what's right in front of you, pick up the vibe from present people (I listen to Eckhart Tolle cds very often) and focusing on your breathing.
3. Don't wait for inspiration or the right moment.
"Inspiration exists, but it has to find us working."
Inspiration can show up on its own, waltzing in through a door or a window. But doing things that way makes work inconsistent – both in quality and quantity - and you spend a lot of time waiting.
I find that it's better to follow Pablo's suggestion and just start working. For the first minutes what you do may suck quite a bit and it's hard going. But after a while inspiration seems to catch up with you. Things start to flow easier and your work is of a higher quality.
If you feel inspired one day that's great. Use your inspiration. But don't limit yourself to the moments where you feel inspired or you feel like the moment is just right to do something. Act instead. A lot of the time you can find inspiration along the way. Or accomplish whatever you want to do despite the moment not looking just as you would like it to.
4. Act.
"Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone."
"Action is the foundational key to all success."
I know. If you have been reading this blog for a while you may have noticed that taking action is included in a lot of the articles. But that's because, as Picasso says, action is the foundation. Without taking action any information – no matter how useful – will be pretty useless. This is also the part of personal growth or just life that is often forgotten or perhaps avoided.
It's scary. It can feel difficult to do it. Or you may not feel like it's the right moment now. But developing a habit of taking more and more action can make a huge difference. Have a look at How to Take More Action: 9 Powerful Tips for help to develop such a habit. My favourite tip among those is the same as for when pushing your limits: stay present to decrease inner resistance to taking action.
5. Ask the right questions.
"Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not."
It's easy to ask yourself the wrong questions. To ask yourself questions that just will give you answers that confirm that you are incompetent, foolish, wrong and tell you that your future is limited. Questions that will sink you instead of help to lift you up.
So instead, ask yourself empowering questions.
- When having a seemingly negative experience ask yourself: what is good about this? What can I learn from this? There is always something you can learn and have use for to create positive experiences later on.
- When interacting with others ask yourself: How can I bring even more value (understanding, help, practical solutions, fun, excitement etc.) to this interaction?
- In just about any situation you can always ask yourself: what's great about this situation/experience? This is a quick way to shift your mood and thoughts into more positive, resourceful and empowered forms through gratitude.
There are of course many more empowering questions you can ask yourself. I think the main point is to reframe the questions you ask yourself into positive questions that open up - instead of closes – the door to opportunities and possibilities.
6. See the hidden beauty by not judging.
"If only we could pull out our brain and use only our eyes."
One of big advantages of becoming more present in your everyday life is that you decrease the amount of analysing and labelling you do to the things/people in your surroundings. You don't judge as much.
This might sound strange but in the moments when you are present the ordinary world becomes more interesting and wonderful. Colors can seem brighter. Your see more aliveness in trees, nature and in people. You see the wonder of all your man-made gadgets and stuff. Things that most often seem common, routine and boring become fascinating and something you can appreciate.
It's like you are observing your world with more clarity and curiousness. Like a little kid again, discovering things while they still feel fresh. Before they have just become walking, talking and growing labels with years of associations and thoughts attached.
This is a bit like the first tip in this article. Before you actually use it – if you just think about it in your mind – it may not make that much sense. I highly recommend reading/listening to Eckhart Tolle to gain a deeper understanding of being present. He and Oprah are doing free 90 minute talks about his book A New Earth right now. Check out the book and those webcasts.
7. It's not too late.
"Youth has no age."
Don't let social conditioning tell you what you can or cannot do just because you are of one age or another. Age is most of the time just in your head anyway. Take tip #1 into consideration and choose for yourself what you can do. And use tip # 6 and ask yourself the right questions instead of ones that limit you.
And, remember, the present moment s all there ever is anyway. So don't get caught up in the past too much. Most of the time you really don't have to act consistently with what you have done before. If you do, then that's your choice. And you can decide to do something different too. Right now.
It is really only too late to change if you look at your life as a time-line. If you learn to become more present, if you learn to live more in the now, much of that thinking just falls away. You realize that you can consciously choose and do pretty much whatever you like in the present moment and built a future with new possibilities.
If you like this article, please give it a thumb up in Stumbleupon. Thanks a lot! =)
Further reading:
- How to Improve Your Social Skills
- Stephen King’s Top 7 Tips for Becoming a Better Writer
- 16 Practical Tips for Solving Your Problems More Easily
16 Things I Wish They Had Taught Me in School
Image by foundphotoslj.
I am 28 now. I don't think about the past or regret things much these days.
But sometimes I wish that I had known some of things I have learned over the last few years a bit earlier. That perhaps there had been a self-improvement class in school. And in some ways there probably was.
Because some of these 16 things in this article a teacher probably spoke about in class. But I forgot about them or didn't pay attention.
Some of it would probably not have stuck in my mind anyway. Or just been too far outside my reality at the time for me to accept and use.
But I still think that taking a few hours from all those German language classes and use them for some personal development classes would have been a good idea. Perhaps for just an hour a week in high school. It would probably be useful for many students and on a larger scale quite helpful for society in general.
So here are 16 things I wish they had taught me in school (or I just would like to have known about earlier).
1. The 80/20 rule.
This is one of the best ways to make better use of your time. The 80/20 rule – also known as The Pareto Principle – basically says that 80 percent of the value you will receive will come from 20 percent of your activities.
So a lot of what you do is probably not as useful or even necessary to do as you may think.
You can just drop – or vastly decrease the time you spend on – a whole bunch of things.
And if you do that you will have more time and energy to spend on those things that really brings your value, happiness, fulfilment and so on.
2. Parkinson's Law.
You can do things quicker than you think. This law says that a task will expand in time and seeming complexity depending on the time you set aside for it. For instance, if you say to yourself that you'll come up with a solution within a week then the problem will seem to grow more difficult and you'll spend more and more time trying to come up with a solution.
So focus your time on finding solutions. Then just give yourself an hour (instead of the whole day) or the day (instead of the whole week) to solve the problem. This will force your mind to focus on solutions and action.
The result may not be exactly as perfect as if you had spent a week on the task, but as mentioned in the previous point, 80 percent of the value will come from 20 percent of the activities anyway. Or you may wind up with a better result because you haven't overcomplicated or overpolished things. This will help you to get things done faster, to improve your ability to focus and give you more free time where you can totally focus on what’s in front of you instead of having some looming task creating stress in the back of your mind.
3. Batching.
Boring or routine tasks can create a lot of procrastination and low-level anxiety. One good way to get these things done quickly is to batch them. This means that you do them all in row. You will be able to do them quicker because there is less "start-up time" compared to if you spread them out. And when you are batching you become fully engaged in the tasks and more focused.
A batch of things to do in an hour today may look like this: Clean your desk / answer today's emails / do the dishes / make three calls / write a grocery shopping list for tomorrow.
4. First, give value. Then, get value. Not the other way around.
This is a bit of a counter-intuitive thing. There is often an idea that someone should give us something or do something for us before we give back. The problem is just that a lot of people think that way. And so far less than possible is given either way.
If you want to increase the value you receive (money, love, kindness, opportunities etc.) you have to increase the value you give. Because over time you pretty much get what you give. It would perhaps be nice to get something for nothing. But that seldom happens.
5. Be proactive. Not reactive.
This one ties into the last point. If everyone is reactive then very little will get done. You could sit and wait and hope for someone else to do something. And that happens pretty often, but it can take a lot of time before it happens.
A more useful and beneficial way is to be proactive, to simply be the one to take the first practical action and get the ball rolling. This not only saves you a lot of waiting, but is also more pleasurable since you feel like you have the power over your life. Instead of feeling like you are run by a bunch of random outside forces.
6. Mistakes and failures are good.
When you are young you just try things and fail until you learn. As you grow a bit older, you learn from - for example - school to not make mistakes. And you try less and less things.
This may cause you to stop being proactive and to fall into a habit of being reactive, of waiting for someone else to do something. I mean, what if you actually tried something and failed? Perhaps people would laugh at you?
Perhaps they would. But when you experience that you soon realize that it is seldom the end of the world. And a lot of the time people don't care that much. They have their own challenges and lives to worry about.
And success in life often comes from not giving up despite mistakes and failure. It comes from being persistent.
When you first learn to ride your bike you may fall over and over. Bruise a knee and cry a bit. But you get up, brush yourself off and get on the saddle again. And eventually you learn how to ride a bike. If you can just reconnect to your 5 year old self and do things that way - instead of giving up after a try/failure or two as grown-ups often do – you would probably experience a lot more interesting things, learn valuable lessons and have quite a bit more success.
7. Don't beat yourself up.
Why do people give up after just few mistakes or failures? Well, I think one big reason is because they beat themselves up way too much. But it's a kinda pointless habit. It only creates additional and unnecessary pain inside you and wastes your precious time. It's best to try to drop this habit as much as you can.
8. Assume rapport.
Meeting new people is fun. But it can also induce nervousness. We all want to make a good first impression and not get stuck in an awkward conversation.
The best way to do this that I have found so far is to assume rapport. This means that you simply pretend that you are meeting one of your best friends. Then you start the interaction in that frame of mind instead of the nervous one.
This works surprisingly well. You can read more about it in How to Have Less Awkward Conversations: Assuming Rapport.
9. Use your reticular activation system to your advantage.
I learned about the organs and the inner workings of the body in class but nobody told me about the reticular activation system. And that's a shame, because this is one of the most powerful things you can learn about. What this focus system, this R.A.S, in your mind does is to allow you to see in your surroundings what you focus your thoughts on. It pretty much always helps you to find what you are looking for.
So you really need to focus on what you want, not on what you don't want. And keep that focus steady.
Setting goals and reviewing them frequently is one way to keep your focus on what's important and to help you take action that will move your closer to toward where you want to go. Another way is just to use external reminders such as pieces of paper where you can, for instance, write down a few things from this post like "Give value" or "Assume rapport". And then you can put those pieces of paper on your fridge, bathroom mirror etc.
10. Your attitude changes your reality.
We have all heard that you should keep a positive attitude or perhaps that "you need to change your attitude!". That is a nice piece of advice I suppose, but without any more reasons to do it is very easy to just brush such suggestions off and continue using your old attitude.
But the thing that I've discovered the last few years is that if you change your attitude, you actually change your reality. When you for instance use a positive attitude instead of a negative one you start to see things and viewpoints that were invisible to you before. You may think to yourself "why haven’t I thought about things this way before?".
When you change you attitude you change what you focus on. And all things in your world can now be seen in a different light.
This is of course very similar to the previous tip but I wanted to give this one some space. Because changing your attitude can create an insane change in your world. It might not look like it if you just think about it though. Pessimism might seem like realism. But that is mostly because your R.A.S is tuned into seeing all the negative things you want to see. And that makes you "right" a lot of the time. And perhaps that is what you want. On the other hand, there are more fun things than being right all the time.
If you try changing your attitude for real – instead of analysing such a concept in your mind - you'll be surprised.
You may want to read more about this topic in Take the Positivity Challenge!
11. Gratitude is a simple way to make yourself feel happy.
Sure, I was probably told that I should be grateful. Perhaps because it was the right thing to do or just something I should do. But if someone had said that feeling grateful about things for minute or two is a great way to turn a negative mood into a happy one I would probably have practised gratitude more. It is also a good tool for keeping your attitude up and focusing on the right things. And to make other people happy. Which tends to make you even happier, since emotions are contagious.
12. Don't compare yourself to others.
The ego wants to compare. It wants to find reasons for you to feel good about yourself ("I've got a new bike!"). But by doing that it also becomes very hard to not compare yourself to others who have more than you ("Oh no, Bill has bought an even nicer bike!"). And so you don't feel so good about yourself once again. If you compare yourself to others you let the world around control how you feel about yourself. It always becomes a rollercoaster of emotions.
A more useful way is to compare yourself to yourself. To look at how far you have come, what you have accomplished and how you have grown. It may not sound like that much fun but in the long run it brings a lot more inner stillness, personal power and positive feelings.
13. 80-90% of what you fear will happen never really come into reality.
This is a big one. Most things you fear will happen never happen. They are just monsters in your own mind. And if they happen then they will most often not be as painful or bad as you expected. Worrying is most often just a waste of time.
This is of course easy to say. But if you remind yourself of how little of what you feared throughout your life that has actually happened you can start to release more and more of that worry from your thoughts.
14. Don't take things too seriously.
It's very easy to get wrapped up in things. But most of the things you worry about never come into reality. And what may seem like a big problem right now you may not even remember in three years.
Taking yourself, your thoughts and your emotions too seriously often just seems to lead to more unnecessary suffering. So relax a little more and lighten up a bit. It can do wonders for your mood and as an extension of that; your life.
15. Write everything down.
If your memory is anything like mine then it's like a leaking bucket. Many of your good or great ideas may be lost forever if you don't make a habit of writing things down. This is also a good way to keep your focus on what you want. Read more about it in Why You Should Write Things Down.
16. There are opportunities in just about every experience.
In pretty much any experience there are always things that you can learn from it and things within the experience that can help you to grow. Negative experiences, mistakes and failure can sometimes be even better than a success because it teaches you something totally new, something that another success could never teach you.
Whenever you have a "negative experience" ask yourself: where is the opportunity in this? What is good about this situation? One negative experience can – with time – help you create many very positive experiences.
What do you wish someone had told you in school or you had just learned earlier in life?
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