If you find yourself losing your memory because of your age (or Alzheimers), have a look at this 2005 chinese animation called “A drawer of memory” that attempts to make poetic sense of what goes on for an old lady with dementia.
Author: neil
Suicide, Assisted [Essays]
Warning: Approach this topic only if you think you are willing to stress test your belief system about life, death & the role medicine.
Drs. Howard Ball, Philip Nitschke, & Patrick Lee put forth their views, for & against, on a topic that is guaranteed to shake the very foundations of our concepts of ethics, law & policy as it applies to death. In a couple of states in the US, a terminally ill patient can ask for & receive a prescription from his doctor that can end his life. Physician assisted death (PAD) differs from euthanasia – where the doctor administers the lethal amount to his patient (remember Dr. Jack Kevorkian?). Dr. Bell opens the discussion with an overview of the ethics, law & policy conflicts of PAD in America. Dr. Nitschke reacts with his opposition to the decriminalization & medicalization of suicide. Dr. Lee wants PAD to remain illegal, & explains why. The discussion continues with Ball responding to the detractors.
Basket-case architecture
The Basket Building (Ohio, United States): The Longaberger Basket Company building in Newark, Ohio might just be the strangest office building in the world, as the text on this video clip says. The 180,000-square- foot building, a replica of the company’s famous market basket, cost $30 million and took two years to complete. Many experts tried to persuade Dave Longaberger to alter his plans, but he wanted an exact replica of the real thing.
[Picture]
Wow! is all I could muster to describe my feelings about this picture. An immaculate job of photography & photoshopping.
How to avoid work [Article]
Advice from the 1950’s from a career counselor, William J Reilly rings true to this day. As he says in his book, How to Avoid Work, “life really begins when you have discovered that you can do anything you want.” This echoes what Thomas Edison said when asked about his secret to success. ” You do something all day long, don’t you? Everyone does. If you get up at seven o’clock and go to bed at eleven, you have put sixteen good hours, and it is certain that you have been doing something all that time. The only difference is that you do a great many things and I do one. If you took the time in question and applied it in one direction, you would succeed. Success is sure to follows such application. The trouble lies in the fact that people do not have one thing to stick to, letting all else go.”
The good news [Song]
This song, written & performed by Sarah Thomsen was written in response to the church shooting in Knoxville, TN (in 2008) and in response to a news editorial in Duluth, MN (2010) titled “The Gospel can bring change into homosexuals lives.” Echoes of the past ring again after the massacre last week (mental health this time).
Grand – parents! [Article]
To add fuel to the grandparents competition fire, some researchers found that your mom’s parents are the better half of grandparents. Guaranteed to raise more than a few eyebrows!
Tragedy [Opinion]
I’m not going to link to another analysis on the tragedy that befell Newton, Connecticut over the weekend. The words that Helen Philpot wrote however are worth reading. I personally find it strange that the “richest” country in the world has more legislation on ladders than it has on the ownership of guns.
Clothing optional [article]
What exactly is the etiquette to be followed in a co-ed bathhouse where clothes are not allowed? American Brian Blickenstaff tries to breakdown the mental paradigm behind his experience in a German sauna. An excerpt: “Throughout our lives, how often are we actually in the buff? Excluding showering and (for some) sleeping, it happens pretty seldom, right? I mean, the only other time we shed clothing is when we’re getting intimate. Try as we might, it becomes difficult to divorce intimacy from the act of being n u d e, and this coupling casts a certain strange shadow over the proceedings at a place like Friedrichsbad.”
Eat & let live [article]
Food is the glue that holds civilizations together, says G. Murphy Donovan. In his eyes, there are four key threats to the modern family – cell phones, video games, the internet, and junk food. We allow the first three because they are cheaper than tutors, private schools, and nannies. Read on.