What I see in different shades of gray, from behind my reading glasses
Black Australians are stereotyped as violent, yet the violence routinely meted out to them by authority is of little interest.
Everything, discovers Robert Krulwich of NPR, from a reading of the very practical-minded Franklin’s letters.
He was one of those guys that if you gave him a problem, he’d think it over, and out would pour a crazy stream of stories, get-rich-quick schemes, fairy tales, adventures and solutions to problems you’d never known you had. He had what you might call “a mind wide-open” ready, like those balloons, to fly anywhere …
Paco buys Marisol, his hairdresser wife, a new wedding ring. Marisol goes to New York with her sisters and stands in Times Square, an unimaginable dream, which is when it occurs to her that she’s really won. At home, Paco and Marisol buy a bigger tank “for pig pee and excrement,” to make fertilizer. “When you have 2,500 pigs and you go from 600- to 800-liter tanks, it saves a lot of time,” says Paco. “And your quality of life gets a little better.”
Is life good since then? Read on to find out.
I am amazed at how many really smart people don’t understand that you can make big mistakes in public and emerge none the worse for it…Actually, people love it when somebody admits to making a mistake.
Remembered this song – and sharing just because. Joan Baez hauntingly beautiful in the images in this video of Diamonds & Rust
‘Twas Poet Rabindranath Tagore who called the Taj Mahal “a tear drop upon the cheek of Time”.
Listen to the accompanying flute music to images of the Taj – if you need a few moments of calmness in your busy day.
There is more to life than simply increasing its speed. ~ Mahatma Gandhi.
Deeply influenced by a meeting with Gandhi when he was a young lad, Eknath Eswaran is one of the first teachers of what is thought to be the first credit course on meditation offered at a major university in the U.S. at U.C. Berkeley in 1968. “Take your Time” is a book that I came across & read by chance a few years ago. This is not a book on time- or activity- management. Full of ageless wisdom delivered with gentle humor, this book is worth your time, & your money.
A quote:
“A slower life is not an ineffective life. It is much more effective, much more artistic, much richer than a life lived as a race against the clock. It gives you time to pause, to think, to reflect, to decide, to weigh the pros and cons. It gives you time for relationships.”
Peter Menzel, co-author of Man Eating Bugs, describes some insect-based cuisine and the western aversion to creepy-crawly snacks, in an interview with Ira Flatow. According to a report from the UN FAO (Food and Agricultural Organisation), insects offer a huge potential for improving the world’s food security.
Turns you off? Honey-bees play an important part in the food eco-system, and honey-bees are dying by the zillions due (even if partly) to pesticides. A few organisations are patenting, nature’s bounty, & trying to controlling seed supply, suing farmers out of existence in the name of a level-playing field (is that ironic or what?)while also selling the pesticides that cause incredible harm, Food, for most city people, is what you get at supermarkets – not many care how or where it is grown. And if you don’t yet know this, for example:
…three big companies now control more than half of the global seed market – a position that has sent prices soaring. The average cost of planting an acre of soybeans had risen 325% between 1995 and 2011.
Technology is the solution to the world’s problems, say many. Blind belief in technology may be our generation’s downfall, considering that we are blind to rest of the world’s beauty & its own coping mechanisms. Don’t get me wrong, I love this connected world. Bruce Schneier, writing in the Guardian, points out, Will giving the internet eyes and ears mean the end of privacy?.
The usual response to privacy is “Why worry if you’ve got nothing to hide?”. Here’s a few reasons
Privacy involves the responsibility on the part of those who collect and use your data to keep it secure in order to prevent fraud and identity theft. We don’t say to an identity theft victim “don’t worry if you have nothing to hide.”