Archive for January, 2003

Jan 28 DARE: Ineffective scapegoat program for lazy parents

Here’s an interesting article from last Sunday’s Chicago Tribune: Now many `just say no’ to DARE in schools (registration required). I’m sure those of you who had a DARE officer visit one of your classes remember the scenario, overly aggressive anal retentive police officer barking ‘Just Say No’. Effective? No.

Jan 23 Vincent van Gogh’s letters

Click here to view an exhibit of letters that Vincent van Gogh wrote to various people throughout his lifetime. Interesting…

Jan 22 Goal Oriented

Update on 7/1/2002 post, I spent two weeks in Europe (England and Italy) over the holidays, so cross that goal off the list. I no longer care about building a blueprint for my future house, so that’s gone too. All that is left is to 1) ride a century (100 miles) on my bike and 2) convert all my CDs to mp3 format. It’s definitely time to update my list, any ideas?

Update: 10/2004 - We bought a house, so blueprinting the dreamhouse is no longer necessary. I haven’t rode 100 miles yet, but I did ride 85 miles back to back (Saturday and Sunday). Converting mp3s…that’s mostly done.

Jan 21 Have we all gone mad?

Has anyone else noticed that our president is completely insane? Visit cnn.com, look at the front page, “SHOWDOWN: IRAQ”. George Bush brainstormed this idea up approximately one year ago after using up the last of his September 11th credibility cards.

What’s going on here? One certainty is that our country is going to war, and there’s nothing anyone can say or do about it. Would we still be going to war if U.N. weapons inspectors returned with a clean bill of health for Iraq? Definitely. Our president can easily concoct a whole slew of reasons to bomb the shit out of Iraq. And if that’s not interesting enough for you, read some of the side articles at CNN regarding the nuclear crisis in North Korea.

How about some more meaninful headlines, like “SHOWDOWN: AMERICA’S DISMAL ECONOMY” or “SHOWDOWN: AMERICA’S HOMELESS” or “SHOWDOWN: AMERICA’S RAPID DECLINE IN MEDIA QUALITY”?

Jan 11 (not) making sense of it all

here is a poem by daniel lutz. a few comments/observations…

i enjoyed reading this poem. i like the detail surrounding the tea infusion, to me it’s very calming. watching tea immersing itself throughout a cup is very surreal, as it holds a complex and almost scientifc pattern, yet obviously the tea holds no such mindfulness or directionality. the sentence, “it is horrible to not be understood”, is a universal truth. this thought is etched deeply into each of our souls. how many times do we ask ourselves “why is that no one understands me?” or “why don’t you understand me?” or “why are you not like me?” no one has ever existed that has been understood, because it’s just not possible. humans are far too dynamic and impressionable to rationalize a single prolonged stance. you will definitely start, and restart your life 4-5* times before you’ve reached the end. it’s our lonely dance, and the never answered question.

*approximate/hypothetical number derived by author; no statistical analysis has been conducted concerning life restarts as of yet.