American Idol (or any amateur hour type show)
I-Phones
Harry Potter
The Simpsons Movie
YouTube (and the YouTube debate nonsense)
Text Messsaging
MySpace
Monday, July 30, 2007
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
How to Earn $1 Million by Not Watching TV
I saw this article on Yahoo finance. The headline touted "How to Earn $1 million by Not Watching TV". Intriguing enough, so I read it.
What a bunch of BS. After several paragraphs of dubious arithmetic, you have to read almost the whole article to find out that that 80% of the money you will "save" is the money you would have spent due to the influence of TV commercials.
This article was from thestreet.com, a site supposedly dedicated to financial education.
There are a lot of good reasons to limit TV watching, but not the expectation that you are going to end up with $1 million in your pocket.
What a bunch of BS. After several paragraphs of dubious arithmetic, you have to read almost the whole article to find out that that 80% of the money you will "save" is the money you would have spent due to the influence of TV commercials.
This article was from thestreet.com, a site supposedly dedicated to financial education.
There are a lot of good reasons to limit TV watching, but not the expectation that you are going to end up with $1 million in your pocket.
Monday, July 9, 2007
The Seven Wonders of The World
The seven new wonders of the world were chosen by popular vote recently and, having visited several of the nominees, it is clear the vote was one of popularity, not an objective ranking of the sites. The final 7 chosen are:
Chichén Itzá, Mexico
Christ the Redeemer, Brazil
The Great Wall, China
Machu Picchu, Peru
Petra, Jordan
The Roman Colloseum, Italy
The Taj Mahal, India.
Of these, I have visited Chichen Itza, Christ the Redeemer, The Great Wall, Macchu Picchu and the Taj Mahal.
My first observation is that any list of wonders that does not include the temples at Angkor Wat is fatally flawed. I consider Angkor to be the #1 wonder of the world I have seen (never saw the pyramids of Egypt). Angkor far surpasses Chichen Itza and Christ The Redeemer in its powerful beauty and scale. Clearly the Brazilians and Mexicans cast more votes than the people of Cambodia.
Next, I cannot understand why the manmade rice terraces of China and Central Bali would not be considered a great wonder of the world. It is a truly awe inspiring sight. Not a monument to the greatness of a regime like the others, but an active work of communal architecture that supports the lives of millions of people.
Lastly, the Great Wall: I am fully in agreement with this one.
Chichén Itzá, Mexico
Christ the Redeemer, Brazil
The Great Wall, China
Machu Picchu, Peru
Petra, Jordan
The Roman Colloseum, Italy
The Taj Mahal, India.
Of these, I have visited Chichen Itza, Christ the Redeemer, The Great Wall, Macchu Picchu and the Taj Mahal.
My first observation is that any list of wonders that does not include the temples at Angkor Wat is fatally flawed. I consider Angkor to be the #1 wonder of the world I have seen (never saw the pyramids of Egypt). Angkor far surpasses Chichen Itza and Christ The Redeemer in its powerful beauty and scale. Clearly the Brazilians and Mexicans cast more votes than the people of Cambodia.
Next, I cannot understand why the manmade rice terraces of China and Central Bali would not be considered a great wonder of the world. It is a truly awe inspiring sight. Not a monument to the greatness of a regime like the others, but an active work of communal architecture that supports the lives of millions of people.
Lastly, the Great Wall: I am fully in agreement with this one.
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Scooter Libby
It makes perfect sense for George Bush to commute the sentence of Scooter Libby.
There really isn't anything Bush could do to diminish his reputation even further, so why not do something to shore up the hard core conservative base of the Republican Party? What's the downside: Democrats and moderates will lose respect for Bush? They already have no respect for him.
Bush could pose nude with Ann Coulter and a penguin and the conservative base would praise him for it. On the other hand he could personally behead Osama Bin Laden and the Democrats would find fault.
There really isn't anything Bush could do to diminish his reputation even further, so why not do something to shore up the hard core conservative base of the Republican Party? What's the downside: Democrats and moderates will lose respect for Bush? They already have no respect for him.
Bush could pose nude with Ann Coulter and a penguin and the conservative base would praise him for it. On the other hand he could personally behead Osama Bin Laden and the Democrats would find fault.
Friday, June 29, 2007
iPhone
Ho hum, another electronic gizmo is on the market. Forgive me for failing to get excited about the latest toy that encourages already self-obsessed Gen-Z'ers to identify themslves through the crap they own.
I want Steve Jobs to stop making toys and figure out how to get the marketplace to provide universal health coverage to all Americans.
That I will get excited about...
I want Steve Jobs to stop making toys and figure out how to get the marketplace to provide universal health coverage to all Americans.
That I will get excited about...
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Dead goldfish
One of our goldfish died yesterday. It was 2.5 years old, and part of a small aquarium I bought with my daughter a couple christmasses ago. They had been doing really well and this was a real surprise to find him just resting on the bottom of the tank.
My daughter is 5 and she is not really too concerned about death yet. When our dog died last year, I mustered up all my courage to tell her that our doggie had gone to heaven and she looked up at me and said "Does that mean we can get a kitten?".
Anyway, gotta go to the pet store and buy some fish antibiotics and clean up the fish tank tonight. Might have ben a bacterial or fungal infection.
My daughter is 5 and she is not really too concerned about death yet. When our dog died last year, I mustered up all my courage to tell her that our doggie had gone to heaven and she looked up at me and said "Does that mean we can get a kitten?".
Anyway, gotta go to the pet store and buy some fish antibiotics and clean up the fish tank tonight. Might have ben a bacterial or fungal infection.
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Metabolic analysis
A few weeks ago I had a metabolic analysis at the gym where I work out.
They hooked up an oxygen sensor mask and heart rate monitor and had me ride a bike for 30 minutes at increasing resistance rates.
The idea is to try to determine at what heart rate your body crosses over into non-aerobic exercise, and you are no longer burning fat, but rather stored glycogen.
They pretty much told me I was exercising too hard and put me on a program of 4 days per week of exercise (instead of 5). Each day is different and pegged to a different combination of heart rates. One day is ure interval training, alternating between 120 HR and 160 HR. Other days are 20 minutes at 120, 20 at 130 and 20 at 140.
The theory is that you can increase the heart rate at which you are still burning fat. I go back in August for the same test and we will see if I have moved my numbers.
They hooked up an oxygen sensor mask and heart rate monitor and had me ride a bike for 30 minutes at increasing resistance rates.
The idea is to try to determine at what heart rate your body crosses over into non-aerobic exercise, and you are no longer burning fat, but rather stored glycogen.
They pretty much told me I was exercising too hard and put me on a program of 4 days per week of exercise (instead of 5). Each day is different and pegged to a different combination of heart rates. One day is ure interval training, alternating between 120 HR and 160 HR. Other days are 20 minutes at 120, 20 at 130 and 20 at 140.
The theory is that you can increase the heart rate at which you are still burning fat. I go back in August for the same test and we will see if I have moved my numbers.
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