This is the first time I've been in the US this close to Christmas, and I'm somewhat disgusted by the amount of advertising for specific products. Haven't you seen/heard too many ads for digital cameras, cologne/perfume, plasma TVs, etc, etc? Firstly, I think materialism shouldn't be promoted more than the festivities and the spirit of the season. Secondly, for a gift to be really special, the idea for the particular item should come from the individual. They should start out with a particular inspiration or some thoughts about what the receiver would like. They shouldn't be coerced or persuaded by ads. How does that make the gift special? I believe the expression goes, "it's the thought that counts." I realize we do have the freedom not to choose items that are pushed on us, but I don't like to be influenced about what to buy.

"People who lean on logic and philosophy and rational exposition end by starving the best part of the mind."
- William Butler Yeats

Fortunately for me I'm an all-rounder... or at least I think so. But hey wait... if I think so then that's being too rational! Ok I'll admit... I am more on the rational/philosophical side. But... through my personal philosophy I always try to nourish my passions/interests (which I believe have to do with the best parts of the mind).

When several of your classmates mention after an exam that their hands were hurting at times because of too much writing, and your hand never hurt at all, is that a bad thing? Does it mean I didn't write enough, or that I have strong muscles in my hand? Or maybe I didn't grip my pen as hard as they did?

You know you have super sound system when the bass causes the contents of your rubbish bin to resettle and, occasionally, stacks of books to fall over! What am I listening to? Underworld's "Luetin"... check it out. It's so pure. But, to do justice to it you better have some good bass.

"It is hard to free fools from the chains they revere."
- Voltaire

Quite pessimistic about human nature, but I think this kind of mindlessness does exist in the world. This idea seems to be related to Plato's Cave (i.e. we're chained and can only see shadows on the wall, not what is real). If you don't know what I'm talking about, think of The Matrix. Another idea is that often we do things to lengthen our chains and make things more comfortable. But, that doesn't erase the fact we're still imprisoned.

"It's a job that's never started that takes the longest to finish."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Have you ever wondered why dryer lint is just about ALWAYS blue-gray? Obviously, lint color is a property of the clothes we wear. Since everyone generally wears the same range of colors (oh, how we love to conform!), those colors blended together produce blue-gray lint.

Which of the Greek Gods are you? Press this to find out.

On revenge: "If thine enemy wrong thee, buy each of his children a drum."
- Chinese proverb

I've been learning about marketing. This book I have says that in the pet food industry companies have found a way around direct competition in terms of distribution channels. Ralston (a company I've never heard of, but apparantly is very big in the pet food industry in this country) floods the shelves of stores with many brands. In 1996 Iams sold $350 million of Eukanuba brand premium dog food to breeders and specialty stores. In the same year Hill's Pet Products (part of Colgate-Palmolive) sold $750 million of Science Diet pet food and other products through vetrinarian's offices.

The important lesson I learned from this example is CLEARLY not about product distribution channels. I can't believe that in this country people spend well over $1 billion annually on pet food. Now, I might be biased because I've never had a pet (although I've taken care of fish in a pond and care for plants), but wouldn't this money be much better off given to UNICEF, or some charity? Or put towards education? Or given to starving/hungry people? Or put towards finding a cure for AIDS? Or immunizing people against diseases? Or wiping out malaria and other diseases?

This is quite surreal for me:
http://www.roshan.af/
"Roshan is the trading name for Telecom Development Company Afghanistan Ltd. an international consortium with strong regional connections led by the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development (AKFED) and comprising Monaco Telecom International (MTI), U.S.-based MCT Corp. and Alcatel."

"After undertaking significant, and ground-breaking local research, Telecom Development Company Afghanistan Ltd. (TDCA) selected Roshan as its brand for its digital GSM wireless services in Afghanistan. The word Roshan means "Light" in Dari and Pashto languages, and symbolises TDCA's commitment to bring a new era of high quality and reliable communications to Afghanistan. Roshan also reflects a very strongly held Afghan vision of the immediate future; that of the emergence of Afghanistan back into a 'world of peace and prosperity'."

"If you want to know what law school's like, imagine taking class with all the students that stayed after class to kiss up to the Prof in college - well, that's law school."
- Ryan Williams (friend and old roommate from Duke who's in law school at Cornell)

I think I have the worst kitchen faucet of all time. Well... maybe not of all time (I'm not sure about the days when running water was just catching on). The trouble is that the temperature is impossible to control. The cold water becomes freezing cold pretty quickly. Also, the hot water starts at room temperature and, after a period of time that is impossible to predict, becomes scalding (it has to do with the pressure, the time of the day, the weather outside and probably how wrathful the Hot Water God is feeling). Trying to mix the two to get a perfectly uniform and warm temperature, something which won’t freeze or cook your hands while washing up, is pretty tough. How I cope is to not do a lot of washing up in one go. I try to minimize the time of this exquisite torture.

Hunger is the best spice.

From NYTimes.com today:
A 425-million-year-old fossil found in Herefordshire, England, may be the oldest record of an animal that is unarguably male. Scientists report today in the journal Science that the tiny crustacean, only two-tenths of an inch long, had an unmistakable penis.

In the paper published in today's issue, the scientists name the creature Colymbosathon ecplecticos, which they say means swimmer with a large penis.

David J. Siveter, a geologist at the University of Leicester, said that although this was his literal translation of the Greek, it might, like so many other references to virility in males, be a bit of an exaggeration.

Colymbosathon, he said, was not remarkable among its group of crustaceans, the ostracodes. Some have copulatory organs one-third the length of their bodies, he said, and some produce sperm 10 times the length of their bodies. Colymbosathon is more modest; its penis was less than a fifth of its body length.

My first thought was how can a fossil of a crustacean two-tenths of an inch long have an "unmistakable" penis (especially if the penis is less than one-fifth of two-tenths of an inch long)? I'm pretty sure most people on the planet wouldn't be able to tell the penis from one of the legs (that is, unless it looked like a human one). No doubt the experts know the difference between a crustacean's penis and its leg, but I just think it's inappropriate to use the word "unmistakable" unless it really is so. My second thought was amazement at how the sperm of some creatures can be 10 times longer than their bodies! That seems so crazy, but it does make sense - I suspect those cells have to swim through ocean currents to get to the crab eggs, so they need long, strong tails.

"Did you train harder than your opponents did today?"
- sign on the inside of the door to the wrestling room

"I think that gay marriage is something that should be between a man and a woman."
- Governor Schwarzenegger

Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons is wrong.