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Mother-Daughter Cities of the World: A Medley |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
7:32 am EDT, May 4, 2009 |
Lagos, the New York of Africa Nyanya, the Lagos of Abuja
Calgary, the Dallas of the North North Bay, the Calgary of Northern Ontario
Tulsa, the buckle of the Bible Belt Kirkuk, the Tulsa of Iraq
Midland, the Tulsa of Texas
Saint Augustine, the Newport of the South Newport, the Charleston of the Northeast Greer, South Carolina, the Taiwan of Germany Taiwan, the Honolulu of China Honolulu, the Miami of the Asia-Pacific Miami, the capital of Latin America Tel Aviv, the Miami of the Middle East Ramallah, the Tel Aviv of Palestine
Izmir, the Miami of Turkey
San Diego, the Miami of the West Coast Tucson, the San Diego of the desert Munich, the Tucson of Europe Fullerton, the Munich of Orange County
Cartagena, the Munich of Latin America Girardot, the Cartagena of the poor
Qingdao, the Munich of China Lowestoft, the Qingdao of Europe
Tehran, the Munich of the Cold War Provo, the Tehran of Utah
Cleveland, the Munich of the Midwest Birmingham, the Cleveland of England Howrah, the Birmingham of the East
Cleveland, the San Antonio of the East San Antonio, the Atlanta of the 80s
Harvard, the Munich of American education 02138, the Harvard of the luxury lifestyle magazines Harvard Law, the Beirut of American law schools Beirut, the Monte Carlo of Asia Monte Carlo, the Long Beach of Europe Long Beach, the Tacoma of Southern California Tacoma, the Oakland of the Pacific Northwest
Macau, the Monte Carlo of the East Bodog, the Macau of the internet
Macau, the Las Vegas of Asia
Dubai, the Las Vegas of the Middle East Jamaica, the Dubai of the Caribbean East St. Louis, the Jamaica of Illinois
Tangiers, the Dubai of North Africa
Herat, the Dubai of Afghanistan
Massachusetts, the Las Vegas of same-sex marriages Onitsha, the Boston of Southern Nigeria
Burlington, the San Francisco of the East Coast
Melbourne, the Boston of the Southern Hemisphere Sydney, the Atlanta of Australia Barcelona, the Sydney of Europe Leeds, the Barcelona of the West Riding of Yorkshire Philadelphia, the Leeds of America Merced, the Philadelphia of the Central Valley Sacramento, the Omaha of the West Coast Guadalajara, the Sacramento of Mexico
Monterey, the Nashville of Norteno Nashville, the Athens of the South Branson, the Nashville of Missouri Provincetown, the Branson of Lesbian Comedy Saugatuck, the Provincetown of the Midwest
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If There Is, I Don't Want To Know About It |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
10:40 pm EST, Dec 22, 2008 |
There is such a thing as being considerate, and although it may come as a surprise to you, you should not presume that everyone loves your dog. Casey is my 4th peke and because their under body is so low to the ground snow clumps form all over his body where the snow attaches to his hair. I put his turtle neck on him more for me so I don't have to freeze my hands breaking up the clumps when we get done with our walk. I am 25 and it's all very lovely and like a costume. It's beautiful and romantic ... it's not like standing up there in my everyday underwear. It's a theatrical show and everyone is there to have a good time. Is there anything fluffier than a cloud? If there is, I don't want to know about it.
I think there is such a thing as "kitty grass" but I am not familiar with it.
Many recipes call for softened or room-temperature butter, but there is such a thing as getting your butter too soft.
So what will we do with global warming? I don’t know. I just hope the place warms enough so I don’t have to worry about the cold anymore. There is such a thing as a happy ending, but I know I couldn't have done it without help. Are we getting hosed? Maybe. If we’re going to get hosed we’re going to get hosed. At least this time they’re being considerate enough to tell you up front.
I hire really smart people who work themselves to death so I don't have to.
One way or another we have to pay up -- even if it feels like we're getting hosed.
Sitting alone with one’s thoughts is the hardest part of jail. |
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Reflections on the Buying and Selling of Affordable Indulgences |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
12:19 pm EDT, Jul 6, 2008 |
Here, for the foreseeable future, Starbucks remains the "affordable indulgence" Schultz has always described. Having refused the poor what is necessary, they give the rich what is superfluous. Perhaps the most powerful way in which we conspire against ourselves is the simple fact that we have jobs.
Now 12,000 partners had suddenly learned what betrayal really was. Surely, I surmised, they'd be venting on starbucksgossip.com, the website largely of, by, and for Starbucks employees. In 1876, a man named Henry Wickham smuggled seventy thousand rubber tree seeds out of the rainforests of Brazil and delivered them to Victorian England’s most prestigious scientists at Kew Gardens. Those seeds, planted around the world in England’s colonial outposts, gave rise to the great rubber boom of the early twentieth century -- an explosion of entrepreneurial and scientific industry that would change the world. The story of how Wickham got his hands on those seeds -- a sought-after prize for which many suffered and died -- is the stuff of legend. In this utterly engaging account of obsession, greed, bravery, and betrayal, author and journalist Joe Jackson brings to life a classic Victorian fortune hunter and the empire that fueled, then abandoned, him.
Rule No. 1: Betray your employer before your employer betrays you.
Rule No. 2: Remember what you are selling.
Rule No. 3: Hide your motives. Or, specifically, minimize the appearance of financial interest. For some, the new era of lightweight, lightning-fast software design is akin to a guerrilla movement rattling the walls of stodgy corporate development organizations. "They stole our revolution and now we're stealing it back and selling it to Yahoo," said Bruce Sterling.
Dick’s novels, reread, invite us to pick one page and draw a thick line across it, separating the novel into before and after the protagonist learns (or believes he has learned) what’s really going on: often we realise, far into the after portion, that we may never know. America will be a more secure country once it discards the notion that ... [ Read More (1.2k in body) ]
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The silence of the concrete dinosaurs |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
5:57 am EDT, Jun 9, 2008 |
Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion. Some would say this is exactly the kind of music people would pay good money to be able to silence. By invoking emotionally volatile imagery, The Forever War, Science Fiction Version, reads exactly like Chinese propaganda. Remember: You can't beat the Axis if you get VD. Also, beware the temes. Although we weren't meant to suffer this much, what we have in America is a nation of places not worth caring about. We must subvert the status quo, and we must reconsider the necessity and wisdom of the blanket, indiscriminate classification. What we have here is a family of concrete dinosaurs, making an epic journey of neurodiscovery. Despite the tendencies of the 'uneducated', at some point, they will come to recognize the value of loitering -- not to be confused with The Forever War, Real World Version.
A recap of the last thirty days. |
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This is not the time for object lessons in temptation and fascination |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
10:24 am EDT, Apr 6, 2008 |
It is tempting to keep uncovering facts, all of them interesting.
I don't wear a hijab, nor am I Muslim, but textiles fascinate me.
Do not try to teach a child any lessons on an airplane.
This is not the time to square off about limit setting.
This is a time for distraction and entertainment.
Two adults and one cat do not need two, identical lasagna pans.
It is tempting to ponder why I own two, but this is not the time.
It is tempting to opt for baby blue rather than bright blue with black,
because it seems like a softer combination, but that looks like business wear.
There's nothing wrong with that, but it's not fashion, darling.
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Foreign Policy: Seven Questions: Waiting for a Cyber Pearl Harbor |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
7:09 am EDT, Apr 3, 2008 |
Chinese hackers are growing increasingly bold in probing critical U.S. defense networks. But former U.S. counterterrorism chief Richard A. Clarke tells FP that if the United States waits for a dramatic, 9/11-style attack on its critical infrastructure to act, it will be missing the real threat.
Foreign Policy: Seven Questions: Waiting for a Cyber Pearl Harbor |
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A Conversation with Jason Hoffman |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
1:23 pm EST, Feb 20, 2008 |
A systems scientist looks at virtualization, scalability, and Ruby on Rails.
A Conversation with Jason Hoffman |
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In wake of debacle, and with considerable fanfare, relentless ugliness is declared new partner of choice |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
5:28 pm EST, Feb 2, 2008 |
Who would have thought the ultimate three-girls-in-the-city flick would premiere not in the flapper-fast 20s, the satin-slouch 30s, or the shoulder-pad 40s, but in the white-glove, bullet-bra 50s? In 1959, with considerable fanfare, Twentieth Century Fox premiered The Best of Everything, a title it took seriously. The movie was in CinemaScope, of course, as were all major Fox films after 1953, and the color was by DeLuxe. Indeed, "deluxe" was the operative word ... Where some moviegoers might have seen relentless ugliness, I saw a profound beauty. Cisco's proven competence in networking makes it our partner of choice."
Young people sought Elvis's cafe as refuge from the relentless ugliness that pervaded most public gathering places. “Finalizing a new partner would be my first priority as the new CEO,“ Singh said. “I intend to establish GE Money as the partner of choice to both consumers and business partners.”
The relentless ugliness of the industrial age, the telegraph wires and smokestacks and steel trusswork, unnerved him. How could he be true to the contemporary world without allowing its mess and banality to infect his art? Telecom Egypt has a decades-long tradition of being the partner of choice to all Asia-Europe submarine cable systems, by providing the infrastructure for crossing from Red to Mediterranean Seas.
He was a relentless boozer, a sucker puncher and a chippy chaser, and the sum of his personal ugliness overwhelmed whatever good he did for the New York Yankees. chippie-chaser (also chippy-chaser) 1 [late 19C-1930s] a well-dressed loafer who spec, pursues young shopgirls and even schoolgirls. 2 [1920s+] a devot... [ Read More (0.5k in body) ]
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Mucking About in a Vast Series of Tubes, Secretively Slapping Together a Post |
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| Topic: Miscellaneous |
11:22 pm EST, Jan 28, 2008 |
Last week the Federal Reserve announced the biggest cut in overnight lending rates in more than two decades. Congress, not to be outdone, is slapping together a massive deficit spending package aimed at giving the economy an emergency booster shot. The CIA and the Pentagon didn't want other agencies mucking about in their computer networks; other agencies sought to maintain exclusive relationships with certain industries. Indeed, al-Qaida, a secret and secretive organization, would be much more immune to Israeli retaliations than is Hamas, a generally pragmatic organization.
Naturally, the helpful Garbage Pail Kids want to assist, so they all steal some sewing machines and begin slapping together nightclubbing dresses for teen whores. We must trust the richness of children's ideas, the report says, not impose our own. Case studies in the report emphasise exploration, experimentation and "mucking about with things". The Israeli explanation for this rather casual approach to security is that the facility was so secret, not even the Syrian Army knew about it, hence the lack of defensive measures. Michael acidly suggests, “this reactor was so secretive that nobody in Syria knew about its existence. Only the Israelis knew.”
Employee engagement is one of the biggest issues facing any leading food or non-food retailer. The specific challenges for Mr Schultz were set out in a recent book, Punching In, by Alex Frankel, who worked as a trainee barista in a San Francisco Starbucks outlet in 2005. He recounts a chaotic introduction to the company, with no time to read the extensive spiral binders of training information, and a feeling that the employees were simply "slapping together" an overly expensive beverage, without any of the "romance and theatre" Mr Schultz says is at the heart of its brand. "Well, one day I was mucking about in the shower, trying to make someone laugh by undermining the point of jokes." Why are secret societies so secretive?... [ Read More (0.6k in body) ]
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