Libby Says...
First entry on Notesgirl.com in its current incarnation (meaning, as a blog): Feb 26, 2003 Giant life-changing events that have happened since then: Too many to count, but let's try this way of counting: moves (3), books written (1), divorce/major new relationship (1/1), major surgery (1), grad school started (1), significant job change/layoff/new job (2/1/1), half-marathons run (2), new friends made (tons!)... So, around 14+ pretty big events in a fairly short period of time... Thanks so much for those of you who've stuck with me, personally and as readers, through all of it. I'm stronger and happier because of you. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
As you all know, I have allowed some of my skills, especially in development, to atrophy a bit over the past few years while I've been being an editor and a program manager and etc. So, when a reader sent in this question, I thought that maybe you kind blog readers would be willing to help us both out: Hey NotesGirl, So, dear readers and friends, anyone who can lend a hand will be most appreciated! Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
In two weeks, like a gadfly who rails against City Hall for years, only to wake up and find himself elected mayor, Mr. Stewart will stand where Mr. Martin was that night, armed with punch lines drafted in consultation with Mr. Karlin and six other "Daily Show" writers, among others. I haven't watched the Oscars in years, but if the Academy hoped to draw in some younger and less-likely-to-watch viewers this year with the choice of Jon Stewart as the host, well, it worked for me -- my popcorn and I will be cuddled up with the boyfriend at a friend's Oscar's get-together. Here's what the producer had to say about why they chose Stewart: Mr. Cates said he selected Mr. Stewart, 43, in consultation with the president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Asked to synthesize Mr. Stewart's appeal, Mr. Cates, 71, said, "He's hip, he's with-it, he's 'today.' " Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Thought Dvorak's column on why academia isn't looking at "phenomena" like MySpace.com or LiveJournal is pretty interesting. Heck, we're computer folks and we found at Lotusphere that a lot of folks don't know about even "mainstream" blogs or blogging. Since the appearance of the desktop computer, very little academic analysis has been done on it and how people use it. Yes, there are a ton of surveys done to show that people use computers for e-mail and entertainment. These are usually done on behalf of advertisers looking for an edge. They are not helping us understand the overnight successes of experimental mechanisms. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
I don't think this is anything other than human nature, over time. But it's funny. And I know I've been guilty of it in the past. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Occasionally, someone else will say what I've been unable to articulate quite as clearly. In this case, Will Shetterly captured what I've been wanting to say about the riots over the cartoons of Mohammed: The people who first published the cartoons mocking Muhammed are within their rights. In a free society, you have the right to be an asshole. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
There's a reader editorial in today's NYTimes that suggests that (based on research) we better absorb food that we enjoy, assuming it has nutritive value in the first place. So perhaps it's a good suggestion to eat healthy foods, but flavorful, interesting, enjoyable healthy foods. And that one of the keywords in that sentence should be "enjoy." The health writer Lawrence Lindner tells of a committee that gathered to hammer out the wording of the United States Dietary Guidelines in 1995. One committee member suggested that the first guideline read "Enjoy a variety of foods" — language that was rejected as "too hedonistic." (In the end, Mr. Lindner wrote, the committee "opted for the apparently less giddy 'Eat a variety of foods.' ") So let's vow to enjoy our food, not wolf it down in the car with a heaping order of guilt. Call it Slow Food, conscious eating, or eating the French way, the point's the same: eating well and with pleasure is more than hedonism — it's good nutritional policy and practice. Bon appétit! from Go With Your Gut by Harriet Brown, in Feb. 20, 2006 New York Times Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Reminded by reading another baseball fan's thoughts on spring training, I had to check out how my boys are doing down in Kissimmee. As you know, pitchers and catchers reported to training, and we're at 44 days to opening day. Bagwell and Clemens are still question marks in the Astros lineup, but hopefully things will work out for the best. I don't know how I'll manage if Baggy is done -- I've only been a baseball fan for about a decade or so, and Bagwell and Biggio have been cornerstones of the Astros team that entire time. But, of course, as we all know... everything changes. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
I hate to even admit that I did this, but the results aren't too embarrassing, so I guess I'll come clean. Via Rob, I happened to see a link to egosurf your name. I egosurfed Notesgirl and got approximately 12000 ego points. Well, then. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
The Johari window is going around the blog world right now -- thought it was kind of interesting... Wanna participate -- tell what you think? Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Updated the template. Probably not much to see right now, but soon... soon... Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Well, I have to admit that Munich wasn't on the top of my list to go see in the theaters (if I'm going to be depressed, I'd rather do it at home, where I can control the dosage), but I am taking a class this semeter called "Islam: State and Society," and our prof suggested that it might enhance our learning. So, off Philip and I went to see it. Here are my impressions: Munich, directed by Steven Spielberg, screenplay by Tony Kushner and Eric Roth After Munich last night -- after 2 hours and 44 minutes of watching people who think they're doing the best things they can to support their country, their religion, and their people -- I was convinced that there are no "good guys." Following the murder of Israeli Olympic athletes during the 1972 games in Munich by a group calling themselves "Black September," the Israeli government recruits a group of Mossad agents to assassinate the people who are blamed for planning the attack. We hear Lynn Cohen as Golda Meir decide that Israelis can no longer afford to hold to their ideals and take responsibility for the killings, even as she recruits Avner (Eric Bana) to leave his seven-months-pregnant wife, go into exile for an indeterminate time, and lead a team who will kill for revenge. Avner's team of agents are not regular field agents and when they agree to take the job, they are "fired" from Mossad (although some of them are "sleeper" agents to begin with) so that they will not be associated with Mossad or the Israeli government as they complete their assassinations. We see the attack on the Israeli athletes, through not only the action itself, but also through the eyes of the families of both the athletes and their attackers, watching the news reports on the situation. This is one of the (many) moments in the film when I think it is most clear that all the people portrayed in the movie, regardless of the horrible things they might do, or have done to them, are human beings, with families and lives and beliefs. Later, the somewhat rag-tag team finds themselves in a "safe house" in Greece, and a team of PLO agents comes in during the night. They too have been told about the "safe house." Thinking quickly, the "who us? we're not Mossad" agents identify themselves as a "red" group operating in Europe and they all decide to stay "safe" in the safe house. Avner and the leader of the PLO team end up in the hallway, talking and arguing about the life of the Palestinian refugees and the Israeli state. It is another reminder of the humanity of both sides: nobody is in the right. In a shootout during the next assassination, Avner kills the PLO team's leader. This leads of course, to the inhumanity of both sides. Eleven men, Arabs, living in Western Europe, are believed to have contributed to the Munich attack. Avner's team is supposed to kill them -- shooting if necessary; blowing up if possible. Spielberg shows us the families, the daily lives, of the men to be killed. And he shows us the uncertainty the team feels in the killing. As time goes on, they become both more efficient and effective as killers, and more scared and hopeless as men. In the end, Avner loses most of his team to retribution attacks from the new members of Black September that take the place of those they've killed, and loses his faith in his country. His handler, Ephraim (Geoffrey Rush), said at one point "We kill for our future. We kill for peace." At the end of the film, Avner has no peace and, I think, no belief that peace is possible. For my part, I felt the anger of the Israeli's and the pride Avner's mother felt as she told her son to do whatever was necessary for Israel. I felt the pain and striving of the people Avner's team killed. I felt the agony Avner felt watching his team be killed, and trying to reconcile their deaths with the deaths of the Olympians and the deaths he and his team were dealing. There are no good guys and no bad guys in many conflicts. There are only people doing what they feel they must and living with the consequences of what they do. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Well, I can certainly see that when you spend so much time at an office that having a friend/confidante/partner could be a good thing... From CNN Money:
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Ferris has a few things to say about the Lotusphere attendance numbers -- they don't quite believe the 6700 number that I'd heard bandied about, but despite a bit of a "debunking" flavor, the upshot is that:
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