"An industrial capitalist society that does not recognize ecological limits but only perpetual economic expansion and has the profit motive as driver, will eventually consume and destroy itself."
A window into the Autistic mind
This is an wildly beautiful video that I came across on BoingBoing today. In just 8 minutes this self-portrait by an an Autistic artist helped me understand a whole lot more about the people with Autism I've worked with over the years. I highly recommend taking the time to watch it:
Artist's statement: "The first part is in my "native language," and then the second part provides a translation, or at least an explanation. This is not a look-at-the-autie gawking freakshow as much as it is a statement about what gets considered thought, intelligence, personhood, language, and communication, and what does not."
posted by Unknown @ 1:16 AM1 comments
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Y-o-d-e-r
who here has read "the cow in science hall" by karl schlabach? it sits by our toilet!
5:30 p.m. a pleasant january evening in the mid-atlantic. all is quiet in a messy yet quaint bike shop in historic federal hill, baltimore.
a young woman sits in a nearly broken orange swivel chair, watching a documentary on waco and alternately playing a game on an imac that shares the small desk with the tv, possibly as old as the chair. to the right, a cold pot of coffee sits atop a microwave on top of a mini fridge, strewn with discarded tea bags and plastic creamer containers.
a bell rings, a tall man is standing in the doorway. immediately she pauses the satellite tv feed. "is there anything i can help you with?"
"yes," he says, "i'm here to pick up my bike. the name is Yoder, Y-o-d-e-r."
She stands up, "I'm sorry - that's Yoder? Y-o-d-e-r?"
"That's right, it's a red Fugi"
She heads for the back, holding back a giggle. She has the puzzled kind of grin usually reserved for department store bikes looking for a "tune-up." She is rehearsing in her head a way to nonchalantly explain the joke the man has inadvertently made.
After a few minutes she returns, bike in hand. she passes the large road bike to the man and heads behind the counter to the register. his ticked reads jonathan yoder, 123 Eutaw St, Baltimore. still grinning, she asks "i'm sorry, but there was this joke at the school where i went, where this guy comes in from California, and he's registering, and he's like, 'my name is Yoder, thats Y-o-d-e-r.' which is funny, because who doesn't know how to spell 'Yoder' because there were like a million Yoders that went to my school." grin
"oh" he says. the employee directs her attention to the repair ticket in hand. "what school?"
"um," she replies, skipping the usual 'you've probably never heard of it, it's in a small town in northern indiana,'"Goshen College."
"oh" neither fully acknowledging the clear cultural bond. "actually, i was in Guatemala this summer with some Goshen students. Brooks (Last name?)."
"oh yeah, um. o forget where he;s from, with all the hair, right?"
"Oregon, I think."
"Actually i was in Guatemala earlier this year! where did you go?"
"I was in Guatemala City for a few weeks, then i went to San (someone?) de Atilan."
"No way, did you go to San Pedro? That was a highlight of the trip, for sure"
"no"
"Believe it or not, the owner of the shop spent some time on the lake too in the eighties i think! .... yadda yadda....
lkdefkljelkkefjf
okay, anyway, so that ended up being a boring story, but the beginning was interesting? right? well i'm going to bed so i;m not going to do anything about it. i have the day off tomorrow if anyone is bored. plans include roaming the town for coffee.
graammorr
posted by kate @ 11:27 PM0 comments blast!
posted by meg @ 1:35 PM0 commentsheartless and cruel in springfield Kate and Julia: That was the best family xmas newsletter I've ever ever read.
It made me laugh uncontrollably while I was answering phones and cancelling peoples subscriptions because they're being deployed to Iraq - making me seem uncharacteristically heartless, cruel and maniacal. Maybe no more internet-grazing in the work place today.
posted by Sara @ 11:05 AM0 comments
Speaking of procrastination...
we weren't really thinking about doing a christmas card thing this year, but then i got a new years card from from a cousin (microsoft word 2003 attatchment - lame) and was inspired by their(my cousin melodie and her hubby-bubby) month to month picturless account of thier year. so i made one of our year hereitis
posted by kate @ 9:05 AM0 comments
Saturday, January 20, 2007
no way
I disagree with that equation. People procrastinate solely because they don't want to do what they have to do. volunteering to do something is far more rewarding than feeling obligated to do something based on some ridiculous internal sense of responsibility. proof to follow. Furthermore, the longer something has been sitting around waiting to get done, the less appealing that course of action is. people thrive on spontaneity. which makes those courses of action which are present in the immediate time most appealing, rather than those courses of action which have been planned for a while. Why? immediate satisfaction. made possible by denying the existence of time therefore eliminating and notions of foresight and consequences. weee! by getting rid of responsibility, people are free to do what makes them happy at that moment. and by golly, if sitting in bed and posting on shoup is more exciting than getting quotes from equipment rental houses, then I'm going to do it! Why? because I have no obligations to this blog and and I should have gotten quotes from the equipment rental houses weeks ago.
posted by meg @ 3:30 PM0 commentsI actually should be doing something else
From Theories of Procrastination:
This theory represents the very cutting edge of motivational research. It suggests that the reasons why people make any decision can be largely represented by the following equation:
Utility indicates preference for a course of action. Naturally, the higher the utility, the greater the preference. On the top of the equation, the numerator, we have two variables: Expectancy (E) and Value (V). Expectancy refers to the odds or chance of an outcome occurring while Value refers to how rewarding that outcome is. Naturally, we would like to choose pursuits that give us a good chance of having a pleasing outcome. On the bottom of the equation, the denominator, we also have two variables. G refers to the subject's sensitivity to delay. The larger G is, the greater is the sensitivity. Finally, D represents Delay, which indicates how long, on average, one must wait to receive the payout. Since delay is in the denominator of the equation, the longer the delay, the less valued the course of action is perceived.
I'm guessing the Scientific American writer glanced at this quickly and mistook the capital gamma for an I. But other than that, I think it hangs together if you consider Delay as the wait for the payout.
As for college vs. vocational schools, that article makes me think of Québec's free CEGEP system, which can lead to either a pre-university or technical diploma.
posted by sasha @ 2:26 PM0 commentsSpuds!!
Shouldn't it be: U = E x V x I x D That is, shouldn't E, V, I and Dall increase U? Am I missing something? Or did my economics degree just come in useful?!
Another possibility: I'm confused about whether I and D should be a high or low numerical value if, say, the task is due tomorrow and I really enjoy getting things done in advance. I was assuming that a task which is due shortly would have a high I value, and that if I enjoy getting things done in advance my personal D value would be high, but maybe the author was imagining the reverse.
posted by weiss @ 7:27 PM0 comments
Thursday, January 18, 2007
equation for procrastination U = E x V / I x D, where U is the desire to complete the task; E, the expectation of success; V, the value of completion; I, the immediacy of task; and D, the personal sensitivity to delay.
posted by sasha @ 4:30 PM0 comments
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
my post graduation dream...
I wish that there could be this intentional community where all sorts of amazing people could gather... live together, have academic discussions, plenty of time to chill and parties at the appropriate times of course. in a beautiful setting, plenty of nature for those who love nature, but still close enough to the "outside world" for modern conveniences and that people wouldn't think we were some awkward cult... there would be a lot of cooking, but still places where meals were prepared ('cause everyone likes being lazy)... Lots of homemade things, and people are giving and help provide for others... maybe there'd be some animals, varying from pet-like animals such as cats and dogs to various others such as chickens, goats, llamas, and at least one yak. there would be lots of comfortable places for gathering inside and out. people wouldn't care what you wore: men could wear skirts, and shoes aren't required--anywhere.
k. so maybe it's sort of just like college, but without a lot of the BS.
posted by Erini CS @ 9:18 AM0 comments
Monday, January 15, 2007
OMG!
Who remembers shoup's water drinking parties? Turns out you can actually die from that! click for story
posted by meg @ 1:47 PM0 comments
I have a crush on Naisy Dolar!
I first met Naisy when K-S and I were out running around the park. She an aldermanic candidate, and probably the most adorable one ever! She handed us campaign literature and we explained that we don't live in the 50th Ward. Then I saw her leafleting at the train station both today and yesterday. Today I worked up the courage to give a shy wave. "I read about you on Chicagoist yesterday," I said. "Oh don't believe what you read on blogs!" she warned me, but I told her that I don't and it was nice words anyway. She said "Sometimes I read about myself on blogs and just want to go like this," putting her hands up in front of her eyes but parting her fingers just so she could peak out. This is exactly what I do during scary parts of movies. She is so cute! I yelled out "I don't!" as the train doors closed.
Don't believe what those evil bloggers say, Naisy. I believe in you!
posted by weiss @ 8:10 PM0 comments