Weight training

By Brian Andreas at Story People.

News holiday

“Where does the news go during the holidays?” he asked.

“It must go where the news makers aren’t, otherwise it wouldn’t be able to relax and enjoy the break,” she replied.

Walk with the dreamers

From Smile Project

The most important thing

Something on which to ponder if you’re making resolutions for next year:

The most important thing you leave behind is the stuff that turns into treasures when children find them.

 

And on the bag: stuff that’ll be worth something someday when people’s priorities change.

 

Treasures by Brian Andreas at Story People

 

If you’re planning to make some New Year resolutions . . .

. . . Barking Up the Wrong Tree has a post on the last damn thing you’ll ever need to know about New Year Resolutions:

I’ve never been particularly serious about making New Year Resolutions, or keeping the few I’ve made.

Resolutions I have made and kept to have been triggered by something other than the date.

Open Mic

Would you like an occasional opportunity to discuss an issue that I don’t?

If so here’s your chance, consider this an open mic.

The response will determine if it becomes a regular event, an occasional one or gets filed in the good-ideas-that-weren’t bin.

(No pressure )

12.12.12.

If my understanding of palindromes is correct, today’s isn’t one – that would be 12.1.21 or 21.1.12.

But today’s date  – 12.12.12 – has a pleasing symmetry which doesn’t happen very often.

Action plan

Rules for making the world: 1. Stand up & do the thing you see needs doing. 2. That’s it. (If it was easy, we’d be having a different conversation.) Brian Andreas at Story People

One of lots of smile and thought provoking mini stories in his new book Theories of Everything.

You can sign up here for a story of the day which brings one of his whimsical stories to your in box overnight meaning there’s something to make you smile when you first check your messages.

Introverts, smiles & over fat from under slept

Topics discussed with Jim Mora on Critical Mass today were:

An introvert’s manifesto

Muscles to smile and frown

And

If you’re over fat you could be under slept: – the impact of sleep deprivation on weight gain.

 

The real reason

Thought for the day:

From Story People by Brian Andreas.

Better than average

Wisdom from a Yorkshireman: If you get it right three times out of five, you’re better than average.

If you don’t want a decision . . .

. . .  form a committee.

That might be a bit harsh, committees have a place and some do make decisions, and good ones at that.

Alas  that can’t be said of all committees and all decisions and this could explain why:

 ”Part of the motivation for the committee is a kind of cowardice, a fear of taking responsibility. If people take a decision alone they are responsible for the outcome, as they should be. Fearful that the result of that decision may be challenged they seek refuge in the imprimatur of a meeting. This spreads any blame.” Gordon McLauchlan

Vested interest

Quote of the day:

It’s hard to believe anything I say, she told me, because I was there & I have a vested interest in being right. Story People

A friend received some books by Brian Andreas from another friend. She lent them to me which led me to the Story People website which sends me an email each day with a message like this which helps me see the world in a different way.

 

Apostrophes, commas and hugs

Discussion with Jim Mora on Critical Mass this afternoon was sparked by:

An apostrolapse at Waterstones

The logical necessity of the Oxford comma

Do hugs really make us happier?

Good deeds batons not bomerangs

“I don’t know how  I’ll ever repay you.”

This is a typical response to an act of kindness to which the best response is:

“You don’t have to. Good deeds aren’t boomerangs the donor expects back, they are batons to be passed on.

“One day, when you’ll be in a position to help someone else, you’ll do so and pass on the baton to them.”

Discipline is . . .

. . . having the self-restraint to suck a lozenge or sweet until it dissolves rather than hastening the process by chewing or biting.

I wish you enough

A friend emailed this to me yesterday:

Recently I overheard a Father and daughter in their  last moments together at the airport.  They had  announced the departure. Standing near the security gate, they hugged and the Father said, ‘I love you, and I wish you enough.’ The daughter replied, ‘Dad, our life together has been more than  enough.  Your love is all I ever needed.  I wish you enough, too, Dad.’ They kissed and the daughter left.  The Father walked over to the window where I was seated.  Standing there I could see he wanted and needed to cry.  I tried not to intrude on his privacy, but he welcomed me in by asking, ‘Did you ever say good-bye to someone knowing it would be forever?’ ‘Yes, I have,’ I replied.  ’Forgive me for asking, but why is this a forever good-bye?’… ‘I am old, and she lives so far away.  I have challenges ahead and the reality is – the next trip back will be for my funeral,’ he said.. ‘When you were saying good-bye, I heard you say, ‘I wish  you enough.’  May I ask what that means?’ He began to smile.  ’That’s a wish that has been handed down from other generations.  My parents used to say it to everyone…’  He paused a moment and looked up as if trying to remember it in detail, and he smiled even more. ‘When we said, ‘I wish you enough,’ we were wanting the other person to have a life filled with just enough good things to sustain them.’  Then turning toward me, he shared the following as if he were reciting it from memory. I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how gray the day may appear. I  wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more. I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting. I wish you enough pain so that even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger. I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.

I wish  you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.

I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final good-bye.

He then began to cry and walked away.

They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them; but then an entire life to forget them.

To all my friends and loved ones, I wish you enough.

Quote of the week

IT IS IN LISTENING to other people talk that you learn to appreciate silence. What higher praise of a man could there be than that he is taciturn? People have only to talk for a short time for it to become obvious that the greatest of human rights is not freedom of opinion, but freedom from opinion. It is a mercy that there are so many languages that one does not understand.

                                                                           Theodore Dalrymple in Second Opinion: A Doctor’s Dispatches from the Inner City.

Sentence of the day

“Problems are bad, and badness is wrong, so we should all do something random immediately in order to stop this wrong badness from causing problems.”
                                                                                   TimT at Will Type For Food.

10.10.10.

I was in the archway theatre at Otago University at some stage on 7.7.77 because I can remember doodling the date.

I have no idea where I was on 6.6.66 but if it was a week day I’d have been at primary school. 

I was probably at home being domestic with a three year old on 8.8.88. What I was doing and where I was doing it on 9.9.99 escapes me.

The only thing of great moment I have planned for 10.10.10 is continuing to read Joy Cowley’s memoir, Navigation. I’m only a few pages into it and am already entranced.