It's a good omen for dinner when you snuggle up to the bar and see this. At Bella Vita in Los Altos.
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It's a good omen for dinner when you snuggle up to the bar and see this. At Bella Vita in Los Altos.
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Vox Hunt: Take a photo of something orange.
This past spring in Mexico had a rather orange-y theme to it.
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Today's Vox Hunt: Show us somethings that take your breath away.
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According to Forbes magazine, Minneapolis/St. Paul is the country's second most drunken city?
Say what?!
Milwaukee was number one. Rounding out the top five drunkest cities are Columbus, Ohio; Boston and Austin, Texas.
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I think it's amusing that Miss Manners is weighing in on LJ "netiquette".
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Show us a great pair of shoes you saw
today.
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It was even prettier, before we started eating it.
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Angela from Project Runway says "Hi Annabelle!"
sent from mobile phone
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I just accidentally typed patty.com instead of patty.vox.com into my browser and discovered that it's a porn link farm. Lovely. I think I'll spare you the live link and resulting pop ups.
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My friend Rees is in from Washington, D.C. this weekend and last night we saw Lewis Black at Mountain Winery. The warm-up act was great (I am blanking on this name now) and the evening was perfect weather-wise to showoff the panoramic view of Silicon Valley from atop the hill.
After the warm up act we sat enjoying the setting sun and waited for Lewis. And waited. And waited. Finally the warm-up comedian came back out, this time with a bullhorn to inform the crowd that they'd lost all power. No explanation for why, but after about 30 minutes, people came rushing on the stage and started to set up candlelabras. There were about 6 of them with 30 candles per stand. They looked like the ones in the Police's Every Breath You Take video.
About thirty more minutes passed and finally they got a generator up and running to power a microphone so the show could begin. After making some jokes referring to himself asLiberace and The Phantom of the Opera, Lewis made the best of a bad situation and gave everyone a great show full of politcal commentary, raunchy humor and angry observations. He was painfully hilarious.
The lights came back on about 30 minutes before the end of the show without any explanation.
And just for the fun of sharing the one-and-only Lewis Black with everyone, here's a recent Back In Black segment of The Daily Show.
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When was the last time you had to speak in front of a group? How did you feel?
It was just this week and it felt pretty darn good. I like being on panels and public speaking, I'm a ham.
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Positive quotes about ADD
"More and more, the concept of ADD as a disorder is being qualified by inclusion of a string of positive qualities -- such as creativity, high intelligence, ability to do many things at once, an aptitude for small business entrepreneurship, and a powerful intuitive sense." - Susan Burgess, from "Think Fast! The ADD Experience
"ADD people are high-energy and incredibly good brainstormers. They will often happily work 12 to 15 hours by choice. The business community should not fear ADD. Instead, they should see that they have a potential gold mine here.” - Dr. Kathleen Nadeau, a psychologist who is ADD herself (from an ABC News Report)
"Think of an absent minded professor who can find a cure for cancer but not his glasses in the mess on his desk. These are the inventors, creators, poets -- the people who think creative thoughts because they don't think like everyone else." - Martha Denckla, M.D., Director of the Department of Developmental Cognitive Neurology at the Kennedy-Drieger Institute at John Hopkins.
"I've worked with many children, and took them all off medication. I think out of all the many we've worked with, there was one little boy we couldn't do much with... But with most of these children, I was told that they were 'little animals', couldn't sit still, were disruptive, couldn't do anything; under my guidance, I found them to be beautiful; they would die for you." - Marie Friedel, Founder and Executive Director, National Foundation for Gifted and Creative Children.
"There are many positives with ADD, including a surplus of ideas, creativity, excitement, and interest which accompany this kind of mind." - Sari Solden, "Women With Attention Deficit Disorder."
"The same right-brained children who are being labeled and shamed in our schools are the very individuals who have the skills necessary to lead us into the twenty-first century. These children process visually and randomly, and think holistically. They are intuitive problem solvers who get the big picture. They thrive on visual imagery and stimulation; these "attention deficit" kids can spend hours with computer and CD-ROM programs that mirror their thought processes. It's no wonder they are attracted to computers. The use of computers is congruent with the way right-brained children think." - Jeffrey Freed and Laurie Parsons from "Right-Brained Children in a Left Brained World"
Excerpts from an "Are you ADD" list, from "Driven to Distraction"
"Several elements of the ADD mind favor creativity....As mentioned earlier, the term 'attention deficit' is a misnomer. It is a matter of attention inconsistency. While it is true that the ADD mind wanders when not engaged, it is also the case that the ADD mind fastens on to its subject fiercely when it is engaged. A child with ADD may sit for hours meticulously putting together a model airplane." - Edward Hallowell, M.D., and John Ratey, M.D., "Driven to Distraction."
"I think Ritalin and other psychoactive drugs for children will remain popular in this country until the values of our society change. There is an intolerance of temperamental diversity currently, yet it is that very diversity that has made our culture rich and worthy." - Dr. Lawrence Diller, author of Running on Ritalin.
"Being ADD, when I read a book about marine life my mind allows me to travel with the fish and imagine life beneath the sea. Or I can read a book about astronomy and dance among the stars...I may not immediately comprehend that 3+4=7, but I may fully realize that n+26=51 and that the missing number is 25." - Matthew Kutz, age 13, from "Think Fast! The ADD Experience (Hartmann, Bownman & Burgess).
"These children are not “disordered”. They may have a different style of thinking, attending, and behaving, but it's the broader social and educational influences that create the disorder, not the children." - Thomas Armstrong, Ph.D., from Myth of the A.D.D. Child - 50 Ways to Improve Your Child's Behavior and Attention Span Without Drugs, Labels or Coercion.
"Impulsivity, ability to tolerate being thought of as eccentric, spontaneity, and little tolerance for boredom, in addition to daydreaming, are listed as identifying characteristics of creative individuals...Given that some highly creative children engage in 'disruptive, attention-seeking behavior' in the classroom, it is not surprising that they are not valued by their teachers as much as more conforming, less creative students." - Bonnie Cramond, Ph.D., from "Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Creativity - What is the connection?" Journal of Creative Behavior.
"The
ADD child has an inventory of positive qualities:
"These are attributes of his outstanding gift for divergent thinking...It is the teacher's job to train your child to use convergent thinking skills. So they tend to overlook his divergent thinking strengths, and see only his weakness in convergent thinking." - Lucy Jo Palladino, Ph.D., "The Edison Trait - Saving the Spirit of Your Nonconforming Child."
"I'm alarmed that to think than modern science may be turning creativity into a medical disorder" - Thomas Armstrong, Ph.D., from "The Myth of the ADD Child."
"Russell Barkley, Ph.D., another expert in the field, notes that the children we call inattentive are also 'wild, funny, effervescent. They have a love of life.' As adults they 'can be incredibly successful' and gravitate into creative fields or make good salespeople" - Lucy Jo Palladino, Ph.D., from "The Edison Trait."
"In my
opinion, the ADD brain structure is not truly an abnormality. In fact, I
believe a very good case can be made that it is not only normal, though in the
minority, but may well be a superior brain structure. However, the talents of
the person with the ADD brain structure are not those rewarded by our society
at its current stage of development. In other words, the problems of the person
with ADD are caused as much by the way we have our society, educational system,
and business methods organized as by other factors more directly related to the
ADD itself." - Paul Elliott, M.D.
Disorder Perspective | ADD as a Natural Adaptive Trait |
Distractible. | Constantly monitoring environment |
Attention span is short, but can become intensely focused for long periods of time. | Able to throw themselves into the chase on a moment's notice. |
Poor planner, disorganized and impulsive (makes snap decisions). | Flexible; ready to change strategy quickly. |
Distorted sense of time: unaware of how long it will take to do something. | Tireless: capable of sustained drives, but only when "hot on the trail" of some goal. |
Impatient. | Results oriented. Acutely aware of whether the goal is getting closer now. |
Doesn't convert words into concepts adeptly, and vice versa. May or may not have a reading disability. | Visual/concrete thinker, clearly seeing a tangible goal even if there are no words for it. |
Has difficulty following instructions. | Independent. |
Daydreamer. | Bored by mundane tasks; enjoy new ideas, excitement, "the hunt," being hot on the trail. |
Acts without considering consequences. | Willing and able to take risks and face danger. |
Lacking in the social graces. | "No time for niceties when there are decisions to be made!" |
Posted at 23:30 | Permalink | Comments (0)
VOX Question of the Day: When you were younger were there any game shows that you religiously watched and wanted to be a contestant on?
My parents (actually, my mom) loved a good tv game show. As a consequence of a tv set that was rarely turned off, back in the 70s there were a quite a few game shows (and hosts) that I remember vividly:
[1] updated with a scan of a photo from the audition!
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Apparently, Vox brand footwear has something to do with skateboarding. Perhaps we've found our sponsor?
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In my continued fascination with The Keeper of The Gems, Leslie Hall and The We Are The Web site, I am posting this catchy music video here.
For more Leslie Hall "gems" and to marvel in her internet celebrity, behold her site.
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VOX Question of the Day:
Do you have any tattoos? If not, if you were going to get inked what would you get?
I don't have any tattoos. But I almost got one on New Years Day a few years ago.
My friend Rees and I decided we were going to get toe-ring tattoos. I had a nice black simply design all picked out based on a toe ring I liked to wear at the time. Rees was in town for New Years and we'd decided to go do this together to kick off the new year. So that morning, we started calling around to see what tattoo places were open. We tried place after place and no one would do it.
It seems that a tattoo on your toe is the most painful place to get inked. And given that the skin on your feet sheds itself regularly and more frequently than other places on your body, the color fades super quickly too. One of the guys I talked to on the phone said that if he gave me a toe ring tattoo he'd have to scrape me off the ceiling and dig my finger nails out of my friends hand because he'd have to put the needle in so deep just to get enough color in there that he'd be hitting the bone -- time after time after time. Well, alrighty then...
No tattoo for me. I wear my silver toe ring instead.
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VOX Question of the Day: What are your favorite and least favorite words? Any reasons why?
Question submitted by Byrne
Pissy is a good word, especially descriptive. Then again, that maybe makes it a yucky word.
Other words I sort of like for reasons that are unknown:
These words, when I hear them spoken make me what to hit someone:
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Click around this site, have fun, advocate, share.
I have no idea who this Leslie Hall character or person is, but she amuses me; I want to know the "keeper of the gems"!
Thanks for the link from Rick who doesn't use his Vox site (but vows to one day), but is an old school LJ type. Good to catch up with you today Mr. Webbington!
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My sister sent me this via email. Now if I could just get her to take advantage of that Vox invitation I sent her, she could be posting these things here instead of emailing them to us all. It is pretty funny.
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Vox Question of The Day: How cute were you as a baby/child? Let's see those baby pics!
I really need to scan some color ones or risk having Mena make the a Civil War reference like she did about Barak's black and white baby photos.
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Some selected quotes from this story about a San Jose church that's gone all web 2.0 on the faithful...and is opening a "mall church" at a shopping mall in my neighborhood!
The pastor, Jeff Wenke, paced the stage with the demeanor of a caffeinated startup executive...
Throughout the
PowerPointKeynote sermon, Wenke paced the stage, sprinkled in slang like “kick it forward” and had contemporary music by OutKast pumped in during short breaks.The Journey was launched in the style and language — and spirit — of Silicon Valley startups. Five years ago, the initial planners for the church met in a garage. They got seed money from an angel investor of sorts, had a business plan...
The Journey plans to delve even deeper into popular culture by helping launch MallChurch— yes, a church with a mall storefront that includes an Internet cafe, books and informal discussions about Jesus.
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From the creator of another of my favorite movies, comes the Science of Sleep.
I believe it's not being released until mid-September, but the trailer makes me want to see it now!
The website for the movie is really well done too. It has some cool interactive features like a little program that lets you use elements from the movie (like the giant hands) to make an animated clip set to music.
Posted at 23:14 | Permalink | Comments (8)
AB and I went to see the new Pirates of the Caribbeanlast week tonight (I'm liking the back dating function) at the mall (the one where they're building the "mall church") and I took note that a new ad placement was about to be born.
All consuming media indeed!
Ignore that yummy coconut banana frappaccino that someone must have purchased and then felt so guilty that they left it on the table untouched.
And just to show how hypocritical one can be from up on a high horse, here's a picture I took that same night of my daughter as a smiling form of media herself.
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What is your current computer desktop image? Let's see it!
Taken at the beach in Capitola a few weeks back.
The whole collection of photos from that day are here.
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