Words come in many colors,
Among those they don numerous hues.
Some are meek.
Some are shy.
Some are stylish.
Some have substance.
Among those that are strong and essential,
"despite" is a good word.

In the family of
deeply unpleasant creatures
when I descry a spirit
I will name it "despite".

List and references to 2007 MacArthur Fellows

3d modelling kids projects

A folded mirror

Take every number from 1 through hundred. Say 5. For that number write down every combination of addition facts. It is simple, Kavitha said. "Just do this", she illustrated:

0 + 5
1 + 4
2 + 3

0,6
1,5
2,4
3,3

wow that is a lot of work. Will you ever be done with it? How long will it take. I needed to know how many pages will this fill if this is done for all numbers from 1 to 100.

Roughly half

I know roughly that the number of addition factors are about half the given number. So the total number of facts will be the addition of all numbers from 1 through 100 divided by 2.

1 + 2 + .... + 100

How much will that be? Although I know there is a formula for that, why not have some fun and derive it

1   + 2 + .... + 100
100 + 99 + .... + 1
________________________

101 + 101 + ..... + 101 (100 times)

_________________________ 

So the total is 100 x 101

Say that is roughly 10,000.

Half of that will be 5,000. I need to do this because I have added the series itself. The addition facts will be further half of that. that would be 2500.

How many pages

So she needs to write 2500 facts. Assuming 25 lines on a page and each line accomodating 10 facts, she can accomodate 250 facts for one page. Total is 2500 facts. So if you divide 2500 with 250 facts for each page you end up with 10 pages.

Not too bad. The teacher does not have too-ill but only slightly-ill of intentions.

How long will it take?

it could take 30 minutes to complete a page. In a day you may push a kid to do two pages. So it will take a week to do this for a number like 100.

Say, there is a kid that deserves a twice as much enlightenment and the temptation is to assign to do this exercise for 200. Well 200 is double that of 100.

But if you figure out the math the kid instead of working for 2 weeks actually will have to work for 4 weeks to complete this. If I were to create a table of this relationship between numbers and weeks you will see, perhaps expected, but nevertheless unsettling reality.

100, 1 week
200, 4 weeks (1 month)
300, 9 weeks (2 months and 1 week)
400, 16 weeks (4 months)
500, 25 weeks (6 months and 1 week)
600, 36 weeks (9 months)
700, 49 weeks (almost a year)
800, 64 weeks (more than a year)

what is between 100 and 800, they seem close enough but with respect to this exercise one kid would have wrapped it up in 1 week (however grudginlgy) but the kid with 800 will have to work for an entire year

What if they share

Say you have allocated two students to do this for a number like 200. One might be inclined to give kid1 to do the 1st 100 and give the second kid from 100 to 200. By looking at the above time frames the 1st kid would spend 1 week for her 100 and the second kid will end up spending 3 weeks on her 100 (which is from 101 to 200).

Folded mirror

Imagine a string where you write these numbers from top to bottom: say for 5

0
1
2
3
4
5

If I fold it right smack in the middle

 |
2|3
1|4
0|5
 |

See if the line in the middle were to be a mirror those are your addition facts. where each addition adds up to the same number which is 5.

So for number 6, say, one can turn the addition facts exercise into a folded-number-writing exercise by writing

0 1 2 3
6 5 4 3

and refrain from writing the sum because the sum is always 6.

But again doing so might turn the work pointless.

Looks like a case of elite curiosity killing the cat.

http://www.favoritepoem.org/poems/longfellow/index.html

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,

Is our destin'd end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow

Find us farther than to-day.

On the Loadstone and Magnetic Bodies by William Gilbert, 1600

A contemporary of Shakesphere his experiments in Magnetism were not to be improved for 200 years.

Micrographia by Robert Hooke, 1665

He was the rock on which the Royal Society of London was built. He described not only the microscopic world but also geology and the nature of light etc, some of his ideas were apparently borrowed by Newton

On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin, 1859

Charles Darwin is Charles Darwin. It will be nice to find a print that has a larger font.

Fragments of Science by John Tyndall, 1871

Its wide ranging topics include the nature of heat and light, spectroscopy, glaciology and the composition of sun. A contemporary of Aldous Huxley and equally popular.

Six Easy Pieces, by Richard P. Feynman, Addison-wesley, 1994

Feynman is Feynman.

Credits

Taken from Dr. John Gribbin as laid out in WSJ, April 14th, 2007

Growth

Pralayagnini Karatalamuna,
Sikharagrini Konaveluna,
Mundu Mundu.
Sari netiki,
Tadabadu chiru padumula uravallu.

Burden

Mukkupachharani mrudu kumarulu.
Palincharuga
Tallulai, Thandrulai.
Pempu vahimparuga
Mantrulai, Rajulai.

Credits

Borrowed a line from a film "Lavakusa" and borrowed a phrase from the greatest pair "Tirupathi Venkata Kavulu".

A Trickle and a Torrent

A step today ventured
Another step tommorrow commited
A journey of thousand miles:
Though difficult to imagine,
By derivation is conclusive.

Futile is not by any means a trickle,
But a good place to start a torrent.

Raise your hand,
Pump the air,
Take a cheer,
Count your wins.
Small or big they are all wins.

Weekend Edition Saturday, February 17, 2007 · The slave trade was abolished in the British colonies 200 years ago this year. The film Amazing Grace commemorates the event. Writer Adam Hochschild discusses the birth of the abolitionist movement in Great Britain. (Hochschild is the author of Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an Empire's Slaves.)

She's a guitarist, singer and songwriter who's been playing gigs since she was 15 ? she's all of 20 now. Her debut album, This Is the Life, has sold more than 1 million copies overseas. Not bad for someone who recently taught herself to play the guitar.

Arctic Sea and the Polar Ice Cap

The life of a physicist is marked by "attacks of hoplessness, depression, and discouragement"

-leon lederman

The complete quote

Physicists today feel the same emotions that scientists have felt for centuries. The life of a physicist is filled with anxiety, pain, hardship, tension, attacks of hopelessness, depression, and discouragement. But these are punctuated by flashes of exhilaration, laughter, joy, and exultation. These epiphanies come at unpredictable times. Often they are generated simply by the sudden understanding of something new and important, something beautiful, that someone else has revealed. However, if you are mortal, like most of the scientists I know, the far sweeter moments come when you yourself discover some new fact about the universe. It's astonishing how often this happens at 3 A.M., when you are alone in the lab and you have learned something profound, and you realize that not one of the other five billion people on earth knows what you now know. Or so you hope. You will, of course, hasten to tell them as soon as possible. This is known as "publishing."

Leon Lederman, The God Particle: If the Universe is the Answer, What is the Question? (with Dick Teresi, 1993)

Some similar scientific quotes can be found at

See the quotes

August Rush is a nice movie

Kyoto, Japan

There's nothing sto stop the average climber from trying the hardest route in the world

by Mark Twight and mentioned by Ybarra

Over the years I've continually re-evaluated what I thought I might be capable of.

Every pitch is brilliant, memorable, varied

Men in jackets and ties stroll toward the formal dinign room with women in dresses and heels.

- YBarra

Legendary pianist, conductor, and recording artist Daniel Barenboim performed the complete Beethoven piano sonata cycle in eight concerts at Berlin's Staatsoper, one of the world's most beautiful opera houses. Now, a two-hour GREAT PERFORMANCES special, BARENBOIM ON BEETHOVEN, presents the entire fourth concert, which consists of five sonatas --including the audience favorite "Appassionata" ("Sonata No. 23 F minor," Op. 57). Also featured are excerpts from Barenboim's master classes with acclaimed young pianists Lang Lang, Jonathan Biss, and Shai Wosner. Barenboim, who has played the piano sonatas for more than 50 years, offers fascinating insights into a vital repertoire continually among the most popular works in the entire piano literature. The eight concerts were produced in high definition and pristine surround-sound. The other sonatas included in the concert special are "Sonata No. 5 C minor," Op. 10, No. 1; "Sonata No.11 B-flat major," Op. 22; "Sonata No. 19 G minor," Op. 49, No. 1; and "Sonata No. 20 G major," Op. 49, No. 2.

belay

Observing this phenomenon, one cannot but wonder how an environment can make people despair and sit idle and then, by changing the conditions, one can transform the same people into matchless performers

book: Extinction by Douglas H. Erwin

How small a thing is art, A little pain;
disappointment, and any man feels a depth - a boundlessness of emotion,
inarticulate thoughts no poet has ever succeeded in imag[in]g.
Death does not conquer me, I conquer death
I am the master

book: Lafcadio Hearn: American Writings

Perhaps, it will tell how love can bend what discipline could not overpower

Book: Pugin and the Building of Romantic Britain

book: Riding Freedom is an engaging read

book: Seven Pleasures by Willard Spiegelman

Book: Terrestrial Energy by William Tucker

Before the gods that made the gods
Had seen their sunrise pass,
The White Horse of the White Horse Vale
Was cut out of the grass.

Before the gods that made the gods
Had drunk at dawn their fill,
The White Horse of the White Horse Vale
Was hoary on the hill.

Age beyond age on British land,
Aeons on aeons gone,
Was peace and war in western hills,
And the White Horse looked on.

For the White Horse knew England
When there was none to know;
He saw the first oar break or bend,
He saw heaven fall and the world end,
O God, how long ago.

For the end of the world was long ago,
And all we dwell to-day
As children of some second birth,
Like a strange people left on earth
After a judgment day.

Read it online

wikipedia reference

book: Why evolution is true

Amazon link

Books by Art Linkletter

No, No, No. No, I don't describe me that way. I am as straight an arrow as there is one in its shape and in its path. Brilliance needs a scheme, and legerdemain that I am not just born with.

But I do admit that I am an easy target as a tested parent. Very suscepting to whining especially when paired with tears that don't seem to stop.

I pick up Narayan and Kavitha between 5 and 6 in the evenings and occasionally there is an errand or two to attend to. That hour of the evening seem to be set aside for unexpected events. Over years I have seen it all. Soiled underwares, pants and even shirts. At times my son seem to be a walking frgrance. When all else seemed normal he would just throw up in the car just in case If I am not paying attention as a parent but wondering how pretty the evening was. And he would be fine as soon as we get home. So I thought the answer is keep a towel in the car. So by that logic half my house is in the car. There is the pillow. there is the blanket. There is a hair brush. A combination of edibles both new and discarded. A fridz in the trunk ....All I need is a self generating nuclear reactor so that I am prepared for all emergencies that seem so routine

JCA is like a guarded and elongated fortress that is built for people with a chip on their forehead so that they can be checked as they move every feet. After going through this maze and emerging with my two kids I must have counted 30 times because Narayan had this incredible urge to pass water. And 5 minutes prior to that while we were in the presence of such a facility he was absolutely certain he was dry as a desert. I surrendered to this argument everytime albeit with clenched teeth.

And we would be visiting publix and in the middle of the aisle he HAD to use the restroom, this time as he describes it with twisting legs that the need is a longer one but he could make it a shorter one. So there isn't a bathroom that we haven't visited in the course of a few years.

Yesterday, we were in Micahels. It is a store no man should enter. We were there for display boards for a project for Kavitha. This is one bathroom that we had never vistited. After many inquiries we found it cornered. No getting away from Narayan. We walk in and there is the sink. Everything in order and clean. We pull the door to the toilet. It is locked. I told him he would need to wait his turn. Well he was not about to. He bent down and saw there was no one in there. We pulled the door again and it was locked. There is no key hole to lock it. As I was wondering to the mystery how on earth it got locked from inside, the 6 year old was already half way through the opening half of him inside and half outside saying he could open it.

I was thinking "ok he had to go, so he is going to head for the toilet". Instead he opens the door from inside and says "oh that is simple to open this door!!". It all happened in a split second.

I was scratching my head "who is brilliant!" who locked the door from inside and gone or Narayan that this seemed routine to walk under and open the door. It just didn't occur to me that was a solution. Well this kid should teach a course on out-of-the-box (or toilet) thinking.

But again if I weren't gullible or not overly impressive father with his son, I suspect the sneaky guy had done this before.

pronounced: Kiaroscuro

A painting or a work of art that contrasts two colors such as black and white.

Click on the link above for more information

A thought has a conclusion.
While it is not concluded,
Listless, unrestful, sad, and distracted
is the tremoring mind.
 
Woven shrouds hide it
from the cogitating mind.
Leading questions, 
Patient deconstruction,
Hope and courage,
The peaceful conclusion awaits.

In dress, habits, manners, provincialism, routine and narrowness he acquired that charming insolence, that irritating completeness, that sophisticated crassness, that overbalanced poise that makes the Manhattan gentleman so delightfully small in his greatness.

"...here and there a disregarded four-footed beast stood as if petrified in unrecumbent sadness" wrote George Eliot. I labored where I heard "unrecumbent". No reason to suppose they are related, but that sounded like "recombinant" DNA. Those simple structures that combine with each other to form complex structures.

It turns out there are a family of words around "recumbent":

cumbent
incumbent
recumbent, recumbency, recumbently
decumbent
accumbent
succumb

All, on lookup, seem to have derived from the Latin root "cubare" or "recumbere" meaning "lying down like a recumbent or decumbent vine". Technically, it appears hence, "bent" has nothing to do with the meaning and only a coincidence that the suffix of "ent" being added to "cumb". However the association with "bent", I suspect, is stronger suggesting an influence unrelated. If not for the "bent" I wonder if "recumbent" would have been, however infrequently, used as often.

What about ..

cumber, cumberment, cumbrance
encumber, encumberment, encumbrance

These, I am reading, have derived from Celtic/French "combre" meaning "hindrance".

Neither for fear nor for favor
should I seek Faith

Neither for loss nor for gain
Should I seek Truth

For things that are not bound to Earth
Stand in Divine contrast

Irrespective of my Faith,
For the sake of Truth on its own,
Do I not offer shoulder for another
Not for favor on Earth or in Heaven.
Due to such I am Human.

To be strong or great is to be humble
To be stronger or greater is to be humbler
Is it not then by ratiocination,
To seek the Strongest or Greatest on Earth or in Heaven
Should you not seek the humblest?

So, with humility
my conduct, I pray, be colored

So, with humility,
And not in righteousness,
Truth on my journey, I pray, be sought

concerned with promoting unity among churches or religions

Contemporary, Cheerful in disposition, but his compositions apparently complex, but significantly 40 of his compositions out of a 100 are composed in his 90s.

noun: theory behind, science behind, or the philosophical theory of knowledge

Every Task a Start
Every Effort a Beginging
Every Day a Dawn
Every Spring a Source
Every Creation a Genesis
Every Journey a Step

To prevail on the phantom darkness
Light a lamp
An act known
A stand taken
An action arrayed for your faculties to stand behind
For them to stand aligned. 

Explore prehistoric time line at National Geographic website

F. Scott Fitzgerald called "the test of a first-rate intelligence": to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.

I am haunted by my failures.
I wake up many mornings
To prove them wrong.
Every succesful offspring
owe their crippled brethern in the wake.

This will be an exercise in synonyms. The more you can dream of the better you are to answer these.

Skeletal

Bony
Frame
Thin
Outline
Wire
Old

Pal

Friend
Bud
Chum
Mate
Love
Pair
Couple
Company
Fellowship
Synonym

Now figure out the rhymes for both

Skeletal Rhymes

Bone (stone, moan, phone, hone, cone, alone, tone, zone)
Frame (lame,maime,name,same,tame)
Thin (bin,chin,fin,gin,kin,pin,sin,tin,win,zin)
Outline
Wire (dire,fire,hire,sire)
Old (bold,cold,fold,gold,hold,mold,sold,told)

Look in the rhymes for a word that means a friend. we come up with kin for thin. That makes one possible pair THIN KIN

Let's do the opposite with Pal

Pal Rhymes

Bud (dud, jud, mud, sud)
Chum (bum, rum, gum, yum, sum, mum, tum, yum)
Mate (bate, date, fate, gate, hate, late, rate, sate, tate, wait) 
Love (glove, dove, move, rove, dove)
Pair (fair, hair, lair)
The following are too many syllables to do
Friend
Couple 
Company
Fellowship
Synonym

Late means dead and could mean skeletal. Perhaps "dud" means dead meaning skeletal. That would give us two possible rhymes: Dud Bud or Late Mate

Overall Reapings

THIN KIN
DUD BUD
LATE MATE

In search of foot prints...

Emma Lazarus

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

Questions, when asked by wondering minds do not necessarily need a context. Perhaps context, like a place, may give a sense of reality. That context started on a late evening when the lingering reluctant light gave way to darkness. Narayan wanted to go along for the walk. As we went past these woods to our left on the sidewalk, he asked

"Are snakes meat eaters?"

"Yes. I think they are"

"How come?"

"What else should they eat?"

"Well they could eat grass...."

"Ummmm..." was all I could say at the moment.

What will I find as I look further?

FFAAUULLTT  TTOOLLEERRAANNTT  FFAAUULLTT  TTOOLLEERRAANNTT

iiff yyoouu wweerree ttoo pprriinntt tthhiiss pprriinntt ttwwiiccee..iiff yyoouu wweerree ttoo pprriinntt tthhiiss pprriinntt ttwwiiccee..

In a gush or in a drone,
If all were to leave,
Would I still perorate? 
I should say less than wanting
when unsought.

Relevent and brief,
New and unknown before,
I should say more than expected
when sought.

From the familiar,
From the known,
Speech should rise like a swell.

"Dad! Read. What is my temprature?"

"Why don't you read the numbers. I will tell you what the temperature is."

"Six..."

"No that is a 9"

"9 ...7....8"

"That is 97.8"

"Is that good?"

"Yes. That is an awsome temperature"

"Ok. I am going to test my awwwwm pit. Read. What is this temperature?"

"Tell me the numbers! I will tell"

"9 ....what is 0 ....6"

"I don't know that is like 96.7"

"Oh! no! You awwwe woong. There is no 7 at the end. It is a zeeeewooo"

"Ok it is 96.0 then. Stop bugging me. I am trying to eat dinner."

"What does 0 mean? is it big or small"

"It is the smallest"

"Ohhhhh! So my mouth is sicker than my awwwwm pit!!. You can have your dinner now."

(I'LL NEVER FORGET) THE DAY I READ A BOOK (Jimmy Durante and Jackie Barnett) 
There's one day that I recall, though it was years ago. 
All my life I will remember it, I know. 
I'll never forget the day I read a book. 
It was contagious, seventy pages. 
There were pictures here and there, 
So it wasn't hard to bear, 
The day I read a book. 
It's a shame I don't recall the name of the book. 
It wasn't a history. I know because it had no plot. 
It wasn't a mystery, because nobody there got shot. 
The day I read a book ? I can't remember when, 
But one o' these days, I'm gonna do it again. 
SPOKEN: Ah, lit'rature! There's nothin' like sittin' home... 

More here

A man of great wealth
A man of great stature 
A man of ripe age
told me once in a moment of earnest affection

Gather wealth
It may be dwindled by expense
it may wither in a season of misfortune
it may fall prey to cunning and thievery

Instead he said, Gather Knowledge
for unlike wealth it can never be stolen
Indestructible is Knowledge
In dispense it shall multiply
In seasons difficult it should be your friend

Indeed Learned ones profess,
In Scholarship and humility 
Lies true Wealth

ineluctable

Where there are none
there may not be any.
Where there is, however, one
There may be many.

These are some excerpts from a WSJ article by James Kelly and Scott Nadler.

The are making a case for leadership at every level and how it is essential in all endeavours.

Here is a summary of the guidelines

1. Make the decission to be a leader
2. Focus on influence and not control
3. Empower horizontal organizations
4. work on your trusted advisor skills
5. Dont wait for a perfect time, but just a good time
6. Create vaccums or questions and not imposing solutions
7. Ask questions with out answers
8. wonder "what if"

Please note, I have paraphrased things a little bit here and there. If you are stickler read the article from WSJ.

I've got three dogs, but two of them ran away with the other one. Actually I had one named Blake, but we sold him because he was digging in the garden. And then we got another one. Her name is Princess Jasmine and she likes to play with us. Ethan might have a play date.

We are like birds of a feather
We are two hearts joined together
We will be forever as one
My brother under the sun

language
brief
precise
economical

Soon, I am sure this name will slip my fishnet brain. I should make an attempt to remember. His name is Julio Diaz. Perhaps a detour before that.

I dislike book critics especially the flowery praise they so generously dish out

Target is not a place I am fond of. For every birthday I end up buying two gifts: one for my 5 year old and another for who ever the birthday happens to be. On one such run I saw a book prominently displayed on the shelf. A book that has about 1000 pages. I gave up on critics, especially book and movie ones. The praise is so diluted I should not bother to read the reviews. While the mind is idle, eyes involuntarily scans. This book is recommended by Oprah's book club. I have never read any thing that is recommended from them. And I am luke warm to the O magazine so I picked the 1000 pages, at 30 dollars, up.

What is it worth

I have read through the racy book over three weeks. I am glad, at least it was not boring, although it was well pandering to the vice, intrigue, and the good. I could disavow the book with out much of a qualm but for one page. I felt this one page is worth reading the whole book for.

Remigius: The deliverer

Remigius is plotting to become the Prior of the Kingsbridge Priory. He undermines the rightful Philip through a difficult set of circumstances. As luck would have it in the end he was exposed and expelled from the Priory. Sometime later as Philip and his Apprentice Tommy were travelling on horseback they ran into someone searching for food. They recognize Remigius and Philip offers him wine and bread much to the disliking of Tommy. Philip in his kindness offers Remigius to come back to the Priory. Remigius wonders in return in what position. Philip points out the inhumility and offers Remigius to come as a monk and live the rest of life with out authority but humility. After much thought Remigius agrees to join the Priory. Remigius recognizes the weight of the offer despite the evil things that he had done to Philip. The realization is not affected but truthful.

Philip offers the physically weekend Remigius his horse to follow the rest of the way. Tommy wonders aloud how Philip is going to get back to the Priory. With only two horses, and both being occupied now, Philip points to the obvious that he would be walking. To his protests Philip tells his apprentice that more than a thousand righteous men, one that truly changed his mind for the better, is more in glory.

An unlikely pair

New York and an immigrant: Neither are in vogue at the moment. I have heard this on NPR. On his way home every night Julio Diaz would get off the subway and eat in a diner and head home. Not much is known to me about him other than this. On one such nights on an empty platform a teenager mugs him for his wallet. Wallet has changed pockets. Julio says as the teenager walks away, "It is a cold night, you could use my jacket if you are thinking of mugging a few more!". The teenager stops and wonders why. Julio says "If you are willing to give up your freedom for a few dollars, you must be really in need of money!". He then offers him to walk with him and have dinner with him. During dinner the teenager wonders if Julio owned the place. But Julio was merely a customer but a friend as well as the two roles did not contradict. He was surprised Julio was nice even to the dishwasher. Things worked out themselves in the end.

Question

I have puzzled what school did Julio go to for his education? Wonder how Julio would fare in intelligence tests? Wondered if he followed the 7 habbits of the most successful people? Wondered if he owned a pair of Air Jordans? How did he manage to dispatch so much beauty with so little green involved?

Family likeness has often a deep sadness in it. Nature, that great tragic dramatist, knits us together by bone and muscle, and divides us by the subtler web of our brains; blends yearning and repulsion; and ties us by our heart-strings to the beings that jar us at every movement.

We hear a voice with the very cadence of our own uttering the thoughts we despise; we see eyes-ah, so like our mother's!- averted from us in cold alienation; and our last darling child startles us with the air and gestures of the sister we parted from in bitterness long years ago.

The father to whom we owe our best heritage-the mechanical instinct, the keen sensibility to harmony, the unconscious skill of the modelling hand-galls us and puts us to shame by his daily errors; the long-lost mother, whose face we begin to see in the glass as our own wrinkles come, once fretted our young souls with her anxious humours and irrational persistence.

...George Eliot

"You need to make up your mind. Where do you want to go?" taking a 6 year old to lunch is not always unannoying.

"No fancy place! Please, Dad! No fancy place"

"Why not?"

"You have to wait for a long time."

Urgency of food seem to trump the clearly trivial matters. That's how one day we were sitting under this hairy ape at Larry's subs. I see his eyes measuring the place and his fingers and hands and then his teeth twisted to make himself look like a giant ape. Finally here is the kindred mind that gets the decor.

"Wow! Dad, I know"

"What is it that you know"

"This place is expired by King Kong!!"

Legends and Lyrics

Let me but move one question to your daughter - Shak.

always distinct, always surprising

A journey of a mile I began,
It was depressing, ellusive, frustrating.
I had to meander a thousand miles
before I reached.

A window opening. A glimpse of the ungraspable. A sudden surge of love ... or hope ... or awe. We asked artists, writers, thinkers, and doers to recall the flashes of understanding that took their breath away.

Read the rest here

monochromatic flock

Listen to Italian Caprice

He is 5. He is a lovely boy. He is so much fun to be with (when I have time to spare).

I was watching with him one of those disney channell shows. The set was a restaurant. There was a girl trying to figure out aloud how much hot cofee to pour on a piece of cofee-cake. I see my son's arms go up, his eyes lit up in horror, his mouth open in puzzlement and he yells "NONE!!!".

He is sure wired for sillyness and comedy.

Note to self: Read "Complications" by Atul Gawande

http://prairiehome.publicradio.org/

There are three radio shows that I regard very highly. Two of them from the US and one from the BBC. Here the three not in any particular order.

The three shows

• My word from BBC. I am not sure if this show is still in broad cast. I used to listen to this about 10 years ago. Eclectic, tasteful, very intelligent.
• Prairee home companion from NPR on saturdays and gets rebroadcasted on sundays as well. This is one of a kind show. Very intelligent again and at the same time profoundly funny. The opposite of slap-stick. A show for the mind.
• The car talk from NPR. Beautifully done. Quirky and quitessentially portrays America at its best. A sense of joy. A sense of confidence. A sense of day to day life all across the United States of America. Just to make sure the reader is not side tracked this show is a call in show where people enquire about cars and car problems.

http://www.webster-dictionary.org/

Good for synonyms
Related words
Fast

Sunrise.
Sunset.
In a firmment at drift, prearranged,
We matter our affairs.

Oscar Hamerstein and brilliant lyrics

Life ought to be fun.
Are there ways otherwise?
Life,
While in healh
Ought to be fun

See
Play
Chat
Discover
Learn
Laugh
Life ought to be fun

Unbearing is Worry
Hence such is not fruitful
Unavailing is Worry
Hence such it garners no gain

Not Mad, but Act you must for Even
Pray not forget
Life ought to be fun
Else, are there ways otherwise??

palikeDidi bhAgavatamaTa
palikiMceDi vADu rAma bhadruMDaTa nE
palikina bhava hara magunaTa 
palikeda vEroMDu gAtha palukaga nElA 

Translation

That gets said, listen, is the book of God.
One that sayeth is Him, in truth.
Having said rebirth in suppression, I hear.
I should say then and hence,
A saga second, say why?

See here for more..

Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks
...
I greatly fear my money is not safe

The full text of the paragraph from the Comedy of Errors

Upon my life, by some device or other
The villain is o'er-raught of all my money.
They say this town is full of cozenage,
As, nimble jugglers that deceive the eye,
Dark-working sorcerers that change the mind,
Soul-killing witches that deform the body,
Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,
And many such-like liberties of sin:
If it prove so, I will be gone the sooner.
I'll to the Centaur, to go seek this slave:
I greatly fear my money is not safe.

Cozenage - trickery and artifice

Probability is a branch of mathematics that is the exact or precise science of inexact and imprecise.

Narayan is 4 years. Will be 5 in November. Here is not an entirely uncommon conversation.

"Dad, I am done!!!"
"Yes, Narayan, Don't scream. I will be right there."
"Did you see?"
"What do you want me to see?"
"I did a lot of 'em. The big one sanked. I ate a lot of food"

http://prairiehome.publicradio.org/performances/20040403/scripts/english.shtml

hilarious

Those hot dry winds that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen.

I needed a drink. I needed a lot of life insurance. I needed a vacation. I needed a home in the country. What I had was a hat, a coat and a gun. I put them on and went out of the room.

Read some works by Alfred Russel Wallace

Kindness and Love,
Reason and Rationale,
Tolerance and Empathy,
Are my guiding lights.

To serve,
I perfer not as my Obligation,
Rather, let me choose as my Right.

I would rather not look into a mirror
but on to a meadow.
Yet, it is my staunch right to declare so.

At least for 6 years, I have catered, cooked, and at times forced breakfast on Narayan. That is 2,190 (give or take a few) mornings I wouldn't have to see the sunlight creep into our house but I could precisely tell what I would be doing at that very moment, which usually is the same. Those are 2,190 mornings that seem so alike on every one of those mornings.

November 5th, 2009. One more morning. Every minute of it predictable. We were walking out with our bags into a faultless pleasant fall morning.

Narayan asked me "What did YOU eat for breakfast".

I haven't been asked that question in many many many years. In fact it must have been so long I have no living memory of anyone ever asking.

Unaware of travails,
Unaware of station,
Unaware of sorrow,
Unaware of victory,
Unaware of defeat,
Unaware of us,
Seasons take leave.
Unbid new seasons arrive.

Sun gets closer
flaring summers in its wake.
There comes that season, as the Moon gets closer, 
When brighter nights come upon.

Soon after dark on a January evening,
When all seem to have less of a reason to walk out,
I opened my door on a Moon of few days.
A chill of rustling air mingled into my pours
in a volume of fog that descended for a graze in the night.

Proportionately, picturesquely,
Afloat, yet afirm, Above the tree tops,
Neither to the West,
Nor to the perfect South,
Ways in between, More to the West than to the South,
In the Southwestern sky,
The silvery moon shone rendering all else dark. 
Like a candle ensconced by a black veil
Untrammelled by all other light,
Its definition precise.
The vast sky retreated in shame,
Few stars dimmed in deference.

Rupturing my silence,
in the most quietest of manners,
The knowing Moon,
The smiling Moon, said:
"Freedom is having the capacity
Freedom is having the wits
Freedom is having the facility 
to recognize paradise when you walk into one".

Scott Simon, December 20th 2008 show

Shake your chills.
Shake your mane.
Away, Shake your fears.

Let all else dissipate.
Drift, Coalese your senses to a singular purpose.
Play like a child,
falling down, getting up.

Some call it education.
Some call it learning.
This is effortless, This is joy.

See the rest at feenixx.com

song: My Stolen Identity

song: Ray Lamontagne: Devil's in the Jukebox

what is South Pacific? A musical...

Some reviews

Where to Buy a DVD of SouthPacific with Kelly O'Hara, new cast recording

where to buy mp3s of south pacific

It may be cheesy at places but I have very much liked it. Wait for about 30 minutes before it picks up. It is an artistically inspiring accomplishment. I would like to watch it again. I can still count on my fingers (just one hand) after all these years, the number of films I wanted to watch again, right after leaving the theatre.

http://www.naturephoto-cz.com/

When ordinary turns to Art

She stands out with her voice and secular humility

Extracted from the PBS Site

Susan Werner's musical path has taken her from opera to pop, jazz and classic folk songs.

But in her latest album, The Gospel Truth, this singer-songwriter explores America's gospel roots ? an experience that leads to her own spiritual journey.

He is 5. He is loud. He is lazy. He needs a fulltime servant. Having exhausted every minute of the waking day, the other night, he was walking down stairs with me to go to bed. He negotiated the 20 or so stairs and he noticed Jasmine the small pup we have sleeping on the floor while her bed was unoccupied.

"Ohhh! Jasmine, you should sleep in your bed!!" he picked her up in an embrace close to his small body, put her in her bed, and then covered her with a blanket.

He then says "Dad, I want to stay 5 forever!"

"Why?"

"Because, if I grow up I won't like puppies any more. I won't like Power Rangers any more. I won't like Ben 10 any more. So I don't want to be a grown up. I want to stay 5."

"Sure, Narayan, I won't have it any other way. Lets do that then."

"Ok, Dad, Cancel all my birthdays. Ok!! I am going to be 5 forever."

Make voyages! Attempt them... there's nothing else.

More ..

Weekend Edition Saturday, March 10, 2007 · Playwright Tennessee Williams kept "notebooks" for most of his life. Collected and annotated by Margaret Bradham Thornton, they have been published for the first time. Actor Rick Foucheux reads from the notebooks.

Did I die by my own hand or was I destroyed slowly and brutally by a conspiratorial group? ... Perhaps I was never meant to exist at all, but if I hadn't, a number of my created beings would have been denied their passionate existence ... The best I can say for myself is that I worked like hell.

http://www.ipl.org/div/subject/browse/hum60.60.00/

http://home.cinci.rr.com/iwishiwerebuffy/poetry.htm

A few lines here...

She nursed me in many a sick room, 
lifted teaspoons of medicine to my lips, 
set cold facecloths on my forehead 
then led me out into the airy light 
and taught me to walk and swim and I in turn presented her with a lanyard. 
"Here are thousands of meals" she said, 
"and here is clothing and a good education." 
"And here is your lanyard," I replied, 
"which I made with a little help from a counselor." 
"Here is a breathing body and a beating heart, 
strong legs, bones and teeth and two clear eyes to read the world." she whispered. 
"And here," I said, "is the lanyard I made at camp." 
"And here," I wish to say to her now, 
"is a smaller gift. Not the archaic truth, 
that you can never repay your mother, 
but the rueful admission that when she took the two-toned lanyard from my hands, 
I was as sure as a boy could be 
that this useless worthless thing I wove out of boredom 
would be enough to make us even

"Perhaps this would not be so serious a matter if the British economy were not a so-called service economy. It has been such ever since Margaret Thatcher solved our chronic industrial relations problem by the simple expedient of getting rid of industry."

and in search of other quips.

1. Back to your bridge you evil troll! You have no powers here.
2. Don't make me go Psycho-Bitch on your annoying ass
3. I'm sorry. My fault. I forgot you were an idiot.
4. Amazingly enough, I don't give a shit
5. A few clowns short of a circus now aren't we?
6. Whoop-dee fucking-do!
7. Not the brightest crayon in the box now aren't we?
8. Well, aren't we just a ray of fucking sunshine
9. Admitting you're an asshole is the first step
10. You say I'm a bitch like it's a bad thing
11. A hard-on doesn't count as personal growth
12. Aren't we just a lettle freak of nature?
13. Easy there Mr. Testosterone, you can be replaced by a zucchini

Creditis

Borrowed summarily from http://mom-and-more.blogspot.com

Thought may seek strength from others, like vine.
Thought must be independent, unlike vine, however.
River of influence may shape it in time,
but the best of it like a polished rock will prevail the floods.  

coronach
dirge
requiem
lament
or even Keen

I admire people who wakes up every morning with a propelling purpose.

More effective than cofee is to truly engage the mind in an activity that the mind truly likes and searches for answers actively.

The opposite of this is a boring activity that the mind is not interested in for some reason.

Is there a time for keeping your distance
A time to turn your eyes away
Is there a time for keeping your head down
For getting on with your day
.....
Is there a time to run for cover
A time for kiss and tell
Is there a time for different colours
Different names you find it hard to spell

( it's said that a river
Finds the way to the sea
And like the river
You shall come to me
Beyond the borders
And the thirsty lands
....
)
....
Is there a time for tying ribbons
A time for christmas trees
Is there a time for laying tables
And the night is set to freeze

See here for complete text

The marching years haven't diminished my capacity to err or my propensity for exageration, especially in what I write. When I go over what I write, in every iteration I find something to be removed. Resulting wisdom begs me for restraint and simplicity while flippant emotion egg me otherwise the next time, irrespective.

In that context the staggering simplicity of my 9 year old took me by surprise. This is what Kavitha wrote

My Dad

Very smart
Takes walks
Bakes chicken
Amazing writer
Likes playing sports
Excellent artist
Loves me

..Love Kavitha

Vedika Lekkenu Vadamu Chesenu
Tyagame Melani Bodhalu Chesenu
Ayina...

In a barren scape we seek out our pebbles, rocks and diamonds
we read a book
we hear a song
we see a film
we see an act
we collect what we like unbehooved
we make a home
we become more than us
No, we are inspired to be more than us

Wes Davis

Full many a glorious morning have I seen 
Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye, 
Kissing with golden face the meadows green, 
Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy; 
Anon permit the basest clouds to ride 
With ugly rack on his celestial face, 
And from the forlorn world his visage hide, 
Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace: 
Even so my sun one early morn did shine 
With all triumphant splendor on my brow; 
But out, alack! he was but one hour mine; 
The region cloud hath mask'd him from me now. 
Yet him for this my love no whit disdaineth; 
Suns of the world may stain when heaven's sun staineth.

Burdens of the world not on their shoulders
Themselves wrapped in modesty 
Their hearts content in their bosom
Neighbors, friends, and family
Gathered that night like on nights often

Hand woven cotton around their head
Finely tempered tobacco to be hand rolled by their side
In the first quadrant of the night
They sat on benches 
in reflection of the calamity outside

Tiles from local kilns, 
Crescent in shape, 
Robust reddish brown in composure,
adorned the roof above. 
15 foot in depth and 60 foot wide,
A fair expanse sliced bamboo.
At that hour of the night,
to cots, of wood and hibiscus threads, in line,
The roof had been home.

A thin blanket spread, a cotton pillow, a sheet to cover,
Children laid there listening to the dance outside
and to the hum of rain on the roof, continuous.
Never a sound more soothing was heard.

Down the eaves of faithful tiles, 
rushed waters in a silver curtain,
Descended the 7 feet clearing
with a noise only falling water can make,
A rustle, a din,
incessant, hurried, many toned,
parting comfort from calamity,
parting safety from chaotic churn.

Single but not lonely
A kerosene lamp of concave glass
A protected flame in its womb 
hung on the wall.
In lamp light, in the shimmering silver,
There come to be on that night, like nights often,
Ruminating men and resting mothers.
A child's heart took wing
in a cocoon of security.
All the world seemed approachable.

In skies above a war was on its way.
Arjuna, Archer of the skies was on his chariot of fearsome wraiths.
As the wheels rumbled and ascended
Lynch pins fell, scorching heavens in stripes of fire.
From under the blankets pronouncements came: "Arjuna" "Arjuna"

Like a flock of birds, in a cackle,
Streaks of water currents rushed out the front yard
and out gushed from the compound wall

To the observant ear
near by yet faint
there drifted the sounds of cow bells
from the rhythmic sway of nodding heads
of young calfes, of mother cows,
of work horses the prized bulls, 
all a family of gentle giants
satisfied in their element
Hay dry, Corn stacks juicy,
in handsome ways gathered, broken and consumed

Among nights such a night was special
Empty and nill a night usually is.
Like a true friend came rain, unannounced,
Morning would be sad when there would still be rain no longer, 
when living beings would stir again in unrest
when attended burdens would take their seats on bent shoulders.
However on that special rainy night
Guiltless rest was what seemed imposed in measure ample.

Men talked, not of their work, not of their worries
Women talked, not of them, not of their worries
They both wondered of things simple.
Of life they discovered for a night, on that rainy night.
Like the tiled roof above, like the ground just outside, 
The living come to feel what it is to be alive.  

Cattle fed, in rain,
Drinking water carried from wells, in rain,
Muddy feet, wet hair, damp clothes,
Children bathed in steamy hot water, in rain,
All tidy in the end,
When all prevailed in the midst of difficulty
"Thanks for the wrestle" the mind said to an otherwise calamity. 

Company of surety,
Hum of rain on the roof,
Silver curtains of rain,
Cackle of the running waters,
Cow bells just beyond the courtyard,
Rumblings in the belly of the sky,
Moments when neighborhood when washed walls lit in white,
Difficulties, the challenges, the calamities,
These I miss

what I miss: draft

Read in wikipedia

"Lunkhead" is someone who will fail to transmogrify you back into a boy from a tiger but instead transmogrified you into a vile-awful amphibian using a transmogrifier machine such as a cardboard box stated in no unclear terms on the outside that it is a "transmogrifier".

At times the following colorful words, omitting the more potent one, can take its place:

dunce, dunderhead, numskull, blockhead, bonehead, hammerhead, knucklehead, loggerhead, muttonhead.

Did you converse, sir, with this gentlewoman?
What is the course and drift of your compact?

From Comedy of Errors

Should I shuffle?

There are 10 cards. 9 of them have goats and 1 of them have a car. I spread them on a table. I pick one and set it aside with out looking. Now there are two piles of them on the table. The one I picked in one pile and the rest of nine in another pile. Let's call the piles Pile_1 and Pile_9.

My hope is I picked the one with the car. I wonder now if I want to keep the card or do I want to pick again from the pile of 9 Pile_9 and return the one that I had picked earlier to the pile. Or do I want to stick with my original choice. Which one will be to my advantage? Should I change or stick with the original choice?

Intuitively

why would I change? what is my incentive? Because originally I picked 1 out of 10. If I were to change my mind, as the reason goes, then I will pick 1 out of 9 which seems better than 1 out of 10. Nevertheless there is a suspicion that the card may not be there in this pile Pile_9. How can I mathematically conclude that this picking from the pile of 9 again by setting one aside is same as 1/10?

1. I pick 1. I set it aside.
2. My probability at this point that the car is in the pile of 9 is 9/10.
3. Assuming that the car is in the pile of 9, If I pick from pile of 9, then my probability that I pick the car is 1/9.
4. So the dependent probability of me picking a car from the pile of 9 is

9/10 times 1/9 = 1/10

Lets try putting 2 cards aside, making two pools of 2 and 8.

The probability of picking a car from the 2 pile is:

2/10 times 1/2 = 1/10

The probability of picking a car from the 8 pile is:

8/10 times 1/8 = 1/10

What if I break them into more than 2 piles?

Pile_x, Pile_y, Pile_z so that x + y + z = 10

Pile_x chances

1. Probability that it is in pile_x

x/10

2. Probability that I pick my car from pile_x

1/x

2. The dependent probability that I got my car if I were to chose pile_x

x/10 times 1/x resulting in 1/10

The argument will apply to pile_y and pile_z as well. So it doesn't really matter in how many piles I break my cards, and it doesn't matter which pile I chose to pick my chances are the same.

Mathematically Speaking

Doesn't matter how I split the cards, as long I don't know what is in those piles, the probability of picking a car from any pile still stays at 1 out of 10. So it doesn't matter how many times you shuffle, your probability is not going to change.

Who is Ardi?

who is David Steinberg?

"This young musician and composer is at once reestablishing the artistic, cultural, and social tradition of jazz while creating an entirely new jazz language for the 21st century."

--MacArthur Foundation,2008.

A link to MacArthur citation

Who is Norman Borlaug?

Dubbed as artist explorer incredibly inspiring paintings

His homepage is at

homepage

Who is Victor Borge? I saw him on PBS. Introducing phonics for punctuation is brilliant.

"Mom! Simon is a diarrhea head."

"Narayan I want to watch TV. Can you stop jumping on the bed."

"But he is mean!"

"Ok! if you continue with this, I will hang you upside down!!"

"Ohhh Yaaaaa! Then I will thwo up on You!!!. How about that"

In my "6 year old speak" "Thwo" should be translated to "Throw".

words I misspell

But, my good friend, what will you do then with your fellow parishioner who opposes your husband in the vestry? With your newly appointed vicar, whose style of preaching you find painfully below that of his regretted predecessor? With the honest servant who worries your soul with her one failing? With your neighbour, Mrs. Green, who was really kind to you in your last illness, but has said several ill?natured things about you since your convalescence?

Nay, with your excellent husband himself, who has other irritating habits besides that of not wiping his shoes? These fellow?mortals, every one, must be accepted as they are: you can neither straighten their noses, nor brighten their wit, or rectify their dispositions; and it is these people - amongst whom your life is passed - that it is needful you should tolerate, pity, and love: it is these more or less ugly, stupid, inconsistent people whose movements of goodness you should be able to admire - for whom you should cherish all possible hopes, all possible patience.

website for the book

If the few pages I have read is any indication, I haven't read a book this funny in ages.

Even my 4th grade daughter finsihed the book in a single sitting. If you can make a 4th grader read a book with out prodding and threats it is a severe compliment to the author.