Monthly Archives: October 2008

It’s Halloween time, baby

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For the first time in a few years, I’m going to a Halloween costume (/birthday) party. So over the last few weeks I’ve been thinking of what to wear. And I think I’ve got it, the ultimate costume. I don’t want to reveal it just yet, but I will list the things I’ve bought and gathered for it and let you ponder what it may be.

  • Cowboy hat
  • Sunglasses
  • 200 safety pins
  • Masking tape
  • Flag tape
  • Post-It Notes
  • Colored paper
  • Black cloth squares
  • Glue stick
  • Old suit coat
  • Black ribbon

I’ve also let my beard grow out somewhat, and I got something else from the toy and grocery departments at Target, but I can’t say what they are as it might give away the costume. I’ll be using a pencil, scissors and a stapler to help put it all together.

I really hope it comes together in real life as great as it looks in my mind, because I’ve been giggling to myself about how much fun this will be when it’s done. I’ll be sure to post some photos afterwards.

The bracket is back for 2008-09

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The bracket is back. View the newly updated (and updated in real-time throughout the season) NBA Playoffs bracket. It’s a constant gauge of how teams are doing an how they are falling into place in the NBA playoff picture.

And while you’re waiting for the season to play itself out, use the handy graph at the bottom to see how much longer there is to go (This is start at 0% on October 28th, the first day of the regular season.)

If you have any comments or suggestions please let me know!

The Future of Freedom

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This is an essay by one of my professors that I greatly admire, Corey Anton. A brief excerpt followed by a link to the full essay:

We talk quite a bit about freedom in the U.S., but I’m not sure how many people really understand what freedom is or even how freedom is related to time. Consider this: people often like to reflect back upon their lives and when they do, they often try to imagine that they could have done other than they did. People commonly think to themselves, “I admittedly did X and Y but I just as well could have done P or Q.” In these kinds of reflections people deeply fool themselves; they basically pretend that they were not there.

No fooling: regarding all the things we already have done in our lives, both collectively and individually, none of them can we now not have done. We did them! And also, of all the things we did not do, none now could have been done. We didn’t do them! In a word: the past, as past, is irrevocable. Any other account tries to let us off the hook, tries to lend us what Mikhail Bakhtin calls “an alibi in being.” But we need to advance carefully here. The suggestion that the past now cannot have been otherwise does not make us victims. Rightly understood, we have a beginning sketch of a free will worth wanting.

Read more

GOOD Magazine is good

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Over the past year I’ve been getting and (actually)reading GOOD Magazine. It’s published every two months in print form and can be found at most large book stores. I actually found my first issue at a grocery store.

They are very environmentally conscious and discuss issues that matter to real people. In fact, they care so much that when you subscribe to their magazine, 100% of the money goes straight to one of 12 non-profits. Yeah, they don’t keep any of it. I had my money go to Kiva. Oh, and they don’t tell you what to pay, you can select amounts from $1 up to $1,000.

It’s a very cool business model for a product and organization that does a lot of good, no pun intended. Check out the latest issue when you’re at the book store, or stop by their website, GOOD.is. Both publications are two of the best designed and well-written sources I have seen.

Some Last.fm stuff

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Last.fm is a pretty cool website, it allows you to track the artists and tracks you listen to the most in iTunes and your iPod (my music-listening outlets of choice.) Here’s my top artists and tracks so far since I’ve been tracking (it only counts when a song is listened to entirely):