Parris Island, South Carolina—They come from all parts of America, from all walks of life. Some are from poor families, some are extremely wealthy. But like all Americans they're banding together in a time of need.

4:22:54 PM    

I wonder if this is normal, to live in the serenity of untouchable joyous memories one moment, and in the darkest sadness and regret the next. I'm sitting in the room where Caroline used to lay down beside me while I did sit-ups, and roll her little body side to side in an effort to imitate me. And I'm sitting in the room where I fussed at her more than once to let me work, not knowing that the time to play was coming to an end so very soon. It's the room where we made up silly dances, and the room where I studied in horror the likely course of her brainstem tumor.

4:18:29 PM    

The Conference Bike. "The Conference Bike is a tricycle built for 7 people sitting in a circle. One person steers while everyone is free to pedal or not, as the bike moves effortlessly along."Once again, my hope for the future of group silliness is restored. [DeepFUN Weblog]

2:39:05 PM    

• Jon's Radio
  • Valdis Krebs on knowledge networks
  • Blogging and homeland security: connecting the dots
• peterme.com: Interview with Valdis
• HR Technology Exchange: reference

Intriguing is the term I'm using. I've analyzed social networks myself, of course: "What the #@$@# am I doing at this party?" (Apparently a naive comment on my knowing someone with a high “betweenness” value; see Valdis' Intro to Social Network Analysis). Valdis applies this to mapping terrorist cells, corporations, etc.
2:18:41 PM    

But, Bush's critics argued, the term “evildoers” dehumanizes our enemy. And again, the critics are both right and wrong. Yes, the term does dehumanize our enemy. But this is only because our enemy has already dehumanized himself.

It reminds me of one of C.S.Lewis' comments in his biography Surprised By Joy. Lewis is apparently discussing atrocities committed in the (then ongoing) Great War (World War I, to us) with his tutor, “The Old Knock”. (From memory, I'm afraid.)

Lewis: When we look at these fiendish acts...
The Knock: (interrupting) but fiends are figments of the imagination!
Lewis: ...at these brutish acts...
The Knock: (interrupting again) but the brutes [animals—rl] do nothing of the kind!
Lewis: Well, whatever am I to call them then?
The Knock: Don't you see that they are nothing more or less than human?

So have they—our enemy—dehumanized themselves? Or have they shown us the worst: that they are nothing more or less than human—like us?—like me?

1:24:55 PM    

Maybe something with Digital but also with a reffrence to engineering something. I remember being advised to start a event log any time I detected an all hands IT emergency because the guy with the most accurate log will be able to define what actually happend in all the post mortam meetings.

Digital Ships Log, Digital Knowledge bla , oh well; it worked well for cable, people understood clearly that digital cable was better than plain old cable but could fill in the blanks in terms favorable to themselves.

...

ssd

[Blogging Alone]

1:00:45 PM    

Bomb and Shield. Bomb and Shield proved to be one of the most successful of the theater games that Tom introduced to our Esalen crowd. I found it on the web, but decided to describe it as taught to us by Tom:People start milling around, not touching each other, just walking hither and yon, or yon and hither, whichever comes first. [DeepFUN Weblog]

12:49:52 PM    

Pair Programming.
...

I thought of this while reading Gerhard Froehlich's weblog... I'd post to a permalink, but he has (ahem) "redesigned" the blog and I cant find any (as well as barely being able to follow the posts... I think it's time for a "version 2"). [Russell Beattie Notebook]

12:41:44 PM    

An interesting sidelight on this post comes from Oldenburg's chapter on German-American Beer Gardens. Apparently, the Germans—or the German immigrants to America—felt the English custom of standing a round for the group (not “standing around”, but each in a group buying a drink for all the others) tended to disorder and disorderly conduct. After all, in such a case, everyone in the group was more-or-less forced to drink at the pace of the heaviest drinker (couldn't leave a fellow's glass empty, could you?). So the Germans would instead each pay for his own beer: thus, “Dutch treat”.

Pub Rules.

From a link in Euan Semple's Weblog, I found... a guide to the psychology and etiquette of the British pub.

Before you can order at all, you must learn the correct bar-counter etiquette. You will notice that the bar counter of the pub is the only place in Britain in which anything is sold or served without the formation of a queue. Many visitors have observed that queuing is almost a national pastime for the British, who will automatically arrange themselves into an orderly line at bus stops, shop counters, ice-cream stalls, lifts, entrances, exits, and sometimes in the middle of nowhere for no apparent reason.

...

Whether you are male or female, and whatever the sex or social background of your native companions, the words “It's my round - what are you having?” will always be appreciated as a friendly gesture. This line may not be in your phrase book, but it is one of the most useful sentences in the English language.

Many of the rules on this site also apply in Australia.

[The Desktop Fishbowl]

9:28:11 AM    

Five minute legislation - David Weinberger recently cautioned that, when it comes to the Web, "we should be careful of making bad, hasty decisions."  I accepted that idea right away.  Congress should just leave the Web alone and not pass any laws until we all have a better idea of how it will work.   But then I started thinking.  Does Congress do a better job when it takes a lot of time to analyze a social problem?  Or does that just lead to more complicated solutions?  Things move quickly on the Web, so maybe the legislation should be passed hastily --with very little thought.  Is there any precedent for this sort of wild, out-of-the-box thinking?  Absolutely.

Father Guido Sarducci, a brashly innovative thinker, conceived of something called The Five Minute University....

[Ernie the Attorney]

9:10:16 AM