New Year's Resolution!

Instead of a resolution two years ago I said to myself I rather give a them to the following year. So year 2009 had the year to "Simplify".  And I did simplify. I left many square footages behind me and moved downtown into a one bedroom apartment. Lots of things got either sold or went to Goodwill for a tax writeoff. I pride myself to never have rented a storage space. This is still ongoing then after one year I will be checking what I really did not use or need. If you have not used it for a year, chance is you really don't need it.
Then the year 2010 was the year of "Engage". I wanted to engage people's minds. Looking back at the last year I realize that is not enough for me, so the year 2011 will be the year of "Challenge". Challenge myself and other peoples minds. Challenging to get out of my and their comfort zones. Because that is where the growth is.

Can you hear me now?

Last summer I went to Hot Lips Pizza for lunch as I did so many times during the fabulous summer cycling season. I prefer this location, because it has outside seating and is set back from the street. Birds are hopping around and chase after the crust crumbs. A very relaxing setting indeed. On my way to the inside entrance I noticed a young couple. He was talking to her and she was "listening" and punching buttons on her cellphone. I noticed that because usually it is the other way around hahaha. But besides that my opinion on multitasking is well described in one of my previous posts and social consequences here. 80% of every conversation is non-verbal. So having a conversation like that you are missing out on most of it. In addition to that I think it is important to show the worth of a person by giving them your undivided attention see attentiveness. The entire advent of the electronic onslaught does major damage to the ability of people to concentrate and communicate. I highly doubt it is a mere coincidence that “the stratospheric increase in diagnosed learning and attention deficits” has correlated with “the advent of the electronic playground. Many times when I get in the elevator in the morning I meet people who are very busy working their phone. Not does that only put a damper on learning social skills, but as a society we are definitely overstimulated. I think it does major damage to the ability of humans to interact and have meaningful conversations. It also shortens our attention span to constantly be inudated with information.
It is important to escape that electronic stimuli on a regular basis. Turn of that TV or whatever and switch on your Life.

Travel the World

Growing up I was fortunate enough to be able to travel extensively in Europe. That already started when I was going to school and at the end of attending a school you take a trip with the entire class for a week. Then of course there are the family vacations and the trip with your friends. Then later it were the business travels that brought me to many places around the globe. But no matter where I traveled I always enjoyed the countries and the different cultures. To understand different cultures it is important to experience them. So if you have the opportunity to travel, regardless if it is domestic or internationally e.g. a trip to Spain do it. The experience and education you will receive is priceless compared to the money that is spend.

Travel well my friends!

The Education Dilemma

Today I read in the Sunday Oregonian, that the Oregon Department of Education made the following announcement. Students in 7th grade and high school can now use automated spell checking when doing the state writing test. Can you spell l-o-w-e-r s-t-a-n-d-a-r-t-s. Doing so will not do the students a favor. Americans are already falling behind compared internationally. Our education system is not doing a good job preparing our youth for the real world out there. We don't want to hurt anybody's feelings right? You still can get a good education here if you are looking for one. But it also comes with a price. College tuition is up and it is not uncommon to be 100k+ in the hole when finished. Many other countries do it far cheaper and a lot better than we do. The entire system should be re-thought, because when your football or basketball career is over you want to have something to fall back onto. Unless of course you are very good at saying: "Do you want fries with that?"
To put that in perspective: Even Cuba has a better education system. A lesser known fact is that US students can get a very good and inexpensive medical education. in Cuba. Cuba has the third highest life expectancy in the Americas after Canada and Chile. So the quality is there. Higher than the US, which has the only for profit health care system on the entire planet. But back to education. This makes me appreciate my education even more. Coming from a country where I had the opportunity to do a three year apprentice ship program, getting paid for it, ok very little, but the astonishing thing was that I did not produce anything valuable for anything or anybody that could be used. It was all about learning and at that time the best apprentice ship program available. The same people offered me a full scholarship to go to college. Of course you cannot turn somebody down that enthusiastic. What I think is important in all of this is that an education system where you are only limited by your own brain grease is better than one where you are limited by the size of your wallet. Yo si puedo
A recent article I read was in my opinion pretty impressive and struck the core of the reason of the US education dilemma. Even if you do not agree with the tiger mom's regiment. The overall picture shows that US parents have to take it up two notches.

The Folly of Multitasking

A popular question in interviews is: "Can you multitask?" Here is the answer I would be giving. Multitasking is defined as doing two or more tasks simultaneously. Yes you can do one task, stop, then do another, stop, then do another, but that is not multitasking. The human brain can only process one input at any given moment. Even a computer with a single processor does not multitask. It can switch a hundred times between tasks within a single second, but only one task can be active at any given moment. It is the same with the human brain. Our mind can only be at a single point at any given moment. A few years back I was driving down a very straight road in the late evening, when I suddenly noticed a very bright light in the left of my peripheral vision. I leaned to the right and turned my head to the right as well, just enough so I could still see the road ahead. Then the side window exploded and the car rocked violently. I pulled over, just as the teenage driver got out of the car still on his mobile. He was driving straight as well and wanted to make a left turn. Too bad for him I was in the way. Yes you can drive and talk on the phone, but you can either pay attention to the road or the conversation, but not both. Sure you can do both half axe, but obviously not both very well. But we have now the "hands free" law. It does not matter where your hands are, but where your mind is.
There is something to be said for single tasking. You focus on one task, do it well and in my opinion there is less stress. Try to do more than one task at the same time your stress level goes way up.

In the Checkout Line

The day before yesterday I went to the grocery store as this day is always my day to stock up on food for the week. I usually go to a Fred Meyer as they have a great organic selection. The Johnson Creek store has a really cool thunderstorm imitation before they sprinkle the veggies. It is the coolest thing, really. Anyway, after I was done with getting what I needed, I went to the checkout line and piled my stuff on the conveyor. Reusable bags first of course. Fred Meyer is supporting the ban the bag movement and does not offer single use plastic bags since August 1st anymore at their Portland stores, which is great. Even my cat joined the movement.
I noticed the heavily inked lady in front of me pretty much only got fruit and veggies on the conveyor. So I go: That are a lot of veggies. She replies: Yes, that is almost the only thing I can eat. I guess: Are you a vegan? She confirms that and I tell her I have been a vegetarian for over a year now. She notices the organic almond butter I am buying and asks me if it is any good. I told her that it is great. She tells me that her friend makes her own peanut butter, but only gives her very little to try. She talks about her kid and her other handicapped kid. I feel for her, because my sister has a child with down syndrome herself. By that time she gets ready to pay and pulls her Oregon Trails card out, which is food stamps and she also has a debit card to make up the difference.
I think this is not good, so I give her a five and a jar of organic almond butter therefore paying for it and giving it to her. She is pretty touched and I tell her happy birthday.
On my way home I am thinking that we as a society have become a sad story when families and children go hungry. Also there are three times as many calories available than needed in the US and a lot of food lands in the trash everyday. It is very easy to take a full fridge for granted, but for many Americans it is not. In fact ever more Americans struggle to put food on the table than before. Things like that should get better, not worse. But that confirms the fact that only God has answers, but the world does not have any.

Albert Einstein

Today after I finished my volunteer shift at the Portland Sunday Parkways I headed down to OMSI. OMSI has free Admission this weekend, so I though I take advantage of that and check out the Albert Einstein exhibit as I read his biography before. He was definitely a gifted scientist and won the Nobel Price in 1921 for the explanation of the photoelectric effect. He wrote a paper in German on the Theory of Relativity "Relativitaetstheorie" which made him famous. Under Newtons law mass was a matter like an apple and energy was the force that could move that matter. Time was a constant and absolute. Now with Einstein's Theory the speed of light is constant which means time and distance are now variables. Time is relative depending on the point of view of the observer. And mass is equal to energy. E=mc2. There are two important statements in this equation. First: Mass is stored energy and energy can be transformed into mass. They are both equal. Second: c is the speed of light and that is a large number. When you multiply a large number by itself you get a huge number. Even if the mass is a tiny number and you multiply it with a huge number you still get a large number. This equation does not tell you how to build a nuclear weapon, but it tells you the amount of energy that gets released when you split the atom. An atom has a tiny mass, but when you split it a fraction of that mass is transformed into energy and that amount is large as it was demonstrated with the atom bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6, 1945 and August 9, 1945 respectively. Only less than 1gram of mass was converted into energy in the bomb over Nagasaki. That tells you the immense amount of energy there is when you split the atom.

Now Einstein was born Jewish, but he was not practicing it. He did not belief in a personal God, but he acknowledged and believed there is a God and that the Universe had a beginning. "The fact that all of the universe, stars and planets happened by chance is highly unlikely." Besides that he was also a great humanitarian and dedicated his last decade to the eradication of nuclear weapons.

The Matrix Revisited

I am finally chillin' after a busy and sizzling day and looking at that opposing wall, that has a Matrix Movie Poster hanging on it. Besides the fact that is was a great movie there is one scene in it that I think is a remarkable symbol of our lives. I am talking about the scene where Neo is in that glass cocoon that is filled with liquid and he is hooked up to all those tentacles. In the movie the human body is used to feed energy into the Matrix. In real life the tentacles symbolizing all the good and bad responsibilities/entities that either drain or feed us. One big one would be the marketing machine that is trying to create needs we do not have, so we buy things we do not need, with money we do not have, to impress people we don't even like. 70% of the US economy is based on consumer spending. That is a very large percentage, which ties it to a must have healthy job situation. Otherwise things go south or stagnate.