Sam Tsui & Kurt Schneider

This may be old news for some of you internet savvy folks.   These kids have been all over YouTube; on the Bonnie Hunt Show; and I just saw them recently on the NBC Nightly News (Channel 4 in New York).   A combination of talent & technology!



I'm addicted...and I've already viewed several of their YouTube videos.   Don't believe me?   Check this one out!   Beyonce's "Halo"!



These Yale students are going places!   You haven't heard the last of them.   Trust me on this!

I gotta feelin'...Joy Rising!

Somehow I missed the Black Eyed Peas performance on Oprah's fall season kickoff show.   Last week...Oprah revisited this moment on one of her "favorite things" show.   A member of the audience, who attended the Black Eyed Peas event, summed up his experience as..."It was Joy Rising"!



Wow!  Wish I could have been there!

All I Really Need to Know...

I Learned in Kindergarten

This is the title of one of my all time favorite reads (aside from "Hold Love Strong"!).   My oldest daughter recommended it to me several years ago.   You could almost say it's my bible.   I just checked and see that the author, Robert Fulghum, has a 15th Anniversary Edition as well as several other books.   Given how impressed I am with "Kindergarten", I can't wait to read ALL the rest!

Here's a partial list of all you need to know...according to Fulghum (so true!):

• Share everything
• Play fair
• Don't hit people
• Put things back where you found them
• Clean up your own mess
• Don't take things that don't belong to you
• Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody
• Wash your hands before you eat
• Flush!
• Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you
  
• When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands, and stick together

It's an amazing and insightful read...not to mention that the above and a few other simple lessons he describes...are truly the basis for all you really need to know!   Enjoy!

Balloon Boy!

OK...enough already!
I saw this story last Thursday (if you live in America you couldn't miss it). Weather balloon gets away...and supposedly there's a 6 year old in side. When I 1st saw...I thought...how distraught the parents must be and switched channels! Later that evening...I hear the kid was not in the balloon but reappeared from the family's attic! Great! Go to Bed!



I wake up the next morning and every TV station in America is interviewing this family! NBC's Today Show interviewed the family at the top of the hour for almost 20 minutes!!!

Have we lost our marbles. We're into two wars; there's the Israeli-Palestinian situation, the whackos in Iran & North Korea, hundreds of kids dying around the world every day, the economy & health care...and American TV devotes all this time to this story?

Forget that this was a hoax! The fact that the "news" media know the American public will watch this crap...which is true...and at the same time...is very discomforting!

Republicans in Congress!

Wow! I just don't understand it..and perhaps I never will!


More about each of them in future posts!

• Joe Wilson - South Carolina
• Louie Gohmert - Texas
• Mark Kirk - Illinois
• John Shimkus - Illinois
• Michele Bachmann - Minnesota
• Randy Forbes - Virginia
• Bill Sali - Idaho
• Steve King - Iowa
• Lynn Westmoreland - Georgia
• Lynn Jenkins - Kansas
• Virginia Foxx - Virginia
• Stever Buyer - Indiana
• Trent Franks - Georgia
  

Myers-Briggs...Personality Test...INFP

My wife mentioned the Myers-Briggs test last week during casual conversation. I understand it may be widely used in corporate America. Basically...it's a personality test. You are asked to answer 72 questions...it takes about 10 minutes or less to complete. Depending on your responses...you are categorized into one of 16 different personality types. I took the test...and the resulting summarized personality assessment were on point! I'm an INFP! I found the results to be so true that I may get those letters as a tatoo! The Mrs. is an ESTP and my best friend (JW) is an ENFJ. I read their summaries...and was again blown away!   Take the test and let me know your results!

Here's a piece of my personality assessment...INPF!

"Usually gentle and kind, they are intense and passionate about their values and deeply held beliefs, which they share with trusted friends. Because of their discreet manner, their enthusiasm may not be apparent. They are sensitive to others' pain, restlessness or general discomfort and strive to find happiness, balance and wholeness for themselves in order to help others find joy, satisfaction and plenitude. They are deeply empathetic."

I'm good with that!

National Assocation of Free Clinics

The National Association of Free Clinics (NAFC) is the only national non-profit whose mission is solely focused on the needs of free clinics and the populations they serve. They understand that it is frustrating when you need medical assistance and have no where else to turn.

No medical insurance???

Free clinics are volunteer-based, safety-net health care organizations that provide a range of medical, dental, pharmacy, and/or behavioral health services to economically disadvantaged individuals who are predominately uninsured.

Locate a Free Clinic in your area.

Donations

• Keith Olbermann of MSNBC recently donated $50,000!
• Michael Baisden (radio talk show/DJ) also donated $20,000!
• My best friend (JW) donated...and so did I.

Please help...and give what you can (as little as $10)...to help those without medical insurance!

The Noble Peace Prize!

The Noble Peace Prize goes to President Barack Obama "for his extraordinary efforts to straighten international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

Already there are those questioning why President Obama? What has he accomplished to garner this prestigious award? If you're one of those...I give you the words of Matthew Goodman...author of   "Hold Love Strong."

Matthew is an incredible young man...if you haven't bought/read his book...you are doing yourself a disservice!

Here is the entry from Matthew's blog!

Any criticism of the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Barack Obama must only be addressed with one simple question: in the last nine months, what have you done or tried to do, or what conversation have you had to make the world better? If the answer is something that indicates an insular, domestic approach to the world, or if the reply is that you have done some sort of good act for someone you already know and love, a family member, a friend, a coworker, etc than you have no right to question or criticize. This is quite simply because this is the twenty-first century, not the twentieth or nineteenth or seventeenth or any other century for that matter; and we have now entered a stage in the world’s history where there is no excuse or reason not consider ourselves, and to champion the need for us all to be global citizens, and to take action as such. Barack Obama, more than any leader in the history of the world, is leading this charge. His outreach to friends, foes, and those on the fence about his presidency is as unprecedented as it is a moral imperative. If he is successful at bridging the divides he is working on, or if he is only successful in bringing them greater attention, then we will be pushed closer to a world in which physical, cultural, economic and religious boundaries are of less importance and eventually, hopefully, nationalism will be replaced by humanistic pride.

I speak of this from a very personal perspective. In writing Hold Love Strong, and after working in egregiously disadvantaged conditions of the worst of New York City’s public school programs and with men and women returning home from prison for nearly a decade, and after spending close to eight years working on a novel highlighting the conditions of the aforementioned peoples’ lives in an effort to understand, to communicate, and to spur action in the name of their plight, and in an effort to prove that we, as human beings, have the capacity to understand each other far beyond what we accept, the novel has been treated by numerous authors, artists, so called liberal educated men and women in a manner that amounts to foolish prejudice and shallow, forsaken pride. I can’t tell you how many people I have reached out to that have not responded with even a brief email; and I can’t express how disappointed I was when recently I was told that a certain head of a large, progressive nonprofit did not wish to meet with me because, without reading a single word of Hold Love Strong, he was offended that I wrote such a book. In addition, a friend recently shared with me a blog run by an ivy league educated, liberal woman that said I should stick to writing about myself and what I know as if the last decade of my life, the people I know and love and who I have little doubt know and love me, are insignificant and thus not apart of my personal development and foundation.

Perhaps I am naïve, but I believe that the purpose of writing, the purpose of having a voice, of speaking out—be one a leader or a humble member of a larger chorus like myself—is that of citizenship to the utmost and most honorable degree: not self-promotion but the promotion of us. Thus, I am proud that the Nobel Peace Prize went to Barack Obama. It is deserved for it supports the efforts of each of us who continue to believe in our ability to overcome preconceived differences and the rhetoric of limited, self-obsessed thinking. Today is a day that not only recognizes and celebrates Barack Obama, but it is also a day that celebrates us: naïve, eager and idealistic as we are. To the rest of the world, well…. please join us in the 21st century where it is not too hot, and the breeze is cool.

Good Hair!

It's a female thing!

"You Talk Like a White Girl!"

Mama Obama! You Go Girl!

Where I've been!

Perhaps I should have posted this info into my profile ...but here are just some random thoughts about me...that I expect to post here....one of these days! I'm grateful for what I've experienced thus far in my life...and remain excited about what may be "around the corner"!

Here it is in a nutshell...major milestones/impacts on a boomer's journey through life!

• 1339 Prospect Avenue (DAyton 8-6615) - my childhood & teenage years...in the South Bronx...in apartment # 4B!
• My Mom..."Tip Toe through the Tulips!" Look up the word Mom in the dictionary...
  
• My Grandfather...a man before his time!
  
• St. Augustine's Church - it's influence on me.
• Camp Bohatom - an innocence of youth?...and total escapism!
• Junior High School #127 - Castle Hill Avenue - Totally Alone!
• James Monroe High School - The United Nations of the Bronx!
• Dubuque, Iowa - How did a kid from the South Bronx...wind up in Dubuque, Iowa.
• The University of Dubuque...an experience I'll never forget!
  
• Terry...you were taken away...too young...too soon!
  
• Corporate America - An Introduction!
• Uncle Sam Wants You! - Why Me?
• Bachelorhood! - Whatever that means!
• Marriage - Wow!
• Fatherhood - Wow Again!
• More Corporate America.
• Tokyo Japan! - How did a kid from the South Bronx wind up in Tokyo, Japan?
• Pete...I miss you more than you'll ever know!
  
• Back to American Reality & Corporate America
• You can't keep them on the Farm...where do we relocate?
• Where are we now...and who gives a crap!
• A daughter is a daughter...
• A grandson! Wow!
  
• Places to see before you die! Aka...the bucket list!
  
• Whatever else comes to mind...we'll see!
  

Meet Your Ancestor!

Yesterday, scientists told the world what they know about Ardipithecus ramidus..."Ardi" for short...the oldest pre-human species yet found. Ardi lived 4.4 million years ago in what is now Ethiopia.

A partial skeleton is believed to be the oldest link in the evolutionary chain!

Adri is not the long-sought "missing link"... the ancestor that scientists say humans and apes have in common...but comes close. And it helps show that both human beings and apes have evolved from something, about six million years ago, that did not look much like either!

Made it home!

Back from Frenchman's Cove last night...without airline (or airport) incident..amazing! Great time was had by all...in spite of grim happenings back stateside...not the least of which is listed below! Thanks again J&J for a great time!