my nephew

i have a nephew! he was born about five weeks ago, and i am so excited, as you can see below.

for those of you who don't know, on the left is my sister seema, and in my hands is baby jasper.

today i've been reading thich nhat hanh (whose name i've butchered so many times.. thin naan han, tic tac toe, oy oy oy.. for those of you who know how bad i am with names, this will come as no surprise) and his sage words, when connected with the new baby in my life, have been quite inspiring.

he's got a good sequence of aphorisms in this book my sister gave me:

a child is always able to live in the present moment.

the child in us is always alive.

maybe we have not had enough time to take care of the child within us.

when we live in the present moment it is possible to live in true happiness. 

seeing jasper smiling and flailing about (i will post a good video when i have it) reminded me that i used to be there -- i used to be flailing and demanding milk and living from moment to moment. there is such simultaneous peace and intensity in his eyes. no wonder he sleeps "like a baby" -- he lives like a baby, which is all senses on the now.

ok, i'm still making sense of this, but i haven't felt like there's something quite important in this mindfulness stuff until i saw jasper and connected him with some of these ideas.

passing of a friend

i learned yesterday that someone i really respected had passed away in fairly unusual circumstances. dan kliman, a doctor, activist, and energetic debater, was found dead in a san francisco elevator shaft this past weekend. the police are emphasizing that this was an accident, and what a tragic one.

i knew dan from sf debate at the commonwealth club. we had argued a number of points, and had always had vigorous conversations about a myriad of topics after the debates. i probably only met dan around 5 times. but in those 5 meetings i grew to greatly respect him and his good humor and willingness to listen and defend his points. and what a laugh -- such a boisterous guy, full of so much verve.

what struck me most about this unfortunate incident is that it hit me so hard. i was in utter shock and very sad. i had a headache almost immediately after i heard about dan's death, and then dreamt that i had gone back in time and had a chance to tell him what was going to happen.

as i told a friend last night, learning of the passing of such a passionate soul makes me want to redouble my efforts in this life and take advantage of every living moment.

thanks to everyone who i spoke to and chatted with -- your support has made this easier.

cajun spiced nuts

made a great spiced nuts recipe from my brother-in-law's family. jane lee gave me the recipe. fanstastic stuff. loved by all.

ingredients

• 2 TBSP unsalted butter
• 1/2 cup corn syrup (we did fake maple syrup, you can likely experiment)
• 2 TBSP water
• 1.5 tsp salt
• 0.5 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp tobasco sauce
• 3/4 tsp ground pepper
• 1 pound almonds (or mix of other nuts)

(NOTE: double the spices if you want realllly spicy nuts. we did 1.5 times, and found it not spicy enough, but others loved it. gauge your audience)

instructions

• preheat oven to 250
• melt butter
• mix all ingredients in butter pot, simmer and let boil for 1 to 2 minutes
• stir in nuts, coating well
• cover baking sheet with tin foil, line with slight amount of oil or pam or whatever non-stick you use
• bake for 1 hour at 250, stirring nuts every 15 minutes to get them well coated
• let cool and break nuts off sheet

The nuts keep for 6 weeks. Beyond that, you can freeze them to keep for a long time.

enjoy!

so, we actually doubled this recipe and made 1.5 pounds of almonds and about half a pound of pecans. realllly good!

inflating tires, inflating dreams

while jogging around in the cold of boston, i noticed a number of cars with visibly low tire pressure. i wanted to leave a note for these folks -- not only can you save on gas, but you can save yourself (neha once blew out a ridiculously low tire on the highway!). a lot of fun has been made of obama's call for people to inflate their tires. but it is something small that can make a difference. from a government efficiency site:

You can improve your gas mileage by around 3.3 percent by keeping your tires inflated to the proper pressure. Under-inflated tires can lower gas mileage by 0.3 percent for every 1 psi drop in pressure of all four tires. Properly inflated tires are safer and last longer.

then i got thinking: what if joggers had a little note they carried around with them that they could drop on any windshield they saw. the green joggers! but that might be annoying for a jogger. then i thought of something better: what if parking enforcement officers had such a little note? they could drop it on the windshield of cars with visibly low tires. not only would they be helping the driver in more ways than one, they'd be helping their image -- no one likes these enforcers! sure, this might mildly slow the officers in doing their work, but i can imagine a city like san francisco thinking this was a good thing to do.

halloween critical mass

i participated in the halloween critical mass this past friday. what a thrill! i borrowed a friend's fancy bike, and zipped in and out amongst the thousand or more bikers, most of them in fantastic costume.

for those of you who don't know about critical mass, it's basically a large bunch of bikers that take over the streets of san francisco on the last friday of every month (they also do critical mass in other cities). the mass isn't coordinated beyond a fixed starting point and time (the ferry building at 630pm or so). when the mass gets going, it follows the leader, for the most part. this leads to some interesting stories:

jesus leads us astray

about 45 minutes into the mass, we were biking on the south side of union square on geary st and we came upon powell st. a man dressed as jesus sped to the front of the mass and asked his brothers to follow him left onto powell st, going towards market. some of us, a foolish few, decided this was a good idea. now, witness below the map:

that's right. we were biking on a trolley street towards a dead end. jesus fooled us. led us astray. i suspect that wasn't really jesus.

thrill of the leader

at one point i bolted to the front of the mass and decided to take the whole thing to the right. so i said "go right!" and people behind me shouted "going right!" and we all went right. what power! so thrilling. i was so giddy that i had moved the whole mass that i fell back and just tasted the victory.

analysis

of course, traffic was slowed as the mass went through the city, cars honked, pedestrians waved, joy and sadness. when i told some people i was going to bike in the mass, i got some derisive looks, comments along the lines of "how could you?" having done it, and having been blocked in traffic at other times while driving in critical mass, and having biked through the city now for over a year, i have decided that this monthly parade of joy by bikers is totally worthwhile. the small anxiety it briefly imposes on drivers is more than made up for by the joy and sense of camaraderie bikers feel.

vote no on prop 8

tonight i decided to do a bit of a dive into the "yes" on proposition 8 campaign -- i'm trying to understand the fundamental arguments for this proposition. ok, some quick background. the proposition is quite clearly titled: "Eliminates the Right of Same-Sex Couples to Marry." a similar proposition was passed by voters in 2000, but struck down by the california supreme court. this proposition would embed the definition of marriage as between a man and a woman into the california constitution, and could not be struck down by the state supreme court.

now, among other things, the "yes" campaign has put a lot of focus on the effects of this proposition on schools and churches. first, on schools, the "yes" campaign has this interesting video:



i think it's worth watching, for educational purposes. these are massachusetts residents who discuss their perceived effects of the MA law. anyway, some stirring quotes. if the bill is passed, there will be "homosexuality at every level" in our schools, and in every discipline: "math, reading, social studies, spelling." indeed, spelling. can you spell "fear-mongering" and "intolerance."

i love this desire the parents express concerning their children: that their children "not have them face adult issues when they're children." one of the parents expresses their revulsion at having their children exposed to these ideas prior to "their choosing." !

now, to the effects on religious institutions. i love how the "yes" campaign is letting others say things for them, rather than actually saying what is the truth. take this line, from the "yes" site. it appears in a letter to the editor of the orange county register:

Churches will be forced to perform same-sex marriages even if that is contrary to the church's position. Churches would not be able to use their doctrinal beliefs to defend their positions.

now, i don't know where this is coming from. the separation of church and state is guaranteed by the US constitution (the amendments, i think, to be exact). so the IRS, the law.. they are not going to be gunning for churches that resist marrying same-sex couples. this is A+ fear-mongering.

anyway, i can't see how if you're in a same-sex partnership, but it's not titled marriage, that somehow people are going to afford what you have the same dignity and respect as what married people have. "separate but equal" in this case seems to smack of discrimination based on sexual preference. if you feel your religion compels you to vote for this resolution, i don't expect to convince you otherwise. but i'd really like to know if there are more compelling arguments to support this resolution. 

finally, this proposition, despite amending the constitution, still needs only 50% + 1 of the vote, not a super-majority. and current polls indicate that the yes campaign is leading. so..

vote no on proposition 8

take some action

this american life: going big

i recently listened to a "this american life" podcast titled "going big." there was the most hilarious section about a musician, david berkeley, who is hired by a desperate boyfriend to help him get his girl back. the story is fantastic and funny. the excerpt is below. it is worth 15 minutes of your time!

prius goes mainstream?

in the past week i've seen a zipping-in-and-out-of-traffic prius driver, a reckless prius driver, and a smoking-while-driving prius driver.

none of these behaviors are things i associate with goody goody prius drivers :)

the prius is going mainstream, and that's a good thing. 

high school musical in my head again

i have been listening to the high school musical soundtrack, once again. the music is so standard, but so candy!

i'll take your money

today i encountered a young women on a street corner asking for donations to a charity. the charity was an sf homeless charity that supports homeless people. here's the pitch:

charity girl: in sf, 5 homeless shelters were shut down or nearly shut down because of budget cuts...

omar: mmm yes yes

charity girl: [more details about the shutdown].. we are looking for donations.

omar: no doubt.

charity girl: $160 would support ...

omar: i'm not giving that much!

cg: you can give just $40 to support...

omar: nope.

cg: well, you could give even $5 and we'd mark your name here in this list with a $ sign, indicating that you gave.

omar: thanks, but no thanks.

that's where it ended. now, the reason i couldn't stand this is because she was implementing a standard method, used before the dawn of time but outlined nicely by the psychologist robert cialdini. she was making me somewhat sympathetic, throwing out a wildly ridiculouslous number that few people would support based on a 2 minute explanation, and then reducing that number to something that sounds reasonable ($40, $5..) when compared to the ridiculous number ($160). i was immune to this tactic because i have read about it, and frankly feel that i need way more information before i'm giving these people any money.

so, i started to tell this story to a friend. turns out, this friend gave the same girl $40! oy. total affirmation of the technique. my friend was trying to justify it ("even if it's a rip off, the girl could use the money.. if not, the charity gets useful money," etc..) but the fact of the matter is it's almost certainly the case that my friend got manipulated, and didn't even know it. this is a friend who i think of as highly analytical, which i think is yet more proof that such an action was prompted by behavioral responses that were manipulated.

"just wake up!"

after my moving time in the session on gay marriage, i wandered into the debate i was supposed to moderate. there were a number of new faces, and i looked forward to hearing what people had to say about the conflict in south ossetia and georgia. i certainly didn't know very much!

almost immediately it became clear that we had a heckler, and the night was going to be a bit tense. to my right sat an old man, with wispy white hair, giant, thick glasses, and a penchant to refill his wine glass every 10 minutes, all the way to the brim. 

the drunk old man was clearly dissatisfied with pretty much everyone in the room. he would mutter, sometimes quite loudly, saying things like "oh god..." or "stupid stupid stupid." i tried to quiet him down a few times, but then realized that ignoring him was probably the best mode of attack.

at the end of the debate, we go around the room and see who supports, rejects or abstains on the resolution before the group. when we got to drunk old man, he said he had only one thing to say, something that was said to him by his mentor aldous huxley (he seemed to toss that one in there). he said "wake up!" and he kept saying it, quite loudly. "just wake up! everyone in this room." 

i reminded him that "wake up" was not one of the options we typically give at this point in the debate, but, when he said he had no other opinion to offer i reminded the house that we don't force a decision on anyone. so i gently put his shouts of "wake up!" to bed and finished the debate, withstanding a few more "oh gods.." from drunk oldy. 

at the end of the debate, our old, drunk friend had to be helped out.

wake up!

human effort, human dignity

yesterday i went to the commonwealth club to moderate a debate on the war between russia and georgia over south ossetia. i arrived a few minutes early and there were still people sitting in our room, so i wandered into a discussion on the latest proposition to ban gay marriage in california. i sat right next to the door, expecting to slip out when my room was free.

as i sat there an obviously very sick man, unclear if he was old or young, hobbled with his cane to the door. i opened the door for him and stood out of his way. he beckoned to me and i followed him outside. he then asked if i would write his question for the speakers (questions were only taken in written format for this event). i said yes, and he began to speak most eloquently, but stilted, with obvious physical exertion, on basic human rights, the decay of roman and greek societies correlating with increased sexual freedoms, human dignity ... he let it all loose. 

i couldn't keep up with him, and told him as much. we managed to piece together one question on human dignity that wasn't too long and really probed the psychology of a voter who would decide to vote for the proposition banning gay marriage. i told him that i had to run this up to the podium before they stopped taking questions. the unnamed man shuffled slowly back to his seat, and i submitted the question.

then, i waited. we waited. i wanted, i so badly wanted, our question to be read. the sick man had his head flopped over in his hands at his seat. he looked exhausted. he had put in a lot of energy coming to me and working out a question. the moderator continued lobbing questions at the panel. one, then another, then another. the moderator finally said that she only had time to read two more questions.

the first wasn't ours.

i so hoped that the second would be. i waited. i crossed my fingers.

...

it wasn't our question. i was late for my event and couldn't bear to see the sick man. i stood up and left.

i love my torn jeans

because i tore them. the damage is all me. frays. rips. fading.

it's a piece of clothing that captures a lot of history. i need to buy a new camera so i can show you!

i saw such a torn up pair of jeans on a friend recently and asked him if the tears were his. he replied 'no', they were designer.

i want to meet the designer who can personalize tears for me better than me. i'll salute that genius.

ok, now i have to fish my keys out of the inner tear in these jeans.

take my books, please!

tonight, while reading, i caught a glimpse of my bookshelf. why, i wondered, do i have so many books i care nothing for? books i'm done with, or never intend to start?

well, i plan to give these books away. but first i want to offer them to my friends. so, feel free to follow this link and put your name in the "Receiver" column if you'd like any of the books . add some comments if you want. the books aren't sorted in any manner. i just dumped the info into this spreadsheet.

and by all means, feel free to list your own books you'd like to give away.

i will be sure to get you your book(s) in a timely fashion (but don't expect amazon prime speeds!)

north by northwest

i love alfred hitchcock. vertigo is one of my favorite movies. so, recently, i saw north by northwest.

now, to be honest, it isn't as good as vertigo. however, it has some wonderful scenes. in the scene below, from right at the beginning of the movie, a case of mistaken identity turns into something far more sinister. i think this part is played to perfection, and martin landau, who you see on the right in the still below, is superb. i felt uncomfortable just thinking about the absurdity of it all..

let's puff

i was at the shanghai kaleidoscope exhibit at the royal ontario museum today. there were a number of neat exhibits, but i really enjoyed one in particular called "let's puff" from 2002 by yang zhenzhong.

when you enter the exhibit area, you first only see a girl blowing at you. exactly like the video below:



then, you turn around and see a second screen (shown in this next video, be patient):



can you guess what's going on? it's not easy from these videos.

anyway, the artist erected two screens, one with a woman blowing at the camera, and another, across from the woman's screen, depicting a street in shanghai. whenever the woman blows, the other screen speeds up. it's a wonderful visual and aural depiction of the rapid growth and change in shanghai that has swept up the city. now imagine walking in an art space and constantly hearing that blowing sound from the first video. a bit eerie!

you can learn more about the piece here.

friendship buckets

(i realize now that this post is on the order of a lara post.. something i try to avoid, noting that blog readers have no attention span these days [i certainly don't!] .. but i feel the temptation to leave it all in)



a friend recently used the phrase "friendship bucket" as a metaphor representing the state of a relationship. when i read this phrase i thought of leaky buckets, buckets with patches, refilling a bucket with water, or leaving a bucket out in the sun and seeing all the water dry up (the bucket above represents a really really old friendship!).

but then i got all geeky and started thinking about the effectiveness of such a metaphor (i think we can thank jono for that, who often pontificates on things like this over on his blog). for example, the state of a relationship is really an intersubjective thing -- so either friends share the same bucket and compromise on the representation ("i thought our bucket had two holes, a small patch and was 3/4 full -- how could you think it was only 1/2 full!") or, more reasonably, the friendship bucket is an individual's view on a particular relationship.

ok. but there still seems to be something missing. for instance, if i had a metaphor for the state of a relationship, i'd want it to either cleanly capture the current state, or the history. ideally, both. i don't think a bucket does either of these very well. for instance, if your bucket is meant to capture history, then how do you make sense of the current "fullness"? obviously there was some reason we'd say the bucket is 3/4 full (it got there somehow?) -- but what was the pour history? if that seems a bit ridiculous, and your bucket is really just a reflection of now, then you also run into problems because the way we (or at least i) think about relationships is hardly ahistoric -- the history is there and immediately foregrounds when i bring a friend to mind. and a bucket is an object i think of as having history -- indeed, a patch on a bucket was placed at a particular time, and in this metaphor might represent some form of friendship repair that may not be immediate but is nonetheless important.

so friendship bucket isn't resonating with me. and you probably think this is quite ridiculous -- who meditates on the effectiveness of such a metaphor? well, i do! :)

i think a few elements are missing in this metaphor. here they are:
- a clear distinction between what i think of the relationship, what i think the other person might think, and maybe some objective measures (when we last met up?)
- a way of tracking the movement of the relationship
- a method for thinking about this relationship in comparison to other similar relationships in your life

this actually leads me to discuss a fantastic work by intel seattle. in elder care homes, a major problem is social isolation amongst the elders. having had a grandmother who was in a nursing home, i intimately understand the problem. workers at homes really try to keep the elders engaged with various others (family, friends, people at the home).

so what intel did was create a very simple display. it shows a solar system, with the central object, the sun, representing the elder. the orbiting "planets" are people in the elder's social network. the distance between a planet and the sun is a reflection of the social closeness of the elder and the person, at that time. in this case, the proximity was based on interactions (phone calls, visits, length of these interactions). the display showed preliminary success when compared to a control case. indeed, elders who used the display would try to bring in outer planets by getting in touch with the represented people.


so, now the question -- why is this just for elders? it likely seems strange to think of having such a detailed reflection on your relationships. we keep this stuff in our head. but as a mechanism for self-reflection, and potentially as a mechanism for mak

i'd want to incorporate a few things into this display:
- reflection of my impression of the relationship. maybe just an emoticon on the planet?
- a method for seeing the movement of the planets over time, so you can see how different relationships have evolved. the faded trajectory above tries to do that

anyway i think i'll end here and continue these thoughts in the future.

obama in the new yorker

the recent cover-controversy issue of the new yorker has a great article about obama's political days in chicago. to all the obama people who are disappointed with his recent big flops (public financing of presidential campaigns, fisa), get real. he's a politician. running for president. as the new yorker writer puts it:

Perhaps the greatest misconception about Barack Obama is that he is some sort of anti-establishment revolutionary. Rather, every stage of his political career has been marked by an eagerness to accommodate himself to existing institutions rather than tear them down or replace them. When he was a community organizer, he channelled his work through Chicago’s churches, because they were the main bases of power on the South Side. He was an agnostic when he started, and the work led him to become a practicing Christian. At Harvard, he won the presidency of the Law Review by appealing to the conservatives on the selection panel. In Springfield, rather than challenge the Old Guard Democratic leaders, Obama built a mutually beneficial relationship with them. “You have the power to make a United States senator,” he told Emil Jones in 2003. In his downtime, he played poker with lobbyists and Republican lawmakers. In Washington, he has been a cautious senator and, when he arrived, made a point of not defining himself as an opponent of the Iraq war.

on the cover: i think hertzberg's analysis is on point. not the best cartoon, but people are way too sensitive. i think it's quite amusing, but no where near as funny as the recent ahminijad cover:


recall that around this time ahmadinejad claimed there were no homosexuals in iran, and senator larry craig had his unfortunate footsie incident in a public bathroom.

human research: how to

i'm taking an online course about research on human subjects. after each module they administer a quiz. after the 'international research' section they were really grasping at straws.. here's one of the questions.

Question 4 Multiple Choice/Single Answer - select only one answer (1 point)

Which of the following is the LEAST important activity when protecting human subjects in international research?

(a) Assessing local transportation conditions
(b) Considering local customs, norms, and laws.
(c) Consulting with members of the community from which subjects will be recruited.
(d) Determining if the research might present unique risks to subjects given local socio-economic conditions.

oy.

basia bulat

my roommate introduced me to basia bulat, a musician with an amazing voice, supposedly from my high school.

anyway, yesterday i sat down at home, turned on the cd player, and hit play, not knowing what might come forth. it was this song, and i love it. give a listen: