Blogs and mental health / I surrender to the winter / Fierce competition / Chavez vs.…

Such as possess the gifts of fortune are easily deprived of them: but when learning is once fixed in the mind, no age removes it, nor is its stability affected during the whole course of life. Vitruvius

Blogs and mental health

I have been browsing several blog directories. I do not know, whether I have some unconscious selections bias, but I seem to find way too many blogs written by depressed, bipolar, schizophrenic, or otherwise rather non-stable persons. I assume that writing is a good therapy, but still it makes me sad to realize the amount of suffering even in Western countries, and especially the amount of mental suffering. But it may well be that I just click on those blogs for some reason and that they really are exceptions. I am not sure. Antti said once that internet is the largest open mental hospital in the world. It may well be true. At least internet and blogging is cheaper and safer than many other things sick people might try in order to get better.

I surrender to the winter

Now, the winter is really here. The temperature at my writing desk dropped below 15C, which starts to be a bit too low even for me. So, for the first time since March, I switched the large hairdryer (or heater) on. I just cannot understand how I managed here with the broken window in January. Rather poorly, I assume. Now I sit in front of the hairdryer, wrapped in a quilt. No more energy saving for the next few hours.

Fierce competition

Two fashion magazines were sitting on a self next to each other. The first one screams at me: "lose 30 lbs before Christmas". The other raises the bets: "lose 43 lbs before Christmas". Competition is hard here where fat of the land roam the street freely. But is it possible to lose such an amount before Christmas? It is now 30 days to Christmas. 43 lbs is about 20 kg. To lose 20 kg, one has to spend 20*7000 kcals more than one gets. So, one would have to lose about 4500 kcals per day, which is about twice the amount a woman, even 20 kg overweight, uses per day. So, to really lose 43 lbs in 30 days, just stopping eating would not be enough. One would also have to start doing some exercise for at least 3 hours per day (while not eating anything). I am sure some fat people will have the will-power to commit to such a diet&exercise. So, we will see many fat people running before Christmas. So funny it will be to watch them.

Chavez vs. Bush

The president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, is a funny guy. He likes to one-up Mr. Bush. His latest trick was to sell discounted home heating oil to chilly residents of Massachusetts, while Bush and the Congress decided not to increase heating subsidies for the poor. I am not sure, how much good Mr Chavez is doing for his own citizen (meaning that I have not read anything about Venezuela lately, please provide some info, link, opinions), but his opposition is at least entertaining, if not useful or necessary. Check some more discussion from The Guardian by Simon Tisdal. Note also, that Mr. Chavez has understood geopolitics well, and tries to stop selling oil to USA, and instead sell Venezuelan oil to China. There we go - another occupation is brewing, if Chavez gets his oilpipe before US get a new administration. Or, maybe the times of using muscle instead on brains is over now. Hope so.

Education vs. preparedness

Fil Hearn in Ideas that shaped buildings:

Many employers take for granted a familiarity with CAD - computer aided design. What they do not take into consideration is that education is not the same things as job preparedness, and that the more beginners are educated in analytical thinking, the more readily the acquire practice skills and become effective in office procedure.

This applies quite well to IT-industry as well. Many employers are looking for narrow skills in some specific (commercial) tool, not educated persons. And they are making grave mistakes. No fit, my ass, with a tool.

Urban development in China

NY Times runs an interesting article on urban development in China. Their example is from Harbin, the city hit by the toxic spill a few days back (by the way, before Europeans get too much schadenfreude up and going, just remember the leak that killed all life from the rive Rhein not that long ago, and the poison leak in Italy). In Harbin, they are building a new city center north of the current one, on the other side of the river. Since the authorities have unlimited powers, and sources of corruption money, this kind of projects get permissions easily. I am not sure at all, whether the project will be of any use - Harbin is not that tempting place for companies. Even in Hangzhou, where they did the exactly same thing, built a new area of offices etc, on the other side of the river, the effort failed. The buildings were empty and companies were not willing to relocate there even with promises of tax-breaks and rent subsidies. It seems that the Chinese way of mixing dictatorship and capitalism does not work that well in urban planning.
I definitely need to visit China soon. I want to see some things and check how it is going there. I just need some holiday, money is not a problem.

Paul Krugman on GM

Paul Krugman writes in his column (subscription, NY Times got greedy and is shooting itself and its columnists in their feet) on the plight of GM: G.M.'s woes are yet another reminder of the urgent need to fix our health care system.. It is really pathetic, that everyone who has even some sense, realizes that the current US health care system is broken and makes each and every US citizen pay extra, and still the government is totally unable to even start any kind of effort to fix the system. It seems, that political systems are, for the most part, unable to change/renew themselves short of total catastrophe. And when the catastrophe hits, it will be many time harder and more expensive to fix than it would be earlier.

Blogging as creative writing

Not that I know much about creative writing, but I have found blogging an excellent means for improving my writing skills. Quite often I just decide to write something, decide a topic and then, in the next 5 minutes, just write something on the topic. It is remarkable how writing guides itself, how words call forward other words, how arguments fight each other for publication. I think that writing, as so many other skills, can only be learned and mastered by continuos practice. So, bear with me while I practice. Anaway, people flock theaters for dress rehearsals as well.

Winter is here

It is 6.10 am, I have been awake for an hour, written something, packed my luggage (one large suitcase full of books), had fish and bananas (separately) for breakfast, and now I am starting to do some systems architecting. I got some good ideas while sleeping - it is the method of Crawley: load your brain with problems before going to bed and the answers will be ready by day break. But I will break for coffee and NY Times in some cafe in the Charles Street after 7am, when Deluga's open and I can buy my daily newspaper. Maybe it makes me rant a little later. But it is cold out there, -6C, and windy. Should I stay put hacking in here, where it is now 16.5C.

Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs November 2005".