thejackb’s posterous

Mathematically Correct Breakfast -- Mobius Sliced Linked Bagel

via georgehart.com

Who said that math and breakfast don't go together.

When is it Appropriate to Use Your iPhone

via cache.gawker.com

I located it over here: http://gizmodo.com/5419435/a-romance-flowchart-when-is-it-inappropriate-to-use-your-iphone?skyline=true&s=x

Malcolm Gladwell: What we can learn from spaghetti sauce

YouTube - Chinese Jews from Kaifeng arrive in Israel 2009 - a moving documentary

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

I Will Never Fall In Love Again

I pulled into a parking space, turned off the motor and cursed out loud. The weather outside the car was perfect. Blue skies and just enough heat to make you feel warm were all the reason I needed not to be here. It is a good thing that my skull isn't transparent because if it was my dear friend Harold would be able to see storm clouds heading his way. With any luck he'd be struck by lightning.

Ok, that is probably unfair. I was semi responsible for this meeting. The company had a funny policy about paying people only for the work they did and not for work that they might do. I had a long conversation with one of the bookkeepers about that one. We got stuck riding an elevator together and since I haven't a clue what pasty faced number boys are interested I talked about paychecks.

We both learned something that day. He found out that a two minute ride on an elevator can feel like a week in cleveland and I found out that I can babble at length about anything. I know, you already knew that.

By the time I had walked into the office I had figured out that the topic of my next submission was going to be why marriage was the devil's greatest invention. In my experience it was the closest thing to hell that one could find. Before you go off half cocked you need to understand that the classic definition of hell is wrong. It is not a place of fire and brimstone.

Hell is seeing the love of your life unhappily living with someone else, but pretending to be happy. Hell is being granted a taste of the most incredible relationship and experience of your life and then having it taken away. It  is like being seated at a table with the greatest feast you have ever seen. The food looks and smells incredible. You look around the table and see that the other guests are having a culinary experience that borders n the orgasmic. Just as you are about to join the  festivities you realize that your arms are tied behind you and your jaw is wired shut.

Hell is the real world and that is much worse than anything Dante can come up with.

Well, if there was ever any question about my being a bit bitter there isn't now. Life is sometimes funny in a way that makes you laugh and sometimes in a way that makes you want to cry.

The first time I had my heart broken was hard. The second time was rough and the third time was ridiculously painful. It was bad enough that I swore that I wouldn't fall in love again. And for a long time that is how it went. Various women came into my life. Some of them tried to break through the walls that I had erected but none really succeeded.

And then one day she did. One day the wall was up and the next day it was a pile of rubble. It scared me. I was frightened and excited by it all. But she took me by the hand and promised to just love me. I think that was part of what caught me, the "I just love you" bit. It was so simple and yet so powerful.

She did and so did I. We just loved each other. It is a cliche, but it felt like a dream. Somewhere along the way we got lost. If I didn't have my meeting with Harold I might even take the time to tell you how and why. At least I think that I would. Can't say for certain because I don't know if I understand it.

So in the time we have before I go off to the meeting let me fill in some details. We fell apart, sort of. Not sure that we ever stopped loving each other, just found ourselves in unfamiliar territory and went separate directions.

She got married and I got married.

I thought that I was in love. I really did. It seemed like it. I guess that it must have felt like it or I wouldn't have done that whole ring thing.

But here I am today, ringless, wifeless and until the other day very happy. Things were great until they told me about her. I was perfectly fine and now I am not.

Now I find myself on fire for a woman I haven't seen or spoken to for what seems like forever. Now I find my heart pounding for a woman who probably thinks of me as just another ex. I am sure that she thinks of me fondly, but what are the chances that she feels like I do.

And this sort of talk is part of why I am pissed off with my daughter and the friends. I didn't want to look at this corner of my closet. I didn't want to explore the lost ruins to see if any treasure remains.There is a reason why you let sleeping dogs lie.

Sigh. Well, I'll put this frustration to good use and go needle the hell out of Harold. If he doesn't go off on one of this interminably long speeches I still might get to the beach.

Americans Toss Out 40 Percent of All Food

U.S. residents are wasting food like never before.

While many Americans feast on turkey and all the fixings today, a new study finds food waste per person has shot up 50 percent since 1974. Some 1,400 calories worth of food is discarded per person each day, which adds up to 150 trillion calories a year.

The study finds that about 40 percent of all the food produced in the United States is tossed out.

Meanwhile, while some have plenty of food to spare, a recent report by the Department of Agriculture finds the number of U.S. homes lacking "food security," meaning their eating habits were disrupted for lack of money, rose from 4.7 million in 2007 to 6.7 million last year.

About 1 billion people worldwide don't have enough to eat, according to the World Food Program.

Amazon Eve, A Giant Model

Thanksgiving- A Working Holiday

You might be the chef or hostess at a restaurant. You could be a bus driver, bag boy, cashier or guy behind the counter at 7-11. Many of us enjoy the holiday because it offers a time during which we stop working. It is a vacation from our normal lives. And that is great, as Martha would say it is a good thing.

I have several Thanksgiving traditions. One of them is a football game. It is not a game I watch, but one I play in. Every year my fraternity plays on Thanksgiving day. I started playing in 1987 and with the exception of the Thanksgiving I spent in Georgetown in 1990 haven't missed one since.

Today I lined up against a boy who told me that he was born the year I graduated from college. So I did what every guy my age would do, I kicked his ass, rubbed his nose in the mud and told him to go home and play with his Lincoln Logs. It is a man's game and we're very manly people.

Of course I don't ever want to see video footage of the game. Allow me to think that I look like a gazelle running and not some awkward, herky-jerky marionette. I glide through the line and sack the quarterback. When necessary I smash a hole in the middle and stomp the ground with all who oppose me. Please allow me to retain this simple fiction.

The game was great fun, but this year was a bit different. It was different because it was a working Thanksgiving for me. I didn't play the entire game because my partners and I took time to work on our business. It was important. It is important and I am glad that we did it.

Part of the reason that I am writing about this is because we are chronicling our journey.If fortune smiles upon us one day we will look back upon this time and talk about it. It will be a fond recollection that we will share as well as a lesson that we pass along to our children.

Success and opportunity are there for those who know how to acquire them. We happen to believe that part of the process is hard work. And we hope that there is a payoff to this hard work.

Although this is a working Thanksgiving for me I am well aware that it is not the sort of work that others are doing. In a few moments I will stop typing and head off to a much needed shower. For a few moments I'll sit inside and watch the mud caked on my arms flow towards the drain. And then I'll dry off, change clothes and head off to dinner.

I am thankful for the opportunity. I am grateful that I have a place to go. And now if you'll excuse me I really must move as the dark haired beauty has told me that I must give her two hugs and three kisses before I am allowed to eat dinner.

Five years-old and that girl is already barking orders at me like some kind of drill sergeant. It is a good thing that she is so damn cute because I don't take orders or instructions very well.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Amazon Eve, A Giant Model

Twitter & Hair Loss