Scratch from MIT

Scratch, created from MIT, is a wonderful programming environment and platform that is kid friendly, to be able to learn and discover coding. In about an hour or two, created this elementary game with my elementary school going daughter. It's fun, expressive and uses real programming concepts with simplified constructs.

http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/16049942/

Perfect Failure

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/in-praise-of-failure/

Two interesting reads, one technology and the other personal facets of one of the two complex personalities that have had been so driven to drive us into the information age from the electronics age. A trip down the memory lane, one reminding us of our humility in the face of frail human body the other working hard on challenges bigger than technology and information. How would later generations look at this dawn of information age, after they have internalized the wonders..

http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/the-steve-jobs-nobody-knew-20111027

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/06/magazine/and-then-steve-said-let-there-be-an-iphone.html

“Let me be more specific: One faction of one party in one house of Congress in one branch of government shut down major parts of the government, all because they did not like one law.” President Obama

With hundreds of laws passing over scores of years, irony is why have the shutdowns not been frequent and common place. Maybe some people who don't like certain laws are more adult than some other juvenile ones?

What an amazing journey from the ironic and hypocritical declaration of self evidence of equality more than ten scores of years back to the emancipation declaration within five scores thereafter, to the poetic dream another five scores thereafter. Waking up from that dream within 50 years, the historic march forward of a man leading the nation, a man who could not have used the bathroom on a southern highway motel back then. A life lesson in how we may not get it right at all the first time around but how we can continue to strive to make it right.

Wheels of Gold

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/06/science/space/stars-gold-dung-beetles-and-us.html

Death Be Not Decaffeinated: Over Cup, Groups Face Taboo

http://newoldage.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/death-be-not-decaffeinated-over-cup-groups-face-taboo/

Million-Anecdote Baby

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/14/million-anecdote-baby/

Messages Galore, but No Time to Think

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/jobs/messages-galore-but-no-time-to-think.html

Why expect privacy when all the online stuff gets regularly hacked into and when this online stuff is meticulously analyzed to target precise pinpointed advertisements? I'd rather government be an equal partner and keep the wanna-be bombers at an arms length, in addition to seeing precise ads for what I may need or not want.

Don’t Take Your Vitamins

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/09/opinion/sunday/dont-take-your-vitamins.html

Only Children: Lonely and Selfish?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/09/opinion/sunday/only-children-lonely-and-selfish.html

Little prayers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/22/opinion/after-the-tornado-in-oklahoma-a-war-zone.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130522

The Scientific 7-Minute Workout

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/09/the-scientific-7-minute-workout/

That art thou

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/06/i-am-not-this-body/?emc=eta1

Here and now, there and then

"All numbers exist simultaneously, and it would be insensible to think that the number 1 exists before the number 20."

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/26742-what-is-time-and-is-it-an-illusion/

Value of money

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/15/opinion/krugman-the-antisocial-network.html

Loss and Power

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/11/the-power-of-loss/

Keep calm and beware of the information warp

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/opinion/sunday/morozov-the-surreal-side-of-endless-information.html

The power to create

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=nKIu9yen5nc

Econommigration

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/business/how-economics-has-benefited-from-immigration.html

Wedding in the Nor'east, ordained from the heavens

http://www.nj.com/weather-guy/index.ssf/2013/02/marriage_of_storms_produces_bi.html

The Poet's Abode

http://travel.nytimes.com/2013/02/03/travel/where-a-poets-vision-lives-on-in-india.html

If one is required to carry liability insurance to own and operate one machinery, a car, what about another machinery, a gun? Is there such a thing as free liberty, er free lunch?

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/01/31/170700177/should-gun-owners-have-to-buy-liability-insurance

Not so common common-sense.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/30/opinion/bipartisan-hunting-buddies.html

Grammar of Happiness

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/22/books/a-new-book-and-film-about-rare-amazonian-language.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

http://www.smithsonianchannel.com/site/sn/full-episodes.do#grammar-of-happiness

http://www.youtube.com/show/thegrammarofhappiness

My daughter and I are hooked onto HarborMaster on the ipad. It teaches almost a Zen-like transcendence amidst a cacophony of multi-tasking demands. It is designed and executed very well, bonding to the touch user interface paradigm.

NRA can chant "law-abiding citizens" till the world ends but how about reflecting on the fact that the Aurora mass killer was a law-abiding citizen who got his weapons and ammunition legally? That Sandy Hook mass killer's mother was a law-abiding citizen who got hers similarly? The most dangerous are the lunatics who do not understand the question is where to draw the line not whether to draw a line. Right to bear arms all right, but what is arms? High grade mass killing machines? Tanks? Missiles? Nukes? Looking to the heavens for an electric jolt of sense and reality check.

Dr. V

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/16/in-india-leading-a-hospital-franchise-with-vision/

One month on, the sweet innocent smiles of little kids are as heart-searing as they were then. How can America go back and stay in the days of the wild west? How can it be that getting the driver license is so much hassle but an 18 year old can walk into a gun show and buy any assault weapon and load up on a huge stash of ammunition in the form of high capacity magazines that can be spewed out in the blink of an eye? How can America regulate six packs of Sudafed over the counter but say there can be no regulations on these industrial strength killing machines (and on regular guns for that matter)? How can America let the wild west movie turn into one about terrorism? Good morning America, let's wake up.

begin sarcasm

I wonder if the founders ever considered a meteor hitting the United States or the oceans surrounding it? I wish to be armed to the teeth and ready with rocket launchers and all as I don't trust the tyrannical government to act in order to protect my family. Maybe a new constitutional amendment is called for?

end sarcasm

http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/201301110108/COLUMNISTS0404/301110007

iPhone 5 is light, very light. After observing a parade of newer phones go by I finally upgraded which thanks to the weird pricing in the market was light on the pocket. The problem now is it is so light my belt case is more weight than the actual phone. I even dropped it once right onto the hard asphalt confused by the lightness in my hand. It's very polished, very Apple, quite faster to respond compared to few generations back. The new OS is pretty good and hopefully iCloud will solve a lot of problems with multiple devices and form factors. I am all set I think for the next five years unless I drop it again (fortunately the first drop did not leave any sign at all).

Childhood work with books.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/books/review/the-book-boys-of-mumbai.html

A positive story.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anand_Kumar

The everyday tragedy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/02/opinion/the-unspeakable-truth-about-rape-in-india.html

The price for the freedom.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/02/opinion/who-pays-for-the-right-to-bear-arms.html

Perhaps a new year resolution for Mr. LaPierre to go visit the Taliban? They are fighting the government as some in NRA would like to have the possibility open for and there are small children learning to wield guns which maybe could make the schools here safer? Maybe he could get a sense of better and more powerful weapons the good guys in this country needs? Hokey pokey.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/31/opinion/keller-babes-in-arms.html

Infinite set of infinities

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/01/science/the-life-of-pi-and-other-infinities.html