Nuudlings

The Wave

2009-12-17T13:21:00.000-08:00

When I watch the stock market rise and fall each day over one bit of economic news or report, I picture a cartoonish group of people staring at each other and then one after another rushes to one side of the seesaw just to do the same and rushes to the other side when the next tidbit of news comes out. All in the hopes that each person thinks he will be the first to get to the other side to take that bit of profit. Meanwhile Warren Buffet stands in the middle to pick up the ones that fall off the edge.

Pedantic!

2009-10-25T10:44:00.000-07:00

I hate to use this kind of language, but this research is dumb. They've learned what every elementary school kid already knew and have been trying to game the results for decades maybe centuries. You toss the coin straight up and down without rotating it and there's a good chance the side you had facing up will land facing up! The academics who did this research truly shows what being pedantic is all about.

Isolationism in local communities

2009-09-24T22:44:00.000-07:00

Los Gatos used to be a rural town many years ago, but has been growing in population and rising in income. Today we see the lengths parents go to in this small town to isolate their children from young adults who are themselves children of a varying maturity. In this article, you can read about the attitude of parents which in my sensibilities represent paranoia. I guess the point of having the Venue is to provide a place for kids to go out and be entertained, but not be associated with young adults who are older than 18. Kids naturally want to be with older kids. Young adults seek independence and naturally are drawn to older peers because of their experiences. It's futile trying to separate them. It would be wiser to simply instill common sense and values in your kids and thereby inoculating them from bad behavior and poor judgement. Separating the younger kids from the older ones merely create a lower class and that's how many kids will see themselves. The rebels will surely act out in defiance just the same. It seems many parents want society or community at large to take on each parent's given responsibilities; protection, education, and moral upbringing. Proscription is always an easy step to take, but applied against human nature nearly always fails.

How computers do not save you time.

2009-09-23T10:32:00.000-07:00

Here's one for you kids out there. When you think of computers you think productivity. You can see it in an entire category of software called 'productivity suite'. Don't be shocked, but computers and their software don't often save you time or make you productive. Case in point, I just received an x-ray image from my doctor to view on my computer. Well, as it turns out it is Windows software that I cannot run on my Mac natively. So I go and launch Parallel, only to have it tell me I should chose between installing XP or Vista. What the f***? The app runs already on the computer for my wife. Before I could pick 'vista', it pops up an update notice. So now it is updating the Parallel after 15 minutes elapsed. Still no image of my X-ray. I end up taking the disc and putting it into my PC instead.

This kind of redirecting happens all the time. You want to do one thing and the computer says, oah aah, no you can't do that you have to install this that and the other thing first. By the time you're done, it would have been easier to not use the computer at all. Say you need a calculator, would you take 10 minutes to boot up your computer, wait for it to acquire the network, launch email, and then launch the calculator. It would have been much faster to open the drawer, pull out your calculator and start punching in numbers; 15 seconds?

Computers are still great at repetitive and redundant tasks. You want to surf the web? No problem, same task over and over again, just keep clicking away until you see something you like. Oh, you want to write volume 4 of your memoirs? No problem, Word will let you write until you drop. You can do both as fast as you can switch your eyes and hands between them. It's called multitasking. Humans have learned to do that too. But if you have something you need a computer to do that you don't already have a routine for, like looking at X-rays your doctor gave you, then forget about it. It will take forever to hunt down the right computer and software. You're better off doing it the old fashion way. Give me the film doc!

Free agent station

2009-05-18T22:58:00.000-07:00

We are a nation of free agents, always fighting for our own survival, speaking of our own worth, and finding our own means.

What is your station in life?

http://www.freeagentstation.com/

Moods

2009-05-04T15:13:00.000-07:00

On a recent trip back to Boston and western Massachusetts, I took note of the different mood that part of the country invoked. Here are some words I think of when I see these places in my mind.

Boston/Newton/Southborough/Marlborough -> serene, still, tempered, ordered

San Francisco/Napa/Pt. Reyes -> bright, cheerful, unfethered

NYC/Bronx/Queens -> hectic, stimulating, class, guarded

Playground mom and her playground logic

2009-01-21T20:36:00.000-08:00

Our 6 month old son was approached by a 1 year old girl today who tried to take his little stuff dog. When our nanny wouldn't let the little girl have it, the playground mom came around with this idiot logic, 'you should teach him to share!'. In polite society, when you take someone else's property without permission, it's called stealing. When did your stealing turning into someone else's sharing? Idiot playground mom! Kids should be spared their parent's stupidity. I hope the little girl grows up well balanced despite her mom.

Happy New Year!

2009-01-01T12:44:00.000-08:00

Here's to 2009 with happy nuudlings to come!

Hope, fears, and in-fighting

2008-11-06T23:33:00.000-08:00

Merely two days after the American presidential election of Barack Obama who campaigned under the banner of hope, media channels throughout the public radio spectrum have been interviewing fellow political journalists, intellectual academicians, and other social advocates who are casting a critical eye on the president elect's political leanings and citing some unnerving facts and trends. After 2 years of silence, the chorus of doubts are being expressed ever so slight. on Democracy Now program today, interviews were carried out with comments about Barack Obama's expressed views ranging from overt support for Israel's security and the preservation of Jerusalem as Israel's capital a central tenet of his middle east policy to a transference of military occupation from Iraq to Afghanistan. The appointment of Rahm Emanuel further consolidate fears of this hawkish Middle East policy comes from today's announcements of Rahm's acceptance of the position of Chief of Staff.

So why now this awakening of conscience for the critical mind? It is a mystery as much as a pattern of behavior in the democrats. As some pundits have said, it is now the time for Barack Obama to both embrace and fight the different voices within the democratic party to forge a policy that adheres to his campaign promises of hope and change, and all sides are vying to influence the man who has no stated plan of his own.

For the rest of us, the man so energized the new voters have given us only hopes and fears.

Sheep governing themselves

2008-10-28T11:47:00.000-07:00

Another election year and California has put up yet more ballot measures. 12 state and 22 city of San Francisco measures mark the ridiculousness of the measures and their way of running a government. San Francisco has measures A - V, just 4 short of the entire alphabet. It's no wonder elected officials do nothing. They don't have to when legislations are made by ballot measures. I should get a stipend as a citizen for doing the work.

Answers that leave you unfulfilled

2008-09-29T00:41:00.000-07:00

Have you ever been caught in the twilight zone of rhetorics? I mean the kind that just leaves you smaking your head, doh! I often ask my nuudling other half innocuous questions like, 'what time did the office call?', reply 'oh earlier today'. 'when earlier?', oh sometime after you left the house.', 'DOH!'

Nuudles nuudles everywhere...

2007-05-17T10:29:00.000-07:00

It seems everytime I turn the papers these days I see something about the Bush administration. So today I see another Nuudle on the news. This time it is our favorite war hawk, Paul Wolfowitz, who is battling with the world bank board daring them to vote him out of office. So why does someone want to stay where he's not wanted? Who knows!? Perhaps it's the will to hold on to power and the urge to exercise his power of influence backed by George Bush. It goes back to the old saying, 'power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.'

Supreme Squeamishness

2007-04-23T11:49:00.000-07:00

I have had supreme respect and admiration for our highest court of the land, until last week's supreme nuudlings pontificated by justice Anthony Kennedy. Without doubt justice Kennedy's brief, one of the most passionate brief I've read in recent times, was also one without sense and reasoning. How does someone with training in reason come up with a justification for banning a medical procedure based on the means rather than results? If one upholds the choice of abortion, why should one ban the method which achieves the outcome of that choice? The obvious misjudgment in upholding the ban is the effect of banning a means based on its squeamishness factor rather than the intent and usefulness of the procedure. How can judge Kennedy know its usefulness? Apparently based on statistics put forth by the advocating lawyers. Statistics whose nature is to show how acceptable percentages of cases involving this procedure are categorized as unnecessary. We all know how statistics work. If you fall within the norm, you would be inclined to side with the politicians making your decision. If however you are in the minority who falls outside the norm of the statistics, then this law is designed to put you in jeopardy. In the vein of 'it is better to let a thousand guilty go free then to let one innocent suffer', I must say the law in this case must protect the 'innocent', who is the mother that needs a safe and practical procedure to abort a prenancy. The Pro Life advocates are taking a radical view that in effect is backwards and 'anti mother'. 'Let the mother die rather than let one unborn suffer,' should be the Pro Life moto. It wasn't so long ago that puritans in the old world as well as in this new world who view mothers as vessels for bringing children to their husbands and families. Judge Kennedy is regressing to this view unbeknown st to himself.

Matter of Size

2006-08-13T14:18:00.000-07:00

Nuudle fact: New York City Central Park is actually smaller than San Francisco's Golden Gate Park! With 843 acres compared to 1017 acres, Central Park with all its grandeur is only a smaller cousin of SF's best. Having grown up in NYC and now make SF home, I'm conflicted. Where should my loyalties rest?

Emergency out of service?

2006-07-31T01:41:00.000-07:00

Emergency, help, 911, what?

Would it surprise you to call for the police and get a response like 'out of service?' Well, it threw me for a loop the other day when I saw my friendly neighborhood black and white state police car roving past me with the sign on its window read 'Out of Service.'

Criminals rejoice, that police car will never stop to arrest you!

Professional Nuudle Heads

2006-07-31T00:53:00.000-07:00

I really don't like to mix politics into my happy blog, but Tony Blair is worth a dishonerable mention here for being a Prime nuudle head. If he were not sullying my green state of California by setting foot on our soil, I would have let him alone, but really.

Tony, supporting massive bombing, economic upheavel, refugee displacement, and wholesale manslaughter in the current Israeli incursion into Lebanon is not the stand of a progressive labor party leader. What would the world think, but that you must be a Bush whipping boy. You must know that Israel's unstated objective of creating a buffer zone in southern Lebanon to push Hezbollah beyond the range of their rockets is doomed to end in a persistent state of violent resistance that will continue this cycle of violence.

Will you never learn from history? For that I induct you into the Professional Society of Nuudle-heads!

Rendezvous in the Loo

2005-07-10T00:31:00.000-07:00

What's new in restaurant architecture these days? I discovered during my trip to NYC this past winter that the newest place for singles to meet each other is in the loo. Well, not exactly the toilet, but the washroom. We were having a drink at the Museum bar next to the MOMA. The Museum is a modern low lit bar restaurant with a gorgeous glass wall stacked with wine bottles and backlit to give a halo around each bottle. We sat and drank our cocktails on low flat modular leather benches. The wall next to us was a mural. Protecting the mural was a wall of glass. I eventually found my way to the mens' room just behind the mural. What caught me by surprise when I entered was to see a woman washing up in front of the basin. I immediately turned and walked back through the door. I looked carefully at the entrance and paused. When I walked back through the door the second time, I had finally realized the bathroom was communal, except for individually enclosed toilet stalls. They eliminated the ubiquitous urinal for guys, no big lost. That same weekend, we went to the Schilling's Liquor Bar and found they had the same arrangement. What's even more engaging, the wash basins face each other. It makes starting a conversation with that woman you're eyeing all night long, that much easier. Oh hey now I can rendezvous with the wife in the loo!

Soprano Inspired

2005-07-08T19:34:00.000-07:00

There are two kinds of nuudles, the silly, fun, ha-ha kind and the stupid kind. I have to tell you that today and in fact on a previous occasion too, I had to do a double take when I came across this stupid kind of nuudle. Well, ok stupid can be harsh, but you judge for yourself.

I drive to work this morning tooling down 101 in lane two. I close in on this gold Grand Cherokee in lane three. I notice four little dots on the lift gate and I had to squint to see what they were. From a distant they looked like holes clustered ever so interestingly in a random sort of pattern. Random in that very recognizable way. You've seen it, on targets. So, I'm driving down the road wondering, is it real? Would someone actually drive around with bullet holes in his car? As I pass the truck, I finally could see that they are FAKE, dumb pasted stickers! f'ing FAKE bullet holes! The driver might as well walk around with one of those U shape arrows over his head pretending he just got shot with an arrow through his nuudle skull! How stupid it that? Argh! I don't get it. What's so amusing about putting fake bullet holes in your car. Someone must love Soprano too seriously.

Nuudle-head!

2005-07-04T11:28:00.000-07:00

Not much nuudlings going on in the past couple of weeks, but I have to write about this morning. On this fine July 4th morning, we wake to the sound of rustling at the foot of the bed. Normally, we ignore the usual sound of our 'kids' (4 cats) playing in the bedroom, but this morning, mama senses something unusal. She and I both open our peepers. We lift our heads to look down the bed to see our troublemaker BooBoo thrashing his head side to side with a Kleenex tissue box completely over his head. BooBoo never ceases to amaze and amuse, Nuudlehead!

Wine Pug

2005-06-19T14:42:00.000-07:00

There is another nuudle worth mentioning. He was an adorable little pug chasing the bugs in the winery. He looked so thrilled to see so many people or maybe he was just excited to hang out with the bridesmaids. He kept on chasing the bugs until suddenly, 'BHAM' he runs face first into the big glass door.

Nuudle Party

2005-06-19T11:32:00.000-07:00

It was a beautiful sunny day in Sonoma yesterday with those puffy cottonball clouds dotting the sky. Cruising over to Sonoma from San Francisco and crossing the Golden Gate bridge with the top down was simply grand. Several bridesmaid parties arrived at our destination, the Gundlach Bundschu winery. Wine country is pretty famous for hosting weddings, and wineries have seen many bridesmaid parties, oddly never the sight of groomsman parties. Yesterday felt just a bit more crowded than I had encountered before. We wanted to sit by that nice pond overlooking the blanket of vineyards sipping their Tempranillo Rose. We weren't thinking of sharing our idyllic scenes with anyone else let alone a bridesmaid party. So you can imagine the look on my face in mid gulp of a nice wine when the wife says, "hey that woman is holding a huge penis!" Sure enough one of the bridesmaid or maybe the bride herself was holding a life-like rubber penis the size of a cucumber in one hand and a glass of wine in the other. What else would you see in a Sonoma winery? Another nuudle in the annals of Nuudlings

Me Nudle, You Read.

2005-06-18T01:53:00.000-07:00

Resistance is futile! I succumbed to creating and publishing a blog. Ask me why, I don't know, except I have come to realize through lethal exposure that a weblog serves as a cathartic venue of all things constipated. A place where you can evacuate, rant, and rave.

So what are you going to excrete on this blog world, you ask Nudle. Nudle searches for that alter ego and with him Nudle replies humbly, Nuudlings!