December 19, 2004
want what you have
this year my in-laws decided to (finally!) draw names for christmas, so no more trying to find the perfect gift for six other people. my step-mom’s family has decided to forgo purchasing gifts altogether (except for the kids — of which there are now five). in that spirit i’ve decided to try out the ‘have what you want’ christmas. (i don’t know if this has been thought of before or not.)
want what you have and you’ll always have what you want.
i read that quote about seven years ago when christina and i were really into this “simplify your life” phase. it always kind of struck a chord with me. so, the idea is to wrap something that i already own but don’t really use. i wanted this book for years and when i finally got it, like so many other things i’ve desperately wanted, it just sits on the shelf.
today i’m going to wrap it, put it under the tree and be pleasantly surprised on christmas morning when i find that i already have what i want.
posted @ 9:41 AM
December 11, 2004
peace
the first african woman to win the nobel peace prize.
and now this...
Dalai Lama Quote of the Week
I always explain that violence is not the human way. I believe that, fundamentally, human nature is positive, gentle; therefore, the non-violent way is the human way. Also, whatever result we achieve through non-violence has no negative side effect. Through violence, even though we may get some kind of satisfaction, negative side effects are also incurred. Then, most importantly, whether we like it or not, we have to live side by side with the Chinese; thus, in the long future, generation to generation, in order to live happily, peacefully, it is extremely important, while we are carrying on the struggle, to accord with the principle of non-violence.
-- from The Art of Peace: Nobel Peace Laureates discuss Human Rights, Conflict and Reconciliation, published by
December 10 is Human Rights Day and the day on which the Nobel Peace Prize is given. His Holiness received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989.
posted @ 12:05 AM
December 8, 2004
yes!
THANK GOD (or Buddha or whoever)! I, like many bloggers these days, have been getting all of these junk email posts over the last several months. It has really been disturbing my mind. It felt like most of my time was spent deleting comments. Well, I finally (not sure what took me so long) did a Google search and found MT-Blacklist. I use Moveable Type as my blog tool and this is a plugin that helps delete junk comments and keep others from being posted. It’s fantastic. If you don’t have it, you should.
posted @ 2:53 PM
December 1, 2004
by design
i was going through some of my old “work” today. graphic design stuff that i have done over the years. i was really impressed with my older stuff. and i realized why... i used to do the old punk rock trick of collecting pictures, phrases, and whatnots from books, magazines, drawings my friends or i made. random bits of printed media. i’d save them for their irony mostly. anyway, this gives a whole wide array of possibilities because you know what’s in your collection and you think about how to put it together for a while before doing it.
the first thing i do now when i need an image of some sort is go to google. then i’m stuck making something work that i haven’t put much thought into. and it doesn’t usually look as cool as grabbing a pencil and sketching something, scanning it and tweaking it. or finding some silly phrase in a magazine, scanning it and using that instead of photoshop type.
it takes more time, but i think it’s worth it. i’ve inspired myself to get back to me and do things the way i used to.
.
posted @ 10:16 PM