The Moth radio - my recent favorite radio program

The moth radio

Spring and green are here

Green in Onion

A surprise green from our Costco onions:

Café Gratitude - a different, nice way to introduce oneself

Café Gratitude is our expression of a world of plenty. Our food and people are a celebration of our aliveness. We select the finest organic ingredients to honor the earth and ourselves, as we are one and the same. We support local farmers, sustainable agriculture and environmentally friendly products. Our food is prepared with love. We invite you to step inside and enjoy being someone that chooses: loving your life, adoring yourself, accepting the world, being generous and grateful every day, and experiencing being provided for. Have fun and enjoy being nourished. Welcome to Café Gratitude!

Uncomplicated happiness

"Before the claustrophobia (fear of having no escape and being closed in) of winter closed in, Korphe's people lived as much possible outdoors. Most families took their two daily meals on their roof. And washing down a bowl of dal and rice with strong tamburok tea, after a satisfying day's work, Mortenson loved basking in the last of the sunlight with Haji Ali's family and chatting across the rooftops to the dozens of families doing the same.

Norberg-Hodge admiringly quotes the kind of another Himalayan country, Bhutan, who says the true measure of a nation's success is not gross national product, but "gross national happiness". On their warm, dry roofs, among the fruits of their successful harvest, eating, smoking and gossiping with the same sense of leisure as Parisians on the terrace of a sidewalk cafe, Mortenson felt sure that , despite all that they lacked, the Balti still held the key to a kind of uncomplicated happiness that was disappearing in the developing world as fast as old-growth forests. "

- Three Cups of tea by Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin in chapter titled "Building Bridges"

Fear, Excitement and determination

When you look at a players eye, you see Fear, Excitement or determination. One should have determination.

- An IPL couch

10 things science says will make you happy

From YES! Magazine through Julie911

1. Savor Everyday Moments

Pause now and then to smell a rose or watch children at play. Study participants who took time to “savor” ordinary events that they normally hurried through, or to think back on pleasant moments from their day, “showed significant increases in happiness and reductions in depression,” says psychologist Sonja Lyubomirsky.

2. Avoid Comparisons

While keeping up with the Joneses is part of American culture, comparing ourselves with others can be damaging to happiness and self-esteem. Instead of comparing ourselves to others, focusing on our own personal achievement leads to greater satisfaction, according to Lyubomirsky.

3. Put Money Low on the List

People who put money high on their priority list are more at risk for depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem, according to researchers Tim Kasser and Richard Ryan. Their findings hold true across nations and cultures. “The more we seek satisfactions in material goods, the less we find them there,” Ryan says. “The satisfaction has a short half-life—it’s very fleeting.” Money-seekers also score lower on tests of vitality and self-actualization.

4. Have Meaningful Goals

“People who strive for something significant, whether it’s learning a new craft or raising moral children, are far happier than those who don’t have strong dreams or aspirations,” say Ed Diener and Robert Biswas-Diener. “As humans, we actually require a sense of meaning to thrive.” Harvard’s resident happiness professor, Tal Ben-Shahar, agrees, “Happiness lies at the intersection between pleasure and meaning. Whether at work or at home, the goal is to engage in activities that are both personally significant and enjoyable.”

5. Take Initiative at Work

How happy you are at work depends in part on how much initiative you take. Researcher Amy Wrzesniewski says that when we express creativity, help others, suggest improvements, or do additional tasks on the job, we make our work more rewarding and feel more in control.

6. Make Friends, Treasure Family

Happier people tend to have good families, friends, and supportive relationships, say Diener and Biswas-Diener. But it’s not enough to be the life of the party if you’re surrounded by shallow acquaintances. “We don’t just need relationships, we need close ones” that involve understanding and caring.

7. Smile Even When You Don’t Feel Like It

It sounds simple, but it works. “Happy people…see possibilities, opportunities, and success. When they think of the future, they are optimistic, and when they review the past, they tend to savor the high points,” say Diener and Biswas-Diener. Even if you weren’t born looking at the glass as half-full, with practice, a positive outlook can become a habit.

8. Say Thank You Like You Mean It

People who keep gratitude journals on a weekly basis are healthier, more optimistic, and more likely to make progress toward achieving personal goals, according to author Robert Emmons. Research by Martin Seligman, founder of positive psychology, revealed that people who write “gratitude letters” to someone who made a difference in their lives score higher on happiness, and lower on depression—and the effect lasts for weeks.

9. Get Out and Exercise

A Duke University study shows that exercise may be just as effective as drugs in treating depression, without all the side effects and expense. Other research shows that in addition to health benefits, regular exercise offers a sense of accomplishment and opportunity for social interaction, releases feel-good endorphins, and boosts self-esteem.

10. Give It Away, Give It Away Now!

Make altruism and giving part of your life, and be purposeful about it. Researcher Stephen Post says helping a neighbor, volunteering, or donating goods and services results in a “helper’s high,” and you get more health benefits than you would from exercise or quitting smoking. Listening to a friend, passing on your skills, celebrating others’ successes, and forgiveness also contribute to happiness, he says. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn found that those who spend money on others reported much greater happiness than those who spend it on themselves.

 

Effect of exposure time on photos

An exposure time of 1/8 sec (0.125)

An exposure time of 1/30 sec (0.033)

An exposure time of 1/2 sec (0.5)

On my Sony W-290 this is set by switching to P (programming) mode and setting the EV (Exposure Value) (0 - image 1 above, -2 - image 2 & 2 - image 3) accordingly.

I am grateful that somehow we are made, in the most trying of times, to just block out everything and keep going, even when you have no idea what to do or how it will all work out.

“I am grateful that somehow we are made, in the most trying of times, to just block out everything and keep going, even when you have no idea what to do or how it will all work out.”

- Sarah Dessen through Julie911

Mastering complexity

‘…Geniuses…people with extraordinary skill…devise innovative idioms, mechanisms and frameworks that others can use as architectural foundations of other applications or systems…However as Peters observes “The world is only sparsely populated with geniuses…”… Although there is touch of genius is all of us, in the realm of industrial-strength software we cannot always rely upon divine inspiration to carry us through. Therefore we must consider more disciplined ways to master complexity.” – Grady Booch in “Object-Oriented Analysis and Design with Applications”

What we create becomes meaningful to us only once we stop creating it and start to think about why we did so.

“What we create becomes meaningful to us only once we stop creating it and start to think about why we did so.” - Rabbi Elijah of Vilna

Contentment is natural wealth

“Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.” 

 

– Socrates through Becoming Minimalist

Data Object and Service Object Design

Data Objects hold data. They do *not* operate on the data (like save, delete etc…).

Service Objects operate on the data held by Data Objects.

 

Data Object design is more real life driven. If there is a “Is a” relationship between two entities in real world, the model objects have a “Is a” relationship. For example a Dog “Is a” Animal.

 

Service Objects design is more application architecture driven. For example if a reusable functional logic should be achieved through aggregation or composition or a utility class (read post titled “Don’t extend to extend functionality. Extend to only override functionality”).

Fragile Base Class problem

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

Don't extend to extend functionality. Extend to only override functionality

Don’t extend to extend functionality

Extend to only override functionality

 

When an API is extended, the author of the API must factor in the fact that it would be extended. If not extension had exposed a means to invoke an API in a way that it was not designed to handle.

On the other hand when aggregation is used, only public APIs are used and hence the class is used as it was intended to be used. When authoring classes care must be exercised in deciding what must be private, protected, default, public and final (a way of saying this API does not support extension).

Wanting what one gets is happiness

Getting what one wants is success
Wanting what one gets is happiness

- In an NPR program

Interesting Article

http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/bschwar1/Choice%20Chapter.Revised.pdf

Choice

Freedom of choice is good. But when one has a whole lot of options to choose from, restricting oneself becomes necessary to achieve direction.

 

When Buddhist monks are trained, options available to them are considerably restrained. In real life, we have a whole lot of options to choose from though. But if those choices are not made consistently, then a sense of direction seems missing.

 

-          My understanding of Sheena Iyengar’s thoughts on NPR today

it is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy, that makes happiness

“it is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy, that makes happiness.”

from Plain Advice for Plain People by Charles Spurgeon through “Becoming Minimalist”

 

our souls are...hungry for...the sense that we have figured out how to live so that our lives matter

“our souls are not hungry for fame, comfort, wealth, or power. our souls are hungry for meaning, for the sense that we have figured out how to live so that our lives matter.”

- harold Kushner through “Becoming Minimalist”

 

Our best decisions, the ones that we never regret, come from listening to ourselves.

“Our best decisions, the ones that we never regret, come from listening to ourselves.”

- Felicity through Julie911

you try a little harder when you're scared.

“You know, I think you try a little harder when you’re scared.”

- Rocky Balboa through Julie911

I know you're scared. Don't be. The world really is beautiful.

“I know you’re scared. Don’t be. The world really is beautiful.”

- Alicia Millstone through Julie911