International James Bond Day

An important announcement! Today is International James Bond Day, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Bond film franchise.

Quick: which is your favorite Bond film? I do love From Russia With Love. Though I have a soft spot in my heart for On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Yes, George Lazenby and all. And of course Casino Royale was an excellent reboot. Couldn't stand any of the Timothy Dalton films, though.

And are we looking forward to the new Bond film? Why, yes. Yes, we are.

Let's go, Oakland! Guest posts from the Parental Units

Photo by Michael Macor, SF Chronicle

I have been a half-hearted fan at best this season. I never even got to a game. But my parents were there today for game 162, so I asked them for their take on the final, and division-clinching, game of the seasons.

Here's my mom's contribution:

5 games behind the Texas Rangers with 9 games to play. 

Then, on October 3, 2102 the amazing A’s, on the last day of the regular season, game #162, won the third game of their series with Texas, 12-5, to take the American League West Championship! And…we were there (along with 36,000 other hopped up fans) The weather was perfect, high 70’s with a nice gentle cool bay breeze. Great ball park food: nachos, hot dogs, ice cream, popcorn, cotton candy, soft drinks and beer, beer, beer. Only once did the team and fans falter, when, in the 3rd inning Texas scored 5 times to take a 5-1 lead. But when the A’s answered in the 4th with a big 6 run inning, thanks in part to Josh Hamilton’s unbelievable error on a routine fly ball, everyone got refocused and never looked back. The fans roared for every strike an A’s pitcher threw, and got even louder for every out. You could know what was going on with your eyes closed just by listening to the fan responses. No one sat still, folks jumped up to see the plays then flowed up and down the isles. The Coliseum rocked. It was a very satisfactory day. Oh and did we mention that the A’s won?

Now we get to fidget as the post season begins.

Dad's take:

Proverbs 24:17

Oh, to heck with that. Go A's!

On the first presidential debate

All week, and for longer than that, actually, we've been hearing about the debate and who's going to win, and the expectations game, and Mitt Romney's been practicing zingers and blah de blah de blah. I'm not planning to watch, and was feeling guilty about that, but this morning I woke up and realized that who wins the debate is completely irrelevant.

The point of the debate for me -- and what I think the point of the debate should be -- is to get an idea of what each candidate thinks about important topics and how his administration will address them. Zingers be damned. What is their approach to topics such as the economy, foreign policy, and governance? You know, things they actually would have a say about were they elected or re-elected. The "winning" thing is not actually going to make a difference when it comes to enacting policy.

So I plan to follow along via Twitter and blogs and read about their answers, examining those for the content. Not that I need help deciding who to vote for. But boy is this not about who "wins" for me.

Then again...

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Democalypse 2012 - Negate Expectations - The Presidential Debates
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog The Daily Show on Facebook

Kleenex (r) Cool Touch (TM) tissues

The Kleenex (r) brand Cool Touch (tm) facial tissue,   "enriched with moisturizers and aloe" that "immediately feel cool to the skin." They provide "a rush of comfort when noses are sore or gentle refreshment anytime." (Yeah, I want to know when noses are gentle refreshment, too.)

Let me tell you: I am amazed at the variety of Kleeneces available for your purchase. I bought a medley of Kleenex, including anti-viral, ultra-soft, with aloe, with moisturizers, and now this one. And I've got to tell you, this one...I don't know if it's the best, but it sure is odd.

It really does feel cool to the touch when you first use it. I suspect that is a property of the stearyl alcohol that somehow is in the tissue (along with polyethylene). Other than that, I'm not sure what they bring to the party. In my extensive comparison testing, I can't say they're any better than any other Kleenex.

It's not that they're bad. It's just that there's something peculiar about them. You've got to wonder about a Kleenex that warns, "Best if used in conditions below 75 degrees." Additionally, I have to keep dumping my wastebasket into the kitchen trash because I can't imagine these ingredients are good for Harper, who likes to pilfer the used Kleenex and shred them. I find myself concerned about the environmental impact of my Kleenex. They're not the greenest item to begin with, but when you start adding all this stuff to the paper, what does that do? Anybody know?

Good Housekeeping had a brief review of this product earlier this year. For a better sense, though, check out what people have to say on Amazon. They describe the sensation well. In the meantime, I'm going to go hack some more.

Review: Daring Greatly

I'm stuck at home with a cold which is no fun, but at least gives me added time to read, and blog.

Readers of the blog know that I'm a huge Brene Brown fan and will not be surprised that I think her new book is terrific. Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead draws on her many years of research studying shame and vulnerability to offer insights into how we can use that information to live a more Wholehearted life.

One thing I deeply appreciate about Brown's work is how research-based it is. Even more compelling, the answers she found were not the ones she was initially looking for. This is not a light-hearted feel-good kind of a project. I was glad she included a section at the end of the book in which she explains the research process and how she collected her data. There are moments in the book where she says, "We don't have the data to back this up yet," as she offers a hypothesis and makes it clear that she is waiting for the data to bear that out. But overall, the theses in this book are backed up by data and research, not a wishy-washy "you should feel good about yourself" sentimentality.

I also appreciate that Brown offers very practical suggestions of how to apply what she has discovered about shame and vulnerability to become, as she terms it, "shame-resilient" (since there is no way to completely avoid shame). She looks at some common areas where we can apply these techniques, such as in leading or parenting, with a lot of case studies and examples.

Many of which are her own life. And this I appreciate as well. She is learning to do these things as well. Brown is well aware of her own imperfections and is not speaking from the point of view of "I've got it all together and you can too!" Instead, as she shared in her initial TED talk, she's coming to all of this information from the perspective of a person who hated the thought of being vulnerable, but has come to see that this is the way to live a whole-hearted, courageous, and joyful life.

There's a lot of information to take in, and I think this is a book that I'll need to revisit. But I think this is an excellent resource, worth adding to your arsenal of life skills.

Sunday Funnies: September 30

h/t Jamelle Bouie

Various & Sundry, too random to categorize

Sorry I'm so late! Today, I was working on the revisions for Confirm not Conform Adult and came across this great TED talk of Karen Armstrong explaining the Charter for Compassion. There are worse ways to spend 20 minutes.

Anyway...let's see what else I've got here. It's fairly minimal this week. I guess I've been doing other things.

I have found a new blogger that I like a lot: one Lance Mannion by name. This week he had an interesting post proposing that "the object of liberalism is to create more conservatives." It's a fascinating argument, which you'll just have to read for yourself. I'm still pondering how this actually works in real life.

In election news, I was very glad to see Greg Sargent ask Can we please talk about torture?

The executive order banning torture was the very first one signed by Obama, to improve America’s image abroad, explicitly repudiating a major policy of his GOP predecessor. The Romney camp is internally debating whether to rescind that order, which would represent a return to those policies. There are only five weeks until the election, and we still don’t know what Romney will do on an issue with far reaching moral and international implications.

I'll be watching to see if this comes up at any of the presidential debates.

One of the people who played a role in the Supreme Court's ruling on the Affordable Care Act died this week. Jennifer Jaff, who had Crohn's Disease and was an advocate for the chronically ill, wrote an amicus brief in one of the cases brought to the court, arguing against insurance policies denying coverage to those with pre-existing conditions.

After the Supreme Court ruling, Ms. Jaff told The Hartford Courant: “I live and breathe chronic-illness law, and in my estimation this is the most important civil rights advance for people with chronic illnesses ever. There can never be equality if we can’t get health insurance.”

I can't imagine what it must have felt like to her to see that law upheld before she died. She was 55.

On a completely different note, Peacebang offers some helpful suggestions for cultivating a personal sense of style, something I'm working on. Here's the essence:

Style can be beautiful, pretty, dramatic, shocking, erotic, and many other things. Whatever it is, it is mindful. It is intentional. It is knowing. The stylish person knows a few things: 

1. What they love.
2. What kind of impact they want to create with their apparel, accessories and personal grooming.
3. How to use fashion to communicate their inner vision of who they are.

She then goes on to give some exercises to help you do just that.

Here's someone with a definite personal sense of style. Well, point of view, at any rate.

And with that, I hope you have a lovely weekend.