Thank You For Organizing Quotes

If you imagine the 4,500-bilion-odd years of Earth's history compressed into a normal earthly day, then life begins very early, about 4 A.M., with the rise of the first simple, single-celled organisms, but then advances no further for the next sixteen hours. Not until almost 8:30 in the evening, with the day five-sixths over, has Earth anything to show the universe but a restless skin of microbes. Then, finally, the first sea plants appear, followed twenty minutes later by the first jellyfish and the enigmatic Ediacaran fauna first seen by Reginald Sprigg in Australia. At 9:04 P.M. trilobites swim onto the scene, followed more or less immediately by the shapely creatures of the Burgess Shale. Just before 10 P.M. plants begin to pop up on the land. Soon after, with less than two hours left in the day, the first land creatures follow. Thanks to ten minutes or so of balmy weather, by 10:24 the Earth is covered in the great carboniferous forests whose residues give us all our coal, and the first winged insects are evident. Dinosaurs plod onto the scene just before 11 P.M. and hold sway for about three-quarters of an hour. At twenty-one minutes to midnight they vanish and the age of mammals begins. Humans emerge one minute and seventeen seconds before midnight. The whole of our recorded history, on this scale, would be no more than a few seconds, a single human lifetime barely an instant. Throughout this greatly speeded-up day continents slide about and bang together at a clip that seems positively reckless. Mountains rise and melt away, ocean basins come and go, ice sheets advance and withdraw. And throughout the whole, about three times every minute, somewhere on the planet there is a flash-bulb pop of light marking the impact of a Manson-sized meteor or one even larger. It's a wonder that anything at all can survive in such a pummeled and unsettled environment. In fact, not many things do for long.

Presents are not “things” but a means for conveying someone’s feelings. When viewed from this perspective, you don’t need to feel guilty for parting with a gift. Just thank it for the joy it gave you when you first received it.

Sway’s an idiot who didn’t order them when we used up the last bunch. (Vik) Isn’t that your job? (Devyn) No. I’m the sub-idiot. Sway’s head idiot because the company refuses to deal with mechas. Since I’m not organic, they think I can’t pay. (Vik) Thanks, Vik. (Devyn) Ever my pleasure to irritate you, sir. (Vik)

People now ask me if I'm passing the torch. I always explain that no, I'm keeping my torch, thank you very much. And I'm using it to light the torches of others. Because the truth is that the old image of one person with a torch is part of the problem, not the solution. We each need a torch if we are to see where we're going. And together, we create so much more light.

When I open the door, Baz is wheeling an old-fashioned chalkboard in front of our beds. “Where did that come from?” I ask. “A classroom.” “Yeah, but how did it get up here?” “It flew.” “No,” I say, “seriously.” He rolls his eyes. “I Up, up and away-ed it. It wasn’t much work.” “Why?” “Because we’re solving a mystery, Snow. I like to organize my thoughts.” “Is this how you normally plot my downfall?” “Yes. With multicoloured pieces of chalk. Stop complaining.” He opens up his book bag and takes out a few apples and things wrapped in greaseproof paper. “Eat,” he says, throwing one at me. It’s a bacon roll. He’s also got a pot of tea. “What’s all this?” I say. “Tea, obviously. I know you can’t function unless you’re stuffing yourself.” I unwrap the roll and decide to take a bite. “Thanks.” “Don’t thank me,” he says. “It sounds wrong.” “Not as wrong as you bringing me bacon butties.” “Fine, you’re welcome—when’s Bunce getting here?” “Why would she?” “Because you do everything together, don’t you? When you said you’d help, I was counting on you bringing your smarter half.

Cocking his head, the demon frowned. He stared at me as if he'd ordered a tender marinated filet, but instead had ended up with a cheap flat beef patty. I was sort of offended. I was 100 percent organic Angus beef, thank you very much.

But let’s consider this more carefully. Most of these gifts remain unopened or have been used only once. Admit it. They simply don’t suit your taste. The true purpose of a present is to be received. Presents are not “things” but a means for conveying someone’s feelings. When viewed from this perspective, you don’t need to feel guilty for parting with a gift. Just thank it for the joy it gave you when you first received it. Of course, it would be ideal if you could use it with joy. But surely the person who gave it to you doesn’t want you to use it out of a sense of obligation, or to put it away without using it, only to feel guilty every time you see it. When you discard or donate it, you do so for the sake of the giver, too.

Andy: But they gave us an out in the Land of Oz. They made us write. They didn't make us write particularly well. And they didn't always give us important things to write about. But they did make us sit down, and organize our thoughts, and convey those thoughts on paper as clearly as we could to another person. Thank God for that. That saved us. Or at least it saved me. So I have to keep writing letters. If I can't write them to you, I have to write them to someone else. I don't think I could ever stop writing completely.

We were all quiet for a few moments before I broke the silence by saying, in my best upper-crust-girls'-school voice, "I am sure that all of you are really just suffering from some horrible disease, and that I should feel nothing but pity for you. If you let me go, I will organize a charity function that you will not believe. It will be, as our ancestors used to say, 'epic.'" There was some furious whispering before Bram responded with, "Ah, thank you, Miss, but we're already dead." I bit my lip. I was starting to crumble.

If your organization’s intentions transcend the mere act of selling a product or service, and it is brave enough to expose its heart and soul, people will respond. They will connect. They will like you. They will talk. They will buy.

Manners are the lubricating oil of an organization. It is a law of nature that two moving bodies in contact with each other create friction. This is as true for human beings as it is for inanimate objects. Manners- simple things like saying 'please' and 'thank you' and knowing a person’s name or asking after her family enable two people to work together whether they like each other or not. Bright people, especially bright young people, often do not understand this. If analysis shows that someone’s brilliant work fails again and again as soon as cooperation from others is required, it probably indicates a lack of courtesy – that is, a lack of manners.

When you come across something that’s hard to discard, consider carefully why you have that specific item in the first place. When did you get it and what meaning did it have for you then? Reassess the role it plays in your life. If, for example, you have some clothes that you bought but never wear, examine them one at a time. Where did you buy that particular outfit and why? If you bought it because you thought it looked cool in the shop, it has fulfilled the function of giving you a thrill when you bought it. Then why did you never wear it? Was it because you realized that it didn’t suit you when you tried it on at home? If so, and if you no longer buy clothes of the same style or color, it has fulfilled another important function—it has taught you what doesn’t suit you. In fact, that particular article of clothing has already completed its role in your life, and you are free to say, “Thank you for giving me joy when I bought you,” or “Thank you for teaching me what

Ms. Terwilliger didn’t have a chance to respond to my geological ramblings because someone knocked on the door. I slipped the rocks into my pocket and tried to look studious as she called an entry. I figured Zoe had tracked me down, but surprisingly, Angeline walked in. "Did you know," she said, "that it’s a lot harder to put organs back in the body than it is to get them out?" I closed my eyes and silently counted to five before opening them again. “Please tell me you haven’t eviscerated someone.” She shook her head. “No, no. I left my biology homework in Miss Wentworth’s room, but when I went back to get it, she’d already left and locked the door. But it’s due tomorrow, and I’m already in trouble in there, so I had to get it. So, I went around outside, and her window lock wasn’t that hard to open, and I—” "Wait," I interrupted. "You broke into a classroom?" "Yeah, but that’s not the problem." Behind me, I heard a choking laugh from Ms. Terwilliger’s desk. "Go on," I said wearily. "Well, when I climbed through, I didn’t realize there was a bunch of stuff in the way, and I crashed into those plastic models of the human body she has. You know, the life size ones with all the parts inside? And bam!" Angeline held up her arms for effect. "Organs everywhere." She paused and looked at me expectantly. "So what are we going to do? I can’t get in trouble with her." "We?" I exclaimed. "Here," said Ms. Terwilliger. I turned around, and she tossed me a set of keys. From the look on her face, it was taking every ounce of self-control not to burst out laughing. "That square one’s a master. I know for a fact she has yoga and won’t be back for the rest of the day. I imagine you can repair the damage—and retrieve the homework—before anyone’s the wiser.” I knew that the “you” in “you can repair” meant me. With a sigh, I stood up and packed up my things. “Thanks,” I said. As Angeline and I walked down to the science wing, I told her, “You know, the next time you’ve got a problem, maybe come to me before it becomes an even bigger problem.” "Oh no," she said nobly. "I didn’t want to be an inconvenience." Her description of the scene was pretty accurate: organs everywhere. Miss Wentworth had two models, male and female, with carved out torsos that cleverly held removable parts of the body that could be examined in greater detail. Wisely, she had purchased models that were only waist-high. That was still more than enough of a mess for us, especially since it was hard to tell which model the various organs belonged to. I had a pretty good sense of anatomy but still opened up a textbook for reference as I began sorting. Angeline, realizing her uselessness here, perched on a far counter and swing her legs as she watched me. I’d started reassembling the male when I heard a voice behind me. "Melbourne, I always knew you’d need to learn about this kind of thing. I’d just kind of hoped you’d learn it on a real guy." I glanced back at Trey, as he leaned in the doorway with a smug expression. “Ha, ha. If you were a real friend, you’d come help me.” I pointed to the female model. “Let’s see some of your alleged expertise in action.” "Alleged?" He sounded indignant but strolled in anyways. I hadn’t really thought much about asking him for help. Mostly I was thinking this was taking much longer than it should, and I had more important things to do with my time. It was only when he came to a sudden halt that I realized my mistake. "Oh," he said, seeing Angeline. "Hi." Her swinging feet stopped, and her eyes were as wide as his. “Um, hi.” The tension ramped up from zero to sixty in a matter of seconds, and everyone seemed at a loss for words. Angeline jerked her head toward the models and blurted out. “I had an accident.” That seemed to snap Trey from his daze, and a smile curved his lips. Whereas Angeline’s antics made me want to pull out my hair sometimes, he found them endearing.

To begin with, there is the frightful debauchery of taste that has already been effected by a century of mechanisation. This is almost too obvious and too generally admitted to need pointing out. But as a single instance, take taste in its narrowest sense - the taste for decent food. In the highly mechanical countries, thanks to tinned food, cold storage, synthetic flavouring matters, etc., the palate it almost a dead organ. As you can see by looking at any greengrocer’s shop, what the majority of English people mean by an apple is a lump of highly-coloured cotton wool from America or Australia; they will devour these things, apparently with pleasure, and let the English apples rot under the trees. It is the shiny, standardized, machine-made look of the American apple that appeals to them; the superior taste of the English apple is something they simply do not notice. Or look at the factory-made, foil wrapped cheeses and ‘blended’ butter in an grocer’s; look at the hideous rows of tins which usurp more and more of the space in any food-shop, even a dairy; look at a sixpenny Swiss roll or a twopenny ice-cream; look at the filthy chemical by-product that people will pour down their throats under the name of beer. Wherever you look you will see some slick machine-made article triumphing over the old-fashioned article that still tastes of something other than sawdust. And what applies to food applies also to furniture, houses, clothes, books, amusements and everything else that makes up our environment. These are now millions of people, and they are increasing every year, to whom the blaring of a radio is not only a more acceptable but a more normal background to their thoughts than the lowing of cattle or the song of birds. The mechanisation of the world could never proceed very far while taste, even the taste-buds of the tongue, remained uncorrupted, because in that case most of the products of the machine would be simply unwanted. In a healthy world there would be no demand for tinned food, aspirins, gramophones, gas-pipe chairs, machine guns, daily newspapers, telephones, motor-cars, etc. etc.; and on the other hand there would be a constant demand for the things the machine cannot produce. But meanwhile the machine is here, and its corrupting effects are almost irresistible. One inveighs against it, but one goes on using it. Even a bare-arse savage, given the change, will learn the vices of civilisation within a few months. Mechanisation leads to the decay of taste, the decay of taste leads to demand for machine-made articles and hence to more mechanisation, and so a vicious circle is established.

Eliot, huh?" she says. The thin fabric of her long T-shirt brushes my arm. "Is everyone in your family named for a famous symbolist poet?" No, I'm named for someone who was supposed to be in the Bible but isn't." No? What happened to him?" I glance over at her, the way the corner of her mouth turns up, half-smirk, half-smile. Her hair moves as she walks. He was called to be a disciple, but he had, you know, stuff to do." Stuff, like...polishing his sandals? Making lunch?" We keep walking, over the bridge across the lake, past the swings and the playground equipment, just walking. Exactly. And what about you, Calliope...is everyone in your family named after a...what is it? A keyboard? An organ?" It's a steam-powered piano. It's also the name of the Greek goddess of poetry. You should read stuff other than chemistry; you'd know these things." Her smirky smile again, her sleeve touching my arm. I feel like my skin has been removed, every nerve exposed. I open my mouth, and this comes out: "I think you are more goddess than piano." Stupid, stupid. But she laughs. "You know, that's the nicest thing anyone's said to me today." You don't see too many calliopes," I tell her. I'm Cal, actually. I mean, that's what I prefer." I meant the steam pianos...you don't see too many." She stops and looks at me, full-on, and right away I put it on the list of the best moments in my life. Until you said that, Eliot, I wasn't fully aware of the demise of the steam piano, so thank you. Really." I smirk at her and we both fight not to smile. "Okay, smart-ass," I say.

When it first emerged, Twitter was widely derided as a frivolous distraction that was mostly good for telling your friends what you had for breakfast. Now it is being used to organize and share news about the Iranian political protests, to provide customer support for large corporations, to share interesting news items, and a thousand other applications that did not occur to the founders when they dreamed up the service in 2006. This is not just a case of cultural exaptation: people finding a new use for a tool designed to do something else. In Twitter's case, the users have been redesigning the tool itself. The convention of replying to another user with the @ symbol was spontaneously invented by the Twitter user base. Early Twitter users ported over a convention from the IRC messaging platform and began grouping a topic or event by the "hash-tag" as in "#30Rock" or "inauguration." The ability to search a live stream of tweets - which is likely to prove crucial to Twitter's ultimate business model, thanks to its advertising potential - was developed by another start-up altogether. Thanks to these innovations, following a live feed of tweets about an event - political debates or Lost episodes - has become a central part of the Twitter experience. But for the first year of Twitter's existence, that mode of interaction would have been technically impossible using Twitter. It's like inventing a toaster oven and then looking around a year later and discovering that all your customers have, on their own, figured out a way to turn it into a microwave.

Take childcare for example, an issue that never gets much support beyond lip service in the feminist world, despite it being something that would benefit the majority of women. Once you reach a certain income level, it’s easier and more convenient for you to take care of your own childcare needs than to pay the taxes or contribute to a system that would help all women. If your child is in a failing school, it’s much more convenient to place your child in a private or charter school than to organize ways to improve the situation for the entire community. This also applies to expanding social welfare programs, supporting community clinics, and so on. As a woman’s ability to take care of herself expands thanks to feminist efforts, the feminist goals she’s willing to really fight for, or contribute time and money and effort to, shrink.

Exactly. And what about you, Calliope...is everyone in your family named after a...what is it? A keyboard? An organ?" It's a steam-powered piano. It's also the name of the Greek goddess of poetry. You should read stuff other than chemistry; you'd know these things." Her smirky smile again, her sleeve touching my arm. I feel like my skin has been removed, every nerve exposed. I open my mouth, and this is what comes out: "I think you are more goddess than piano." Stupid, stupid. But she laughs. "You know, that's the nicest thing anyone's said to me today." You don't see too many calliopes," I tell her I'm Cal, actually. I mean, that's what I prefer." I meant the steam pianos...you don't see too many." She stops and looks at me, full-on, and right away I put it on the list of the best moments in my life. Until you said that, Eliot, I wasn't fully aware of the demise of the steam piano, so thank you. Really." I smirk at her and we both fight not to smile. "Okay, smart-ass," I say. Callipe and Eliot-Scrambeled Eggs at Midnight

Ronan's phone buzzed with a text: Gansey. Reached out to a few peers, it said, as if he were sixty instead of the same age as Ronan. Image you sent confirmed logo for Boudicca. All-lady group involved in the protection and organization of women in business. Henry says his mother thinks they're pretty powerful. Another text came in. Boudicca is actually a very interesting historical figure in her won right. Another: She was a warrior queen of the Celts around 60 CE and she fought against the Romans Another: Blue wants you to know Boudicca is Another: Sorry sent too soon quote is 'Boudicca is the original goth. Ronan Lynch wishes he was that badass' Another: Is badass one word or two Ronan's phone displayed ellipses to show that Gansey was about to shoot off another text. Ronan texted back hurriedly, If you have to ask you aren't one. Thanks old man. I'll wiki it.

2-Make eye contact. When someone is speaking, keep your eyes on him or her at all times. If someone makes a comment, turn and face that person. 3-During discussions, respect other students’ comments, opinions, and ideas. When possible, make statements like, “I agree with John, and I also feel that…” or “I disagree with Sarah. She made a good point I feel that…” or “I think Victor made an excellent observation, and it made me realize…” 4-If you win or do well at something, do not brag. If you lose, do not show anger. Instead, say something like, “I really enjoyed the competition, and I look forward to playing you again,” or “good game,” or don’t say anything at all. To show anger or sarcasm, such as “I wasn’t playing hard anyway” or “You really aren’t that good,” shows weakness. 5-“When you cough or sneeze or burp, it is appropriate to turn your head away from others and cover your mouth with the full part of your hand. Using a fist is not acceptable. Afterward, you should say, “Excuse me.” 6- “Do not smack your lips, tsk, roll your eyes, or show disrespect with gestures.” 7-“Always say thank you when I give you something. 8-“Surprise others by performing random acts of kindness. Go our of your way to do something surprisingly kind and generous for someone at least once a month.” 9-“You will make every effort to be as organized as possible.” 10-"Quickly learn the name of other teachers in the school and greet them by saying things like, "Good morning Mrs. Graham," or "Good afternoon Ms. Ortiz. 11-"When we go on field trips, we will meet different people. When I introduce you to people, make sure that you remember their names. Then, when we are leaving, make sure to shake their hands and thank them, mentioning their names as you do so." 12-“If you approach a door and someone is following you, hold the door. If the door opens by pulling, pull it open, stand to the side, and allow the other person 13-to pass through it first, then you can walk through. If the door opens by pushing, hold the door open after you push through." "Be positive and enjoy life. Some things just aren't worth getting upset over. Keep everything in perspective and focus on the good in your life.

Things to Do in the Belly of the Whale” Measure the walls. Count the ribs. Notch the long days. Look up for blue sky through the spout. Make small fires with the broken hulls of fishing boats. Practice smoke signals. Call old friends, and listen for echoes of distant voices. Organize your calendar. Dream of the beach. Look each way for the dim glow of light. Work on your reports. Review each of your life’s ten million choices. Endure moments of self-loathing. Find the evidence of those before you. Destroy it. Try to be very quiet, and listen for the sound of gears and moving water. Listen for the sound of your heart. Be thankful that you are here, swallowed with all hope, where you can rest and wait. Be nostalgic. Think of all the things you did and could have done. Remember treading water in the center of the still night sea, your toes pointing again and again down, down into the black depths.

BACK IN SCHOOL, I loved ending stories that way. It’s the perfect conclusion, isn’t it? Billy went to school. He had a good day. Then he died. The end. It doesn’t leave you hanging. It wraps everything up nice and neat. Except in my case, it didn’t. Maybe you’re thinking, Oh, Magnus, you didn’t really die. Otherwise you couldn’t be narrating this story. You just came close. Then you were miraculously rescued, blah, blah, blah. Nope. I actually died. One hundred percent: guts impaled, vital organs burned, head smacked into a frozen river from forty feet up, every bone in my body broken, lungs filled with ice water. The medical term for that is dead. Gee, Magnus, what did it feel like? It hurt. A lot. Thanks for asking. I

The next time you drive into a Walmart parking lot, pause for a second to note that this Walmart—like the more than five thousand other Walmarts across the country—costs taxpayers about $1 million in direct subsidies to the employees who don’t earn enough money to pay for an apartment, buy food, or get even the most basic health care for their children. In total, Walmart benefits from more than $7 billion in subsidies each year from taxpayers like you. Those “low, low prices” are made possible by low, low wages—and by the taxes you pay to keep those workers alive on their low, low pay. As I said earlier, I don’t think that anyone who works full-time should live in poverty. I also don’t think that bazillion-dollar companies like Walmart ought to funnel profits to shareholders while paying such low wages that taxpayers must pick up the ticket for their employees’ food, shelter, and medical care. I listen to right-wing loudmouths sound off about what an outrage welfare is and I think, “Yeah, it stinks that Walmart has been sucking up so much government assistance for so long.” But somehow I suspect that these guys aren’t talking about Walmart the Welfare Queen. Walmart isn’t alone. Every year, employers like retailers and fast-food outlets pay wages that are so low that the rest of America ponies up a collective $153 billion to subsidize their workers. That’s $153 billion every year. Anyone want to guess what we could do with that mountain of money? We could make every public college tuition-free and pay for preschool for every child—and still have tens of billions left over. We could almost double the amount we spend on services for veterans, such as disability, long-term care, and ending homelessness. We could double all federal research and development—everything: medical, scientific, engineering, climate science, behavioral health, chemistry, brain mapping, drug addiction, even defense research. Or we could more than double federal spending on transportation and water infrastructure—roads, bridges, airports, mass transit, dams and levees, water treatment plants, safe new water pipes. Yeah, the point I’m making is blindingly obvious. America could do a lot with the money taxpayers spend to keep afloat people who are working full-time but whose employers don’t pay a living wage. Of course, giant corporations know they have a sweet deal—and they plan to keep it, thank you very much. They have deployed armies of lobbyists and lawyers to fight off any efforts to give workers a chance to organize or fight for a higher wage. Giant corporations have used their mouthpiece, the national Chamber of Commerce, to oppose any increase in the minimum wage, calling it a “distraction” and a “cynical effort” to increase union membership. Lobbyists grow rich making sure that people like Gina don’t get paid more. The

My rib cage clenched all of the organs and muscles within it. It pulsed, full of life and warmth and gummy bears and glitter. This was... I don't know how to explain it—it was like Christmas morning when you were a kid. It was everything I’d wanted. Each of his thumbs curved over the shells of my ears. "That's my girl." His girl. After all the crap that I'd gone through today, there couldn't have been three better words to hear. Well, there were three other words I'd like to hear but I'd take these from him. That didn't mean that he was the only one who knew how to give. He'd given enough. My bones and heart knew that there was nothing for me to fear. I loved him and sometimes there were consequences of it that were scary, but it—the emotion itself—wasn't. I knew that now. What kind of life was I living if I let my fears steer me? This was a gift I’d forgotten to appreciate lately. For so long I’d been happy to just be alive but now...now I had Dex. I had my entire life ahead of me, and I needed to quit being a wuss and grab life by the balls. In this case, I’d take his nipple piercings. “What’cha thinkin’, Ritz?” I held my hands out for him to see how badly they were shaking. “I’m thinking that I love you so much it scares me. See?” Dex's thumbs tipped my chin back so that I could look at his face—at his beautiful, scruffy face. "Baby." He said my name like a purr that reached the vertebrae of my spine. "And even though it really scares the living crap out of me, I love you, and I want you to know that. Everything you've done for me..." Oh hell. I had to let out a long gust of breath. "Thank you. You're the best thing that ever yelled at me." He murmured my name again, low and smooth. The pads of his thumbs dug a little deeper into the soft tissue on the underside of my jaw. "If all the shit I do for you, and all the shit I'd be willin' to do for you doesn't tell you how deep you've snuck into me, honey, then I'll tell you." He lowered his mouth right next to my ear, his teeth nipping at my lobe before he whispered, "Love you." The feeling that swamped me was indescribable. He gave me hope. This big, ex-felon with a temper, reminded me of how strong I was, and then made me stronger on top of it. "Dex," I exhaled his name. He nipped my ear again. "I love you, Ritz." The scruff of his jaw scraped my own before he bit it gently. "Love your fuckin' face, your that's what she said jokes, your dorky ass high-fives and your arm, but I really fuckin' love how much of a little shit you are. You got nuts bigger than your brother, baby." I choked out a laugh. Dex tipped my head back even further, holding the weight on his long fingers as he bit the curve of my chin. "And those are gonna be my nuts, you little bad ass." Fire shot straight through my chest. "Yeah?" I panted. "Yeah." He nodded, biting my chin even harder. "I already told you I keep what's mine.

The only sustainable approach to thinking today about problems, he argues, “is thinking without a box.” Of course, that doesn’t mean having no opinion. Rather, it means having no limits on your curiosity or the different disciplines you might draw on to appreciate how the Machine works. Wells calls this approach—which I will employ in this book—being “radically inclusive.” It involves bringing into your analysis as many relevant people, processes, disciplines, organizations, and technologies as possible—factors that are often kept separate or excluded altogether. For instance, the only way you will understand the changing nature of geopolitics today is if you meld what is happening in computing with what is happening in telecommunications with what is happening in the environment with what is happening in globalization with what is happening in demographics. There is no other way today to develop a fully rounded picture.

Thanks, Jared. His views are pretty antediluvian.” Shit. Those lips wrapping around the word “antediluvian” may as well be wrapped around my cock. Has my brain always been a sex organ, or did she do this to me? “Did you hear me?” she asks, frowning. “Sorry.” I was busy adjusting myself under the table. “What’d you say?

I always felt that someone, a long time ago, organized the affairs of the world into areas that made sense-catagories of stuff that is perfectible, things that fit neatly in perfect bundles. The world of business, for example, is this way-line items, spreadsheets, things that add up, that can be perfected. The legal system-not always perfect, but nonetheless a mind-numbing effort to actually write down all kinds of laws and instructions that cover all aspects of being human, a kind of umbrella code of conduct we should all follow. Perfection is crucial in building an aircraft, a bridge, or a high-speed train. The code and mathematics residing just below the surface of the Internet is also this way. Things are either perfectly right or they will not work. So much of the world we work and live in is based upon being correct, being perfect. But after this someone got through organizing everything just perfectly, he (or probably a she) was left with a bunch of stuff that didn't fit anywhere-things in a shoe box that had to go somewhere. So in desperation this person threw up her arms and said, 'OK! Fine. All the rest of this stuff that isn't perfectible, that doesn't seem to fit anywhere else, will just have to be piled into this last, rather large, tattered box that we can sort of push behind the couch. Maybe later we can come back and figure where it all is supposed to fit in. Let's label the box ART.' The problem was thankfully never fixed, and in time the box overflowed as more and more art piled up. I think the dilemma exists because art, among all the other tidy categories, most closely resembles what it is like to be human. To be alive. It is our nature to be imperfect. The have uncategorized feelings and emotions. To make or do things that don't sometimes necessarily make sense. Art is all just perfectly imperfect. Once the word ART enters the description of what you're up to , it is almost getting a hall pass from perfection. It thankfully releases us from any expectation of perfection. In relation to my own work not being perfect, I just always point to the tattered box behind the couch and mention the word ART, and people seem to understand and let you off the hook about being perfect a go back to their business.

Wow," Agnes said, looking at her bridge. "Was it good for you?" Lisa Livia said. "It was good for me." "That bridge was built for tanks," Shane told Agnes proudly. "It'll take your wedding traffic and then some. It's even better than what you had." "Thank you," Agnes said to him, trying not to sound hero-worship-y. "But it's temporary," Lisa Livia said, leaning on Carpenter a little. Carpenter put his arm around her. "And I'm thinking the price is right," Agnes said, and sipped her coffee as Shane settled his arm around her. "And my mother is going to have a stroke," Lisa Livia said. "It's a beautiful bridge," Agnes said, and tried to forget all the hell swirling around her and the need to be practical and not get hurt. She could be smart tomorrow. Tonight she had a bridge and she was holding on to him.

This is the most common misconception about speechwriting. It came up especially often in the years before I started at the White House, when I wrote for CEOs. “You seem capable,” they would tell me, “but can you really find my voice?” “I think I can manage it,” I’d reply gravely. Left unsaid is that it would be easy, because when it comes to rhetorical styling, 99.9 percent of speeches sound the same. Martin Luther King had a voice. John F. Kennedy had a voice. With all due respect, you probably don’t. What you do have are thoughts. What you need, although you may not know it, is someone to organize them. A good writer can take your ten ideas and turn them into one coherent whole. Where you see two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, and onions on a sesame seed bun, a speechwriter sees a Big Mac.

The two of them carefully stepped around the crime scene, picking up Nick’s arms, legs and organs, and brought them back to his head. They placed his extremities into position, and then pieced in the gorier bits, assembling a gruesome jigsaw puzzle. In a few moments, most of Nick’s body was in place. The healing process took about twenty minutes. Elphaba and John stood spellbound as they watched a bloody collection of body parts reintegrate into a human form. As Nick’s sinews, nerves, and muscle knit back into place, the gaping wound in Esperto’s body also closed, completing a few minutes before Nick’s healing. The panther form quickly shrank back to housecat just as Nick sat up. Esperto jumped in his lap and licked the remnants of blood off his face. “Thank you Esperto,” Nick said. He looked at Elphaba and John. “Well, that could have gone better.

At the grocery store, a clerk told her she'd taken one organic avocado and one regular. "You can't get the two-for-one deal," he informed her. He acted like she had inconvenienced him, like she'd done it on purpose, like she was someone who would scheme to steal avocados. She didn't apologize. "I pulled them from the same bin," she said. "If your produce was organized, this wouldn't have happened." He got flustered and gave her the deal. She didn't say thank you.

BAPTISM BY FIRE Scriptures for meditation: 2 Chronicles 6; 7:1-6 Confession: Jer. 20:9 PRAYER POINTS Thank God for the purifying power of the fire of the Holy Ghost. I cover myself with the blood of the Lord Jesus. Father, let Your fire that burns away every deposit of the enemy fall upon me in the name of Jesus. Holy Ghost fire, incubate me in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. I reject any evil stamp or seal placed upon me by ancestral spirits in the name of Jesus. I release myself from every negative anointing in the name of Jesus. Let every door of spiritual leakage be closed in the name of Jesus. I challenge every organ of my body with the fire of the Holy Spirit. (Lay your right hand methodically on various parts of the body beginning from the head.) Let every human spirit attacking my own spirit release me in the mighty name of Jesus. I reject every spirit of the tail in the name of Jesus. Sing the song "Holy Ghost fire, fire fall on me". Let all evil marks on my body be burnt off by the fire of the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus. Let the anointing of the Holy Ghost fall upon me and break every negative yoke in the name of Jesus. Let every garment of hindrance and dirtiness be dissolved by the fire of the Holy Ghost in the name of Jesus. I command all my chained blessings to be unchained in the name of Jesus. Let all spiritual cages inhibiting my progress be roasted by the fire of the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus. Now Make this Powerful Confession Before You Proceed I boldly declare that my body is the temple of God and that the Holy Ghost is dwelling in me. I am cleansed through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, whosoever wants me to go into captivity shall go into captivity. Whosoever wants me to die by the sword shall die by the sword. The strangers shall fade away and be afraid out of their close places in the mighty name of the Lord Jesus Christ. They shall lick the dust like a serpent, they shall move out of their holes like worms of the earth,

Support Your Warriors I write about warriors; men and women who rise above the rest. Men and women who overcome their fears with courage and integrity. While some of my characters may seem like super heroes, the real life men and women who risk their lives every day to protect and to serve us are truly super heroes. Please support your warriors. There are a variety of worthwhile organizations that need financial support and/or volunteers. Visit a hospital, send a card, say a prayer. Thank you Sandy

He kept looking out the window and said slowly, “Gabriel wasn’t just my brother, he was my best friend. He was the kindest man you ever met. Too kind. And all his talent, his goodness, his passion for life—wiped out, because of that bitch. It wasn’t just his life she destroyed—it was mine too. Thank God my parents didn’t live to see it.” Max choked up, suddenly emotional. It was hard not to sense his pain, and I felt sorry for him. “It must have been extremely difficult for you to organize Alicia’s defense.

What is causing you to put things down "for now"? Are you feeling too rushed in your everyday life? Is there never a chance to reset? As you go through the process of clearing out your clutter, you will see that things become easier to put away when there is a home for them and that home is easier to access. When you are tempted to put something down, ask yourself, "Will I really have more time to deal with this later? Will I know where to find this later when I'm looking for it?" Be kind to your future self and put it away now. Next week you will thank me.

I messed up the toast,” she said quietly. “Nah,” he said, stretching his long legs out in front of him and slouching down a bit to get comfortable. “Just think how many people you educated on the mating ritual of parasitic worms. They should be thanking you.” Mollie groaned. “It was supposed to be romantic. I did a paper about them for my systematics and biotics diversity final. They’re unusual because they’re bonded for life. Most organisms sleep around or, you know, the male dies after mating—” Jackson winced, and Mollie wished she could wither and die just like a male bee.

Rest too long after an injury and your system powers down, preparing you for a peaceful exit. Fight your way back to your feet, however, and you trigger that magical ON switch that speeds healing hormones to everything you need to get stronger: your bones, brain, organs, ligaments, immune system, even the digestive bacteria in your belly, all get a molecular upgrade from exercise. For that, you can thank your hunter-gatherer ancestors, who evolved to stay alive by staying on the move. Today, movement-as-medicine is a biological truth for survivors of cancer, surgery, strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, brain injuries, depression, you name it.

Thanks, Elizabeth,” Rachel said, jumping eagerly to her feet. “Sorry to have wasted your time.” “Oh, it was nice to have something to do,” Elizabeth replied. “I usually see a dozen or more campers every day with various bumps and bruises, but you’re the only ones I’ve seen so far today.” She picked up another roll of bandages. “So I decided to organize my medicine cabinet instead.” “That’s because of Leona’s unicorn,” Kirsty whispered to Rachel as they went to the door of the cabin. “His healing powers mean that the campers don’t need the nurse!” “Help yourself to a lollipop from my jar on your way out, girls,” Elizabeth called. There was a big glass jar of brightly colored lollipops on a shelf near the door. As Rachel reached for it, she noticed that the jar had a strange

Vargus: Be me. Eat a bag of dicks for breakfast. Go home for lunch and eat another bag of dicks. Finish work and start preparing my bag of dicks for dinner while I warm up ‘The Saga Continues’. No Aetherius. Me sad. Chew dicks pensively. Some guy called Scorpius fighting instead. Level 28. Total noobcake. ROFL, wut a tryhard. Noobcake kicks demi-god in my three meals a day and cusses him out in livestream, with broken arms and legs. Dicks spilling from my gobsmacked open mouth (soooooo many dicks). I inhale too hard and my dinner gets lodged in my throat. Stars in my vision, blacking out. Try to call my mom for help, but multiple phalli are blocking my respiratory organs. Tumble out of my chair sideways and hit the ground, hands around my throat to dislodge all the penises I’ve been chowing down on. There’s no hope, there are too many. Everything goes dark. Wake up, my vision is blurry and my throat is blissfully unburdened by inadvertent deep throating. I’m being transported somewhere. Am I on my way to heaven? How will I explain my eating habits to Saint Peter? Big blurry white words are floating into perspective in the center of my vision. I try to focus on them, my brain still struggling to replenish oxygen. The words clear, and it is obvious that my diet has not gone unnoticed. I am in hell. ‘The Elder Scrolls V’. Oh no, oh god no, anything but that! ‘SKYRIM’. Please, St. Peter, I can change, please don’t forsake me, PLEA- “Hey you, you’re finally awake”. Thanks Todd. 10/10, would eat dicks and watch Daemien kick a demi-god in the schlong again.

Life, in short, just wants to be. But—and here’s an interesting point—for the most part it doesn’t want to be much. This is perhaps a little odd because life has had plenty of time to develop ambitions. If you imagine the 4.5 billion odd years of Earth’s history compressed into a normal earthly day, then life begins very early, about 4 A.M., with the rise of the first simple, single-celled organisms, but then advances no further for the next sixteen hours. Not until almost 8:30 in the evening, with the day five-sixths over, has Earth anything to show the universe but a restless skin of microbes. Then, finally, the first sea plants appear, followed twenty minutes later by the first jellyfish and the enigmatic Ediacaran fauna first seen by Reginald Sprigg in Australia. At 9:04 P.M. trilobites swim onto the scene, followed more or less immediately by the shapely creatures of the Burgess Shale. Just before 10 P.M. plants begin to pop up on the land. Soon after, with less than two hours left in the day, the first land creatures follow. Thanks to ten minutes or so of balmy weather, by 10:24 the Earth is covered in the great carboniferous forests whose residues give us all our coal, and the first winged insects are evident. Dinosaurs plod onto the scene just before 11 P.M. and hold sway for about three-quarters of an hour. At twenty-one minutes to midnight they vanish and the age of mammals begins. Humans emerge one minute and seventeen seconds before midnight. The whole of our recorded history, on this scale, would be no more than a few seconds, a single human lifetime barely an instant. Throughout this greatly speeded-up day continents slide about and bang together at a clip that seems positively reckless. Mountains rise and melt away, ocean basins come and go, ice sheets advance and withdraw. And throughout the whole, about three times every minute, somewhere on the planet there is a flashbulb pop of light marking the impact of a Manson-sized meteor or one even larger. It’s a wonder that anything at all can survive in such a pummeled and unsettled environment. In fact, not many things do for long. Perhaps an even more effective way of grasping our extreme recentness as a part of this 4.5-billion-year-old picture is to stretch your arms to their fullest extent and imagine that width as the entire history of the Earth. On this scale, according to John McPhee in Basin and Range, the distance from the fingertips of one hand to the wrist of the other is Precambrian. All of complex life is in one hand, “and in a single stroke with a medium-grained nail file you could eradicate human history.” Fortunately, that moment hasn’t happened, but the chances are good that it will. I don’t wish to interject a note of gloom just at this point, but the fact is that there is one other extremely pertinent quality about life on Earth: it goes extinct. Quite regularly. For all the trouble they take to assemble and preserve themselves, species crumple and die remarkably routinely. And the more complex they get, the more quickly they appear to go extinct. Which is perhaps one reason why so much of life isn’t terribly ambitious.

our land: The Encyclopedia of Organic Gardening and Double Yoga. Northland Wildflowers and Quilts to Wear. Songs for the Dulcimer and Bread Baking Basics. Using Plants for Healing and I Always Look Up the Word Egregious. I took the books she’d read to me, chapter by chapter, before I could read to myself: the unabridged Bambi and Black Beauty and Little House in the Big Woods. I took the books that she’d acquired as a college student in the years right before she died: Paula Gunn Allen’s The Sacred Hoop and Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior and Cherríe Moraga and Gloria Anzaldúa’s This Bridge Called My Back. Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick and Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn and Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass. But I did not take the books by James Michener, the ones my mother loved the most. “Thank you,” I said now to Jeff, holding The Novel. “I’ll trade this for

Don’t be defensive. People will be reluctant to share feedback if they are afraid of hurting your feelings or having to justify their perceptions. Listen carefully. Relax and actively listen to understand what the other person is trying to tell you; be sensitive to how your nonverbal communication is affecting the other person’s willingness to share with you. Suspend judgment. Listen, don’t judge. Don’t worry about what you’re going to say, but rather work to understand what the other person is trying to tell you. Be welcoming and assume that the information is intended to help you be better rather than anything otherwise. Ask questions and ask for examples. Make sure you understand what is being said and learn about the context as well as the content. Say thank you. Let the other person know that you appreciate his or her feedback and that you can’t get any better without knowing more about yourself and how your actions affect others.

I’m much richer than I appear and that, thanks to well advised investments, I’ve managed to amass a small fortune. They’ve casually tried to ask me about this. I’ve said nothing to confirm or deny the rumor. They tell “Grandpa” how happy they are to see him in good form; they shower him with charming, bland smiles, telling him about the latest exploits of the youngest grandchildren and bringing him up to date on the brilliant careers of the eldest. They remind him of the names of the first great grandchildren. And then in the end, when there’s not much of a response beyond a grunt or a gurgle, they lean back in their seats saying that “Grandpa” isn’t so easygoing, he always had a difficult character and that doesn’t change with age, he could still be a bit more polite and show a little more gratitude toward this family that spends Christmas Day with him; he barely smiles, it’s true, which seems to prove that he doesn’t enjoy it and that we organize the whole hoopla for nothing, he’d rather stay at home near the radiator with a book; ah yes, books, for “Grandpa,” you’d think they were more important than human

All Europe was watching Spain. The left-wing government elected last February had suffered an attempted military coup backed by Fascists and conservatives. The rebel general Franco had won support from the Catholic Church. The news had struck the rest of the continent like an earthquake. After Germany and Italy would Spain, too, fall under the curse of Fascism? “The revolt was botched, as you probably know, and it almost failed,” Billy went on. “But Hitler and Mussolini came to the rescue, and saved the insurrection by airlifting thousands of rebel troops from North Africa as reinforcements.” Lenny put in: “And the unions saved the government!” “That’s true,” Billy said. “The government was slow to react, but the trade unions led the way in organizing workers and arming them with weapons they seized from military arsenals, ships, gun shops, and anywhere else they could find them.” Granda said: “At least someone is fighting back. Until now the Fascists have had it all their own way. In the Rhineland and Abyssinia, they just walked in and took what they wanted. Thank God for the Spanish people, I say. They’ve got the guts to say no.

The imperialist found it useful to incorporate the credible and seemingly unimpeachable wisdom of science to create a racial classification to be used in the appropriation and organization of lesser cultures. The works of Carolus Linnaeus, Georges Buffon, and Georges Cuvier, organized races in terms of a civilized us and a paradigmatic other. The other was uncivilized, barbaric, and wholly lower than the advanced races of Europe. This paradigm of imaginatively constructing a world predicated upon race was grounded in science, and expressed as philosophical axioms by John Locke and David Hume, offered compelling justification that Europe always ought to rule non-Europeans. This doctrine of cultural superiority had a direct bearing on Zionist practice and vision in Palestine. A civilized man, it was believed, could cultivate the land because it meant something to him; on it, accordingly, he produced useful arts and crafts, he created, he accomplished, he built. For uncivilized people, land was either farmed badly or it was left to rot. This was imperialism as theory and colonialism was the practice of changing the uselessly unoccupied territories of the world into useful new versions of Europe. It was this epistemic framework that shaped and informed Zionist attitudes towards the Arab Palestinian natives. This is the intellectual background that Zionism emerged from. Zionism saw Palestine through the same prism as the European did, as an empty territory paradoxically filled with ignoble or, better yet, dispensable natives. It allied itself, as Chaim Weizmann said, with the imperial powers in carrying out its plans for establishing a Jewish state in Palestine. The so-called natives did not take well to the idea of Jewish colonizers in Palestine. As the Zionist historians, Yehoshua Porath and Neville Mandel, have empirically shown, the ideas of Jewish colonizers in Palestine, this was well before World War I, were always met with resistance, not because the natives thought Jews were evil, but because most natives do not take kindly to having their territory settled by foreigners. Zionism not only accepted the unflattering and generic concepts of European culture, it also banked on the fact that Palestine was actually populated not by an advanced civilization, but by a backward people, over which it ought to be dominated. Zionism, therefore, developed with a unique consciousness of itself, but with little or nothing left over for the unfortunate natives. In fact, I would go so far as to say that if Palestine had been occupied by one of the well-established industrialized nations that ruled the world, then the problem of displacing German, French, or English inhabitants and introducing a new, nationally coherent element into the middle of their homeland would have been in the forefront of the consciousness of even the most ignorant and destitute Zionists. In short, all the constitutive energies of Zionism were premised on the excluded presence, that is, the functional absence of native people in Palestine; institutions were built deliberately shutting out the natives, laws were drafted when Israel came into being that made sure the natives would remain in their non-place, Jews in theirs, and so on. It is no wonder that today the one issue that electrifies Israel as a society is the problem of the Palestinians, whose negation is the consistent thread running through Zionism. And it is this perhaps unfortunate aspect of Zionism that ties it ineluctably to imperialism- at least so far as the Palestinian is concerned. In conclusion, I cannot affirm that Zionism is colonialism, but I can tell you the process by which Zionism flourished; the dialectic under which it became a reality was heavily influenced by the imperialist mindset of Europe. Thank you. -Fictional debate between Edward Said and Abba Eban.

And then I saw him speak. Years later, after writing dozens upon dozens of presidential speeches, it would become impossible to listen to rhetoric without editing it in my head. On that historic Iowa evening, Obama began with a proclamation: “They said this day would never come.” Rereading those words today, I have questions. Who were “they,” exactly? Did they really say “never”? Because if they thought an antiwar candidate with a robust fund-raising operation could never win a divided three-way Democratic caucus, particularly with John Edwards eating into Hillary Clinton’s natural base of support among working-class whites, then they didn’t know what they were talking about. All this analysis would come later, though, along with stress-induced insomnia and an account at the Navy Mess. At the time, I was spellbound. The senator continued: “At this defining moment in history, you have done what the cynics said you couldn’t do.” He spoke like presidents in movies. He looked younger than my dad. I didn’t have time for a second thought, or even a first one. I simply believed. Barack Obama spoke for the next twelve minutes, and except for a brief moment when the landing gear popped out and I thought we were going to die, I was riveted. He told us we were one people. I nodded knowingly at the gentleman in the middle seat. He told us he would expand health care by bringing Democrats and Republicans together. I was certain it would happen as he described. He looked out at a sea of organizers and volunteers. “You did this,” he told them, “because you believed so deeply in the most American of ideas—that in the face of impossible odds, people who love this country can change it.

Among the people who asked about them was Bradley Cooper, thanks to Jason, who’d championed Chris and the book. Cooper was already a huge star, one who had a reputation for taking big risks and trying a variety of roles (including one in the TV series Alias the connection I promised earlier). None of that was important to Chris. If there was a movie, he wanted the actor who portrayed him to be a true American. He couldn’t stand actors who would make unpatriotic statements against the war and then turn around and do war films. He’d told Jim he didn’t want a hypocrite playing him. I think he would have chosen not to let a movie be done rather than agree to let people proceed with it whom he didn’t consider patriotic. And so for Chris, the most impressive thing about Bradley Cooper was not his acting ability or the enormous research he put into his roles, but the work he’d done helping veterans. He was a supporter of Got Your 6, an organization that helps veterans reintegrate into family life and their communities. He had also done some USO tours. I couldn’t imagine a better match. Still, Chris didn’t just say okay. He talked to Bradley before deciding to let him option the book and his life rights. I remember Chris coming out of his home office after the final conversation. He was smiling; Bradley had a great sense of humor, which was probably the first thing they bonded over. “How’d it go?” I asked. “Went good. I told him, ‘My only concern with you, Bradley--I might have to tie you up with a rope and pull you behind my truck to knock some of the pretty off you.” Bradley laughed. Still, he did just about everything short of that to prepare for the movie. He grew a beard, studied photos and videos, and worked out like a madman, getting himself into the proper shape to play a SEAL in the movie.

As time passed, I learned more and more about the culture that comes with beign an injured veteran. There are a lot of really wonderful people and organizations to help veterans returning from war. Right about the time I started to really move forward in my recovery, two women came by and introduced themselves. They explained that they raise money to help injured veterans with various needs. They asked if there was anything I or my family needed. I said, “No thank you, I’m all good.” But my sisters piped up and said, “He needs clothes. He doesn’t have anything.” The women smiled and said they’d be back. They came back with some sweatpants and a shirt and then announced that they were taking us to the mall. This would be my first time leaving the campus of Walter Reed, my first real trip out of the hospital. We were all excited. Leaving the hospital was a big step for me but my poor sisters had been cooped up much of the time with me in there as well. I was a little nervous, but I owed it to them to push aside my anxiety. We decided that the electric wheelchair would be too heavy and too much trouble to get in and out of the car, so Jennifer wheeled me down to the front door where the ladies were waiting in their car. With very little assistance, Jennifer was able to get me for that chair into the car and we were off to the mall. When we arrived, my sisters pulled the wheelchair out of the trunk and placed it next to the car door. They opened the door and Jennifer leaned down and with one swift motion lifted me up like a nearly weightless child and placed me in the chair. I laughed it off. “My sister’s strong. She’s really strong,” I boasted on her behalf. Sara, Katherine, and Jennifer were laughing the whole time because I didn’t realize how scrawny I was, how much weight I had lost. Jennifer could pick me up with no problem because I practically weighed nothing at all. But through the laughter, I felt a pang of guilt. I am the brother of three sisters. It was my job to protect and care for them. Yet here I was, barely able to take care of myself.

And just as music is the space between notes, just as the stars are beautiful because of the space between them, just as the sun strikes raindrops at a certain angle and throws a prism of color across the sky—so the space where I exist, and want to keep existing, and to be quite frank I hope I die in, is exactly this middle distance: where despair struck pure otherness and created something sublime. And that’s why I’ve chosen to write these pages as I’ve written them. For only by stepping into the middle zone, the polychrome edge between truth and untruth, is it tolerable to be here and writing this at all. Whatever teaches us to talk to ourselves is important: whatever teaches us to sing ourselves out of despair. But the painting has also taught me that we can speak to each other across time. And I feel I have something very serious and urgent to say to you, my non-existent reader, and I feel I should say it as urgently as if I were standing in the room with you. That life—whatever else it is—is short. That fate is cruel but maybe not random. That Nature (meaning Death) always wins but that doesn’t mean we have to bow and grovel to it. That maybe even if we’re not always so glad to be here, it’s our task to immerse ourselves anyway: wade straight through it, right through the cesspool, while keeping eyes and hearts open. And in the midst of our dying, as we rise from the organic and sink back ignominiously into the organic, it is a glory and a privilege to love what Death doesn’t touch. For if disaster and oblivion have followed this painting down through time—so too has love. Insofar as it is immortal (and it is) I have a small, bright, immutable part in that immortality. It exists; and it keeps on existing. And I add my own love to the history of people who have loved beautiful things, and looked out for them, and pulled them from the fire, and sought them when they were lost, and tried to preserve them and save them while passing them along literally from hand to hand, singing out brilliantly from the wreck of time to the next generation of lovers, and the next. Thanks to: Robbert Ammerlaan, Ivan Nabokov, Sam Pace, Neal Guma.

The first signal of the change in her behavior was Prince Andrew’s stag night when the Princess of Wales and Sarah Ferguson dressed as policewomen in a vain attempt to gatecrash his party. Instead they drank champagne and orange juice at Annabel’s night club before returning to Buckingham Palace where they stopped Andrew’s car at the entrance as he returned home. Technically the impersonation of police officers is a criminal offence, a point not neglected by several censorious Members of Parliament. For a time this boisterous mood reigned supreme within the royal family. When the Duke and Duchess hosted a party at Windsor Castle as a thank you for everyone who had helped organize their wedding, it was Fergie who encouraged everyone to jump, fully clothed, into the swimming pool. There were numerous noisy dinner parties and a disco in the Waterloo Room at Windsor Castle at Christmas. Fergie even encouraged Diana to join her in an impromptu version of the can-can. This was but a rehearsal for their first public performance when the girls, accompanied by their husbands, flew to Klosters for a week-long skiing holiday. On the first day they lined up in front of the cameras for the traditional photo-call. For sheer absurdity this annual spectacle takes some beating as ninety assorted photographers laden with ladders and equipment scramble through the snow for positions. Diana and Sarah took this silliness at face value, staging a cabaret on ice as they indulged in a mock conflict, pushing and shoving each other until Prince Charles announced censoriously: “Come on, come on!” Until then Diana’s skittish sense of humour had only been seen in flashes, invariably clouded by a mask of blushes and wan silences. So it was a surprised group of photographers who chanced across the Princess in a Klosters café that same afternoon. She pointed to the outsize medal on her jacket, joking: “I have awarded it to myself for services to my country because no-one else will.” It was an aside which spoke volumes about her underlying self-doubt. The mood of frivolity continued with pillow fights in their chalet at Wolfgang although it would be wrong to characterize the mood on that holiday as a glorified schoolgirls’ outing. As one royal guest commented: “It was good fun within reason. You have to mind your p’s and q’s when royalty, particularly Prince Charles, is present. It is quite formal and can be rather a strain.

WHERE TO HIRE A CRYPTO RECOVERY SERVICE — DIGITAL HACK RECOVERY We've all been there: you see an email that looks important, maybe from a service you use, and you click the link without a second thought. That was me one unsuspecting morning when I received an email claiming there was "suspicious activity" on one of my accounts. Thinking I was protecting my assets, I clicked the link, entered some information, and went about my day. What I never knew was that I had just stepped into an organized trap. It wasn't from my account provider at all-malware-and in less than five to ten minutes, it siphoned $75,000 from my cryptocurrency wallet. I felt my heart drop the moment I opened my wallet some time later and the balance showed zero; it felt as if all air had been sucked out of the room. Panic turned to anger, then despair. How could I have been so careless? I spent the next few hours spiraling, scouring the internet for solutions, feeling the world closing in on me. That's when I came across Digital Hack Recovery. I won't lie; at first, I was skeptical. The internet is full of promises that almost sound too good to be true, and I must say that right after getting conned once, it was pretty hard for me to try another. Reviews about Digital Hack Recovery were great, so I called them because I just literally had nothing to lose. From the initial contact, their staff were the picture of professionalism. They didn't just hear my story; they listened. They assured me that they had seen similar cases and explained the recovery process step by step. Their calm confidence was infectious, and for the first time since the incident, I felt a glimmer of hope. They worked day and night for the next several days, keeping me updated and answering all my anxious questions. Then, one day, the call came: they had recovered my $75,000. To hear those words was like getting a second chance at life. The relief was indescribable. But they didn’t stop there. The team took the time to educate me on how to spot phishing scams and secure my wallet better. They even shared tips on recognizing red flags in suspicious emails. Thanks to them, I’m more vigilant than ever, and my funds—and peace of mind—are safe.Digital Hack Recovery didn't just recover my wallet; they restored my faith in humanity. Lesson learned: trust cautiously, but never lose hope. WhatsApp +19152151930 Website; https : // digital hack recovery . com Email; digital hack recovery @ techie . com

When players study all those patterns, they are mastering tactics. Bigger-picture planning in chess—how to manage the little battles to win the war—is called strategy. As Susan Polgar has written, “you can get a lot further by being very good in tactics”—that is, knowing a lot of patterns—“and have only a basic understanding of strategy.” Thanks to their calculation power, computers are tactically flawless compared to humans. Grandmasters predict the near future, but computers do it better. What if, Kasparov wondered, computer tactical prowess were combined with human big-picture, strategic thinking? In 1998, he helped organize the first “advanced chess” tournament, in which each human player, including Kasparov himself, paired with a computer. Years of pattern study were obviated. The machine partner could handle tactics so the human could focus on strategy. It was like Tiger Woods facing off in a golf video game against the best gamers. His years of repetition would be neutralized, and the contest would shift to one of strategy rather than tactical execution. In chess, it changed the pecking order instantly. “Human creativity was even more paramount under these conditions, not less,” according to Kasparov. Kasparov settled for a 3–3 draw with a player he had trounced four games to zero just a month earlier in a traditional match. “My advantage in calculating tactics had been nullified by the machine.” The primary benefit of years of experience with specialized training was outsourced, and in a contest where humans focused on strategy, he suddenly had peers. A few years later, the first “freestyle chess” tournament was held. Teams could be made up of multiple humans and computers. The lifetime-of-specialized-practice advantage that had been diluted in advanced chess was obliterated in freestyle. A duo of amateur players with three normal computers not only destroyed Hydra, the best chess supercomputer, they also crushed teams of grandmasters using computers. Kasparov concluded that the humans on the winning team were the best at “coaching” multiple computers on what to examine, and then synthesizing that information for an overall strategy. Human/Computer combo teams—known as “centaurs”—were playing the highest level of chess ever seen. If Deep Blue’s victory over Kasparov signaled the transfer of chess power from humans to computers, the victory of centaurs over Hydra symbolized something more interesting still: humans empowered to do what they do best without the prerequisite of years of specialized pattern recognition.

In a Harvard Business Review article titled “Do Women Lack Ambition?” Anna Fels, a psychiatrist at Cornell University, observes that when the dozens of successful women she interviewed told their own stories, “they refused to claim a central, purposeful place.” Were Dr. Fels to interview you, how would you tell your story? Are you using language that suggests you’re the supporting actress in your own life? For instance, when someone offers words of appreciation about a dinner you’ve prepared, a class you’ve taught, or an event you organized and brilliantly executed, do you gracefully reply “Thank you” or do you say, “It was nothing”? As Fels tried to understand why women refuse to be the heroes of their own stories, she encountered the Bem Sex-Role Inventory, which confirms that society considers a woman to be feminine only within the context of a relationship and when she is giving something to someone. It’s no wonder that a “feminine” woman finds it difficult to get in the game and demand support to pursue her goals. It also explains why she feels selfish when she doesn’t subordinate her needs to others. A successful female CEO recently needed my help. It was mostly business-related but also partly for her. As she started to ask for my assistance, I sensed how difficult it was for her. Advocate on her organization’s behalf? Piece of cake. That’s one of the reasons her business has been successful. But advocate on her own behalf? I’ll confess that even among my closest friends I find it painful to say, “Look what I did,” and so I don’t do it very often. If you want to see just how masterful most women have become at deflecting, the next time you’re with a group of girlfriends, ask them about something they (not their husband or children) have done well in the past year. Chances are good that each woman will quickly and deftly redirect the conversation far, far away from herself. “A key type of discrimination that women face is the expectation that feminine women will forfeit opportunities for recognition,” says Fels. “When women do speak as much as men in a work situation or compete for high-visibility positions, their femininity is assailed.” My point here isn’t to say that relatedness and nurturing and picking up our pom-poms to cheer others on is unimportant. Those qualities are often innate to women. If we set these “feminine” qualities aside or neglect them, we will have lost an irreplaceable piece of ourselves. But to truly grow up, we must learn to throw down our pom-poms, believing we can act and that what we have to offer is a valuable part of who we are. When we recognize this, we give ourselves permission to dream and to encourage the girls and women

The morning was already setting up to be hectic, and Jon thanked his lucky stars that Jessie was so good at his job and a constant spark-plug of activity. Oh god, you did not just think Jessie was a spark-plug? You really are getting old. Next thing you know you’ll being saying whipper-snappers and break a hip getting out of bed. He shook his head. I guess I had a good run. Jessie quickly re-entered the office. “Alright. Elisabeth has her caffeine fix and said she’ll be down to say goodbye in a few. So let’s get this bad boy going for the week. Travel plans are done for next month and meetings for the week are in you planner so I’m assuming they’ll be no more complaining about flying coach class this time?” Jessie gave a sly wink and kept organizing his desk. “Yes. And for that I thank you for that my color-coding, hyper computer organized planner. We have to make sure the next presentation for Chicago is ready in three weeks; the storyboards for the new campaign ideas have to be finished by Tuesday the 16th so we can get them shipped before I head out there.” “And let’s not forget our important morning ritual.” Jon looked at Jessie with a question about to form before the realization hit him. His expression changed from confused to stern. “No cat videos Jessie. I swear. Enough of the cat videos.” “C’mon. You know you love them and they brighten your dour moods. Look at this one.” Jessie turned his screen and Jon begrudgingly looked at the cute little puppy and kitten with captions over them. “How can you not love this?” Jessie smiled. “The cute little kitty tells the playful puppy not to do it and yet the puppy bonks the little kitty on the head with his little puppy paw. “Boop Boop.” And then the cat swipes at the puppy and it falls off the bed. You know this is internet gold.” Jon smiled. “Can we get back to work?” Jessie nodded and then walked up to Jon - without hesitating, he bonked him lightly on the head. “Boop.” He paused and added, “I think this puppy is onto something.” Jessie grinned ear to ear still. “I pledge, from now on if something makes me as happy as this bonking picture I’m just going to say Boop boop.” Jon stood stone-faced but a second later, could not stop his smile. “I am not amused.” Jon shook the smile away. “Now, if you’re done boop booping me, there is something else I want to talk with you about.” Jessie looked at Jon with a quizzical smile. “Not to blow my own horn but I have a new and brilliant thought my young apprentice.” Jessie opened his mouth to comment on the blowing horn, but Jon held up his hand and cut him off. “Stop it.” Jessie closed his mouth and swallowed the sexual innuendo-laced comment he had forming on the tip of his tongue.

Never treat your launch team like a core group. It’s not. Your launch team is a time-limited, purpose-driven team. It ends with the debriefing session following your launch. At that meeting, release the launch team members to join a ministry team of their choice. Your launch team will not stay with you over the long haul. Many church planters make the mistake of thinking that the people from their launch team (whom they have grown to love) will be the same people who will grow the church with them in the long term. That is seldom, if ever, the case. While it’s sad to see people go, it’s part of God’s process in growing your church. So, expect it, be prepared for it, and be thankful that you have the opportunity to serve with so many different people at different points along the journey. Preparing a launch team to maximize your first service is first and foremost a spiritual enterprise. Pray and fast—a lot. Don’t be fooled into thinking that being a solid leader undermines the spirit of teamwork. You can lead a team, hold people accountable and ensure that things get done in a way that fosters teamwork and gives glory to God. So get ready. show people your heart before you ask for their hand. People want to know that you care, and they want to be part of something bigger than themselves. If you can articulate your vision in a way that excites people, they’ll want to be on your team. The launch team is not a democracy. Don’t vote. You are the leader. Lead. While it’s true that you want to share the gospel with as many people as possible, you will need to develop a clear picture of the specific demographic your new church is targeting in order to effectively reach the greatest number of people. Diffused light has little impact, but focused light has the ability to cut through steel. Take time to focus so that you are able to reach the specific people God has called you to. 1. Who Are the Key Population Groups Living in My Area? 2. What Population Group Is Not Being Reached Effectively? 3. What Population Group Do I Best Relate To? Healthy organisms grow, and that includes your church. If you feel stagnation setting in, your job is not to push growth any way you can but to identify the barriers that are hindering you and remove them. The only people who like full rooms are preachers and worship leaders. If you ignore this barrier, your church will stop growing. Early on, it’s best to remain flexible. The last thing you want to do is get in a position in which God can’t grow you because you aren’t logistically prepared. What if twice as many people showed up this Sunday? Would you be ready? When a lead pastor isn’t growing: The church stops growing, the sermons are stale, The staff and volunteers stop growing, The passion for ministry wanes. Keeping your church outwardly focused is just as important now as it was during your prelaunch stage. Make sure that you are continually working to expand God’s kingdom, not building your own. A healthy launch is the single greatest indicator of future church health.

Permanent Revolution THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION OPENED up new ways to convert energy and to produce goods, largely liberating humankind from its dependence on the surrounding ecosystem. Humans cut down forests, drained swamps, dammed rivers, flooded plains, laid down hundreds of thousands of miles of railroad tracks, and built skyscraping metropolises. As the world was moulded to fit the needs of Homo sapiens, habitats were destroyed and species went extinct. Our once green and blue planet is becoming a concrete and plastic shopping centre. Today, the earth’s continents are home to billions of Sapiens. If you took all these people and put them on a large set of scales, their combined mass would be about 300 million tons. If you then took all our domesticated farmyard animals – cows, pigs, sheep and chickens – and placed them on an even larger set of scales, their mass would amount to about 700 million tons. In contrast, the combined mass of all surviving large wild animals – from porcupines and penguins to elephants and whales – is less than 100 million tons. Our children’s books, our iconography and our TV screens are still full of giraffes, wolves and chimpanzees, but the real world has very few of them left. There are about 80,000 giraffes in the world, compared to 1.5 billion cattle; only 200,000 wolves, compared to 400 million domesticated dogs; only 250,000 chimpanzees – in contrast to billions of humans. Humankind really has taken over the world.1 Ecological degradation is not the same as resource scarcity. As we saw in the previous chapter, the resources available to humankind are constantly increasing, and are likely to continue to do so. That’s why doomsday prophesies of resource scarcity are probably misplaced. In contrast, the fear of ecological degradation is only too well founded. The future may see Sapiens gaining control of a cornucopia of new materials and energy sources, while simultaneously destroying what remains of the natural habitat and driving most other species to extinction. In fact, ecological turmoil might endanger the survival of Homo sapiens itself. Global warming, rising oceans and widespread pollution could make the earth less hospitable to our kind, and the future might consequently see a spiralling race between human power and human-induced natural disasters. As humans use their power to counter the forces of nature and subjugate the ecosystem to their needs and whims, they might cause more and more unanticipated and dangerous side effects. These are likely to be controllable only by even more drastic manipulations of the ecosystem, which would result in even worse chaos. Many call this process ‘the destruction of nature’. But it’s not really destruction, it’s change. Nature cannot be destroyed. Sixty-five million years ago, an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs, but in so doing opened the way forward for mammals. Today, humankind is driving many species into extinction and might even annihilate itself. But other organisms are doing quite well. Rats and cockroaches, for example, are in their heyday. These tenacious creatures would probably creep out from beneath the smoking rubble of a nuclear Armageddon, ready and able to spread their DNA. Perhaps 65 million years from now, intelligent rats will look back gratefully on the decimation wrought by humankind, just as we today can thank that dinosaur-busting asteroid. Still, the rumours of our own extinction are premature. Since the Industrial Revolution, the world’s human population has burgeoned as never before. In 1700 the world was home to some 700 million humans. In 1800 there were 950 million of us. By 1900 we almost doubled our numbers to 1.6 billion. And by 2000 that quadrupled to 6 billion. Today there are just shy of 7 billion Sapiens.

Praise your body right now. Thank your body. If you have a liver problem, apologize to your liver for having overtaxed it selfishly without either care or thanks. Pledge to change your attitude and use your liver with sincere and deep gratitude. This applies to every bodily function, every internal or external organ, every artery or vein, every muscle or bone. If you continuously thank any part of your body, it will definitely respond.

While I struggled with the menu, a handsome middle-aged guy from a nearby table came over to help. "You like sashimi? Cooked fish? Sushi?" he asked. His English was excellent. He was originally from Okinawa, he said, and a member of Rotary International. I know nothing about the Rotarians except that it's a service organization; helping befuddled foreigners order food in bars must fall within its definition of charitable service. Our service-oriented neighbor helped us order pressed sweetfish sushi, kisu fish tempura, and butter-sauteed scallops. Dredging up a vague Oishinbo memory, I also ordered broiled sweetfish, a seasonal delicacy said to taste vaguely of melon. While we started in on our sushi, our waitress- the kind of harried diner waitress who would call customers "hon" in an American restaurant- delivered a huge, beautiful steamed flounder with soy sauce, mirin, and chunks of creamy tofu. "From that guy," she said, indicating the Rotarian samaritan. We retaliated with a large bottle of beer for him and his friend (the friend came over to thank us, with much bowing). What would happen at your neighborhood bar if a couple of confused foreigners came in with a child and didn't even know how to order a drink? Would someone send them a free fish? I should add that it's not exactly common to bring children to an izakaya, but it's not frowned upon, either; also, not every izakaya is equally welcoming. Some, I have heard, are more clubby and are skeptical of nonregulars, whatever their nationality. But I didn't encounter any places like that. Oh, how was the food? So much of the seafood we eat in the U.S., even in Seattle, is previously frozen, slightly past its prime, or both. All of the seafood at our local izakaya was jump-up-and-bite-you fresh. This was most obvious in the flounder and the scallops. A mild fish, steamed, lightly seasoned, and served with tofu does not sound like a recipe for memorable eating, but it was. The butter-sauteed scallops, meanwhile, would have been at home at a New England seaside shack. They were served with a lettuce and tomato salad and a dollop of mayo. The shellfish were cooked and seasoned perfectly. I've never had a better scallop.

Several of them have moved up to the highest ranks of the organization, thanks to a strong track record of proving to their bosses, day in and day out, that they have what it takes to help the company succeed. They are passionately curious about the entire organization and how it can beat the competition. They have shown repeatedly that they can tackle tough assignments. They have built teams of complementary staff and rallied them around ambitious goals. They have distilled complex strategy decisions down to just a few priorities, helping align their employees around just a handful of focused goals. And they have pushed and prodded their bosses to shake up the organization, taking bold steps even when there was no burning need to do so. These are the people you find at the top of organizations. They embody these qualities and, as leaders, help develop them in others.

If you’ve been thanked and know your gift has arrived, you must never again inquire about it. Do not tell the recipient to give it back to you if she can’t use it. You gave it away, so you are not allowed to control its fate anymore; now someone else gets to decide what happens with it. Realistically, there will be some number of gifts for which the sentiment is greatly appreciated, but the object is not to the receiver’s taste; it’s unfair to put someone on the spot by making them confess that she doesn’t like your taste, especially when she is in debt to you for a generous impulse.

Love MINECRAFT? **Over 18,000 words of kid-friendly fun!** This high-quality fan fiction fantasy diary book is for kids, teens, and nerdy grown-ups who love to read epic stories about their favorite game! Meet the Skull Kids. They're three Minecraft players who hop from world to world, hunting zombies and searching for the elusive Herobrine--the ghost in the machine. Teleporting down into a new world, the group is surprised to find that the game has changed once again, rendering almost ALL of their technology and mods useless. And when two of the Skull Kids are starving and distracted by exploring a desert village on Day 1 of their new adventure, the whole group is in danger when the sun goes down. Will the Skull Kids survive? Thank you to all of you who are buying and reading my books and helping me grow as a writer. I put many hours into writing and preparing this for you. I love Minecraft, and writing about it is almost as much fun as playing it. It’s because of you, reader, that I’m able to keep writing these books for you and others to enjoy. This book is dedicated to you. Enjoy!! After you read this book, please take a minute to leave a simple review. I really appreciate the feedback from my readers, and love to read your reactions to my stories, good or bad. If you ever want to see your name/handle featured in one of my stories, leave a review and tell me about it in there! And if you ever want to ask me any questions, or tell me your idea for a cool Minecraft story, you can email me at steve@skeletonsteve.com. Are you on my Amazing Reader List? Find out at the end of the book! June 29th, 2016 Now I’m going to try something a little different. Tell me what you guys think! This ‘Players Series’ is going to be a continuing series of books following my new characters, the players Renzor51, Molly, and quantum_steve. Make sure to let me know if you like it or not! Would you still like to see more books about mobs? More books about Cth’ka the Creeper King? I’m planning on continuing that one. ;) Don’t forget to review, and please say hi and tell me your ideas! Thanks, Ryan Gallagher, for the ideas to continue the wolf pack book! Enjoy the story. P.S. - Have you joined the Skeleton Steve Club and my Mailing List?? You found one of my diaries!! This particular book is the continuing story of some Minecraft players—a trio of friends who leap from world to world, searching for the elusive Herobrine. They’re zombie hunters and planeswalkers. They call themselves “The Skull Kids”. Every time these Skull Kids hop into a new world, they start with nothing more than the clothes they’re wearing, and they end up dominating the realm where they decide to live. What you are about to read is the first collection of diary entries from Renzor51, the player and member of the Skull Kids who documents their adventures, from the day they landed on Diamodia and carved out their own little empire, and beyond. Be warned—this is an epic book! You’re going to care about these characters. You’ll be scared for them, feel good for them, and feel bad for them! It’s my hope that you’ll be sucked up into the story, and the adventure and danger will be so intense, you’ll forget we started this journey with a video game! With that, future readers, I present to you the tale of the Skull Kids, Book 1. The Skull Kids Ka-tet Renzor51 Renzor51 is the warrior-scribe of the group, and always documents the party’s adventures and excursions into game worlds. He’s a sneaky fighter, and often takes the role of a sniper, but can go head to head with the Skull Kids’ enemies when needed. A natural artist, Renzor51 tends to design and build many of the group’s fortresses and structures, and keeps things organized. He also focuses a lot on weapon-smithing and enchanting, always seeking out ways to improve his gear. Molly

4. Give recognition and show appreciation. “The deepest principle of human nature is the craving to be appreciated,” wrote William James, the father of American psychology. It is impossible to be motivated and do great work if you don’t feel that somebody cares and appreciates what you do. Studies have shown that for people to be happy and productive at work, they need to experience positive interactions (appreciation, praise) vs. negative (reprimands, criticism) with their manager in a ratio of at least 3:1. (Watch out: For a marriage to work, you actually need a 5:1 ratio!!) So make it a simple habit to thank people each and every day — and that includes using the word generously in emails to your team. The way people want to receive recognition varies greatly: public vs. private, material vs. immaterial, from peers vs. from superiors, etc. Great managers test different approaches and observe reactions until they find the triggers that work best with each of their people. At MOM’s Organic Market, managers will sometimes publicly recognize employees who have performed well, but CEO Scott Nash has often found that one-on-one comments are most effective.

My Lord, It was very kind of you to send the lovely gift which is very useful now that the weather has turned. I am pleased to relate that the cashmere absorbed an application of black dye quite evenly so that it is now appropriate for mourning. Thank you for your thoughtfulness. Lady Trenear “You dyed it?” Devon asked aloud, setting the note on his desk with mixture of amusement and irritation. Reaching for a silver penholder, he inserted a fresh nib and pulled a sheet of writing paper from a nearby stack. That morning he had already written a half-dozen missives to lawyers, his banker, and contractors, and had hired an outside agent to analyze the estate’s finances. He grimaced at the sight of his ink-stained fingers. The lemon-and-salt paste his valet had given him wouldn’t entirely remove the smudges. He was tired of writing, and even more so of numbers, and Kathleen’s letter was a welcome distraction. The challenge could not go unanswered. Staring down at the letter with a faint smile, Deon pondered the best way to annoy her. Dipping the pen nib into the inkwell, he wrote, Madam, I am delighted to learn that you find the shawl useful in these cooler days of autumn. On that subject, I am writing to inform you of my recent decision to donate all the black curtains that currently shroud the windows at Eversby Priory to a London charitable organization. Although you will regrettably no longer have use of the cloth, it will be made into winter coats for the poor, which I am sure you will agree is a far nobler purpose. I am confident in your ability to find other ways of making the atmosphere at Eversby Priory appropriately grim and cheerless. If I do not receive the curtains promptly, I will take it to mean that you are eager for my assistance, in which case I will be delighted to oblige you by coming to Hampshire at once. Trenear Kathleen’s reply was delivered a week later, along with massive crates containing the black curtains.

His features were Middle Eastern, his eyes haunted but also defiant. They were all defiant, Gray had found. When he looked at someone like al-Omari, Gray couldn’t help but think of a Dostoyevsky creation, the displaced outsider, brooding, plotting and methodically stroking a weapon of anarchy. It was the face of a fanatic, of one possessed by a deranged evil. It was the same type of person who’d taken away forever the two people Gray had loved most in the world. Though al-Omari was thousands of miles away in a facility only a very few people even knew existed, the picture and sound were crystal clear thanks to the satellite downlink. Through his headset he asked al-Omari a question in English. The man promptly answered in Arabic and then smiled triumphantly. In flawless Arabic Gray said, “Mr. al-Omari, I am fluent in Arabic and can actually speak it better than you. I know that you lived in England for years and that you speak English better than you do Arabic. I strongly suggest that we communicate in that language so there is absolutely no misunderstanding between us.” Al-Omari’s smile faded, and he sat straighter in his chair. Gray explained his proposal. Al-Omari was to become a spy for the United States, infiltrating one of the deadliest terrorist organizations operating in the Middle East. The man promptly refused. Gray persisted and al-Omari refused yet again, adding that “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” “There are currently ninety-three terrorist organizations in the world as recognized by the U.S. State Department, most of them originating in the Middle East,” Gray responded. “You have confirmed membership in at least three of them. In addition, you were found with forged passports, structural plans to the Woodrow Wilson Bridge and bomb-making material. Now you’re going to work for us, or it will become distinctly unpleasant.” Al-Omari smiled and leaned toward the camera. “I was interrogated years ago in Jordan by your CIA and your military and your FBI, your so-called Tiger Teams. They sent females in wearing only their underwear. They wiped their menstrual blood on me, or at least what they called their menstrual blood, so I was unclean and could not perform my prayers. They rubbed their bodies against me, offered me sex if I talk. I say no to them and I am beaten afterward.” He sat back. “I have been threatened with rape, and they say I will get AIDS from it and die. I do not care. True followers of Muhammad do not fear death as you Christians do. It is your greatest weakness and will lead to your total destruction. Islam will triumph. It is written in the Qur’an. Islam will rule the world.

Cheat Sheet   Capture – System for capturing new inputs   • Desk • Phone • Email     Action steps   1. Set up Capture system   • Designate note-taking process on phone • Create “In-basket” for desk • Clean out email inbox        –Unsubscribe from unnecessary emails        –Create filters for verification messages   2. Set up system for scanning receipts   • Create Evernote Account • Download Scannable • Read tutorial on scanning receipts with Scannable   Filter – Process for simplified decision-making   • Do it • Delegate it • Defer it • Dump it     Action steps   1. Set up a Tickler File   • Purchase and label 43 folders and file holder or • Read tutorial on creating Tickler file in Evernote   2. Set up “Next Actions” list   • Download preferred to-do app (Eg. Wunderlist) • Add necessary lists   3. Set up other useful lists in Evernote   • Download templates for useful lists   4. Opt out of junk mail   Organize – Maintaining your system   • Weekly Review     Action steps   1.    Schedule a time each week for a “Weekly Review” 2. Download “Weekly Planner”       Click here for a printable version of this cheat sheet summary.   Thank You Before you go, I’d like to say “thank you” for purchasing my book. You

After Steve’s death I received letters of condolence from people all over the world. I would like to thank everyone who sent such thoughtful sympathy. Your kind words and support gave me the strength to write this book and so much more. Carolyn Male is one of those dear people who expressed her thoughts and feelings after we lost Steve. It was incredibly touching and special, and I wanted to express my appreciation and gratitude. I’m happy to share it with you. It is with a still-heavy heart that I rise this evening to speak about the life and death of one of the greatest conservationists of our time: Steve Irwin. Many people describe Steve Irwin as a larrikin, inspirational, spontaneous. For me, the best way I can describe Steve Irwin is formidable. He would stand and fight, and was not to be defeated when it came to looking after our environment. When he wanted to get things done--whether that meant his expansion plans for the zoo, providing aid for animals affected by the tsunami and the cyclones, organizing scientific research, or buying land to conserve its environmental and habitat values--he just did it, and woe betide anyone who stood in his way. I am not sure I have ever met anyone else who was so determined to get the conservation message out across the globe, and I believe he achieved his aim. What I admired most about him was that he lived the conservation message every day of his life. Steve’s parents, Bob and Lyn, passed on their love of the Australian bush and their passion for rescuing and rehabilitating wildlife. Steve took their passion and turned it into a worldwide crusade. The founding of Wildlife Warriors Worldwide in 2002 provided Steve and Terri with another vehicle to raise awareness of conservation by allowing individuals to become personally involved in protecting injured, threatened, or endangered wildlife. It also has generated a working fund that helps with the wildlife hospital on the zoo premises and supports work with endangered species in Asia and Africa. Research was always high on Steve’s agenda, and his work has enabled a far greater understanding of crocodile behavior, population, and movement patterns. Working with the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service and the University of Queensland, Steve was an integral part of the world’s first Crocs in Space research program. His work will live on and inform us for many, many years to come. Our hearts go out to his family and the Australia Zoo family. It must be difficult to work at the zoo every day with his larger-than-life persona still very much evident. Everyone must still be waiting for him to walk through the gate. His presence is everywhere, and I hope it lives on in the hearts and minds of generations of wildlife warriors to come. We have lost a great man in Steve Irwin. It is a great loss to the conservation movement. My heart and the hearts of everyone here goes out to his family. Carolyn Male, Member for Glass House, Queensland, Australia October 11, 2006

Thank you for giving me joy when I bought you,” or “Thank you for teaching me what doesn’t suit me,” and let it go. Every

David tears a chocolate chip cookie in half. “Want some?” He holds a piece out to me. The chocolate glistens, and the brown-buttery inside looks like it will be chewy, which is how I like my cookies. I can’t think of a single reason to refuse. So I reach for it. “Thanks.” We chew together for a companionable moment. “That was really good,” I say after I’ve swallowed. “I know.” He balls up the wrap it came in. “It was a pretty big sacrifice on my part to give you half. I’m already regretting it.” “I’ll make it up to you someday, somehow. This, I swear.” “How about giving me your firstborn child?” “Okay, but when climate change has destroyed life as we know it and we’re all fighting to survive, you can’t favor your natural children over my poor little loaner.” He laughs, and I notice a couple of other kids turning to look at us. I guess the sound of David Fields laughing is unfamiliar enough to draw attention. His laugh is unexpectedly warm—​I’ve heard it a few times now, but its richness still surprises me. “Someone’s been reading too much dystopian fiction,” he says. “Yeah, don’t get me started on the zombie apocalypse.” “What’s to get started on? All you need is an axe and you’re good.” “You need some chain too.” “For what?” I roll my eyes. “To chain up your loved ones when they get bitten. Duh.” “Why even bother fighting? Why not just give in and all become zombies? Nothing would change—​most of the kids here would already tear out each other’s flesh if it meant they had a better chance of getting into Stanford.” “Yeah, but their parents would never let them eat any old brains—​they’d have to be organic.

Openness can enhance creativity in many different ways—not just for organizations like the LEGO Group, but also for individuals. And the benefits of openness are greater now than ever before, thanks to digital technologies. If you’re making videos, websites, or other digital creations, you can get ideas and suggestions from people around the world—and also make use of code, artwork, and music created by other people. On the flip side, you can make your digital creations available for others to modify, extend, and integrate into their own projects. This is all possible because digital media, unlike traditional products, can be copied and sent around the world at virtually no cost.

Such immune systems could equally be described as organismic early forms of a feeling for transcendence: thanks to the efficiency of these devices, which are constantly at the ready, the organism actively confronts the potential bringers of its death, opposing them with its endogenous capacity to overcome the lethal. Such functions have earned immune systems of this type comparisons to a ‘body police’ or border patrol. But as the concern, already at this level, is to work out a modus vivendi with foreign and invisible powers – and, in so far as these can bring death, ‘higher’ and ‘supernatural’ ones – this is a preliminary stage to the behaviour one is accustomed to terming religious or spiritual in human contexts. For every organism, its environment is its transcendence, and the more abstract and unknown the danger from that environment, the more transcendent it appears.

Our team at Start With Why is working hard to build a world where the vast majority of people wake up inspired to go to work, feel safe when they are there and return home at the end of the day fulfilled by the work they do. We are working hard to ensure that every employee has a Golden Circle on their desk and every organization can clearly articulate their higher purpose, cause or belief. This book is just one of the things we are doing to help bring our WHY to life. We know we can’t do this alone. Thank you for joining the movement, for helping us share the WHY. Inspire on

Nunes’s once-promising career in Congress had been given over fully to being a house organ for Trump.

Every morning, I had to work harder to talk my limbs into moving. Imagine a skeleton, tossing its organs inside its bony shell, sealing on its skin. Strutting into the world with a Hello! Doing fine, thank you. How are you? I’ll have it to you by the end of the day. Yes! That’s too funny, ha ha, good-bye.

In tough times, however, we’re praised for staying at our desks and burning the midnight oil. How are you supposed to see the horizon with your nose pressed against the grindstone? Thanks in large part to the factory mentality of modern workplace culture, organizations discourage the very behaviors that can save them.

What did Duncan have with which to organize pointless, brutal life?

Everyone deserves to write books if they want to. That will never be possible in a world where billionaires exist, but it’s possible in a humane one; thank you to everyone who’s working and organizing to get us there.

Um, we’re floating on a boulder in space, spinning at an incredible speed, held down by gravity and some arbitrary rule of physics. There’s only so much organic material on this planet, which means we’re made of molecules that came from dead stars. Dead. Stars. Some part of you was probably part of a dinosaur. For you to exist, every single one of your ancestors had to survive long enough to procreate, all the way back to the Stone Age and monkeys and small mammals and reptiles and fish and cells. You exist thanks to an unbroken chain of successful sex. Everything is a miracle…so calm your ass down.

Just like a city, parts of the Archives teemed with activity. The Scriptorium held rows of desks where scrivs toiled over translations or copied faded texts into new books with fresh, dark ink. The Sorting Hall buzzed with activity as scrivs sifted and reshelved books. The Buggery was not at all what I expected, thank goodness. Instead, it proved to be the place where new books were decontaminated before being added to the collection. Apparently all manner of creatures love books, some devouring parchment and leather, others with a taste for paper or glue. Bookworms were the least of them, and after listening to a few of Wilem’s stories I wanted nothing more than to wash my hands. Cataloger’s Mew, the Bindery, Bolts, Palimpsest, all of them were busy as beehives, full of quiet, industrious scrivs. But other parts of the Archives were quite the opposite of busy. The acquisitions office, for example, was tiny and perpetually dark. Through the window I could see that one entire wall of the office was nothing but a huge map with cities and roads marked in such detail that it looked like a snarled loom. The map was covered in a layer of clear alchemical lacquer, and there were notes written at various points in red grease pencil, detailing rumors of desirable books and the last known positions of the various acquisition teams. Tomes was like a great public garden. Any student was free to come and read the books shelved there. Or they could submit a request to the scrivs, who would grudgingly head off into the Stacks to find if not the exact book you wanted, then at least something closely related. But the Stacks comprised the vast majority of the Archives. That was where the books actually lived. And just like in any city, there were good neighborhoods and bad. In the good neighborhoods everything was properly organized and cataloged. In these places a ledger-entry would lead you to a book as simply as a pointing finger. Then there were the bad neighborhoods. Sections of the Archives that were forgotten, or neglected, or simply too troublesome to deal with at the moment. These were places where books were organized under old catalogs, or under no catalog at all. There were walls of shelves like mouths with missing teeth, where longgone scrivs had cannibalized an old catalog to bring books into whatever system was fashionable at the time. Thirty years ago two entire floors had gone from good neighborhood to bad when the Larkin ledger-books were burned by a rival faction of scrivs. And, of course, there was the four-plate door. The secret at the heart of the city. It was nice to go strolling in the good neighborhoods. It was pleasant to go looking for a book and find it exactly where it should be. It was easy. Comforting. Quick. But the bad neighborhoods were fascinating. The books there were dusty and disused. When you opened one, you might read words no eyes had touched for hundreds of years. There was treasure there, among the dross. It was in those places I searched for the Chandrian.

best market research companies in Myanmar: With AMT Market Research, you can learn more about Myanmar, a new market with a lot of potential. It is becoming a popular destination for businesses looking to expand in Southeast Asia. However, a thorough comprehension of the local consumer behavior, trends, and regulatory frameworks is necessary for successfully navigating this dynamic and rapidly changing landscape. AMT Market Research, one of the best market research companies in Myanmar, steps in to help businesses thrive by providing actionable insights and data-driven strategies. What Attracts You to AMT Market Research? AMT Market Research is well-known for providing customized, dependable, and comprehensive market research services. With a solid presence in Myanmar, AMT has been at the bleeding edge of assisting both neighborhood and worldwide organizations with figuring out the complexities of this one of a kind market. AMT stands out as one of the best market research companies in Myanmar for the following reasons: Local Knowledge: Myanmar is a nation with distinctive social, cultural, and ec onomic characteristics. AMT Market Research employs seasoned professionals who are well-versed in the dynamics of the local market. They provide in-depth knowledge of consumer behavior, upcoming trends, and potential obstacles unique to Myanmar's market. A Variety of Services: AMT Market Research offers a wide range of services, such as consumer research, competitor analysis, brand positioning, and product testing. Each client receives a service that is tailored to meet their specific requirements, ensuring that insights are accurate and actionable. Insights Driven by Data: To collect data, AMT makes use of cutting-edge research methods like qualitative and quantitative methods. AMT makes sure that the data it collects—from focus groups and surveys to in-depth interviews and field studies—is relevant and aids businesses in making informed decisions. Research on a Specific Sector: AMT Market Research provides industry-specific studies for businesses in the retail, telecom, healthcare, FMCG, and financial sectors. Businesses can more effectively target their audience and optimize their strategies using precise data thanks to this sector-specific approach. Strategic Entry into a Market: AMT provides strategic insights that can assist businesses attempting to navigate the complexities of market entry for the Myanmar market. AMT assists businesses in avoiding costly errors and accelerating growth by comprehending regulatory frameworks and determining the appropriate distribution channels. AMT Market Research's Advantages Accurate Data Collection: Get a clear picture of the market by having access to accurate, real-time data. Recommendations for Taking Action: AMT provides recommendations that assist businesses in taking immediate action in addition to providing data. Cost-effective Options: AMT Market Research is a cost-effective option for businesses of all sizes because they offer competitive pricing for their services. Conclusion: AMT Market Research is your go-to partner if you want your business in Myanmar to succeed long-term and with knowledge. AMT is one of the best market research companies in Myanmar thanks to their data-driven approach, extensive expertise, and wide range of services. Partner with AMT Market Research right away to empower your business with important insights!

Suraj solar and allied industries, Wework galaxy, 43, Residency Road, Bangalore-560025. Mobile number : +91 808 850 7979 Introduction to Solar Rooftop in Bangalore Solar rooftop systems have emerged as a game-changing innovation in Bangalore's energy consumption, providing a green and sustainable alternative to conventional sources of power. Solar rooftops are gaining a lot of traction among residential, commercial, and industrial users in the city as it deals with rising energy demands and environmental concerns. This article examines the advantages, drawbacks, government initiatives, case studies, and prospects for the future of solar rooftops, which have had a profound effect on Bangalore's energy landscape. 1. Introduction to Bangalore's Solar Rooftops An Overview of Bangalore's Solar Rooftop Systems Ah, Bangalore! Home to tech whiz kids, filter coffee connoisseurs, and now the progressive pioneers who are embracing solar rooftops! The eco-friendly Batman of the energy industry, solar rooftop systems are perched atop buildings and convert sunlight into clean, renewable power. Installed on rooftops, these systems use solar panels to generate electricity, assisting in the reduction of reliance on conventional grid power. 2. Economic Benefits of Solar Rooftops for Energy Consumption Who doesn't love saving money while protecting the environment? The economic benefits of solar rooftops in Bangalore are significant. By producing your own power, you can slice those heavy energy bills and even bring in an additional money by selling overabundance influence back to the matrix. It's like having a solar side business on your roof! Impact on the Environment Let's be honest: Bangalore's air quality could use a break. When it comes to reducing emissions of greenhouse gases and air pollution, solar rooftops emerge as the cloaked crusaders. You are reducing your carbon footprint and contributing to a cleaner and greener Bangalore by using solar power. When the sun shines on your rooftop panels, it's like giving Mother Nature a high five. 3. Impact of Solar Rooftop in Bangalore Energy Landscape Reduction of Carbon Footprint Bangalore, with its vibrant culture and bustling IT hubs, can also be a hotbed for emissions. Sun powered roofs go about as the eco-heroes, checking carbon impressions and advancing manageability. The city has the potential to make a significant leap toward a more healthy environment and a brighter future for future generations by utilizing solar energy. Integration with Existing Energy Infrastructure The beauty of solar rooftops in Bangalore is that they seamlessly combine solar power with traditional grid energy. These frameworks can undoubtedly incorporate with the current energy foundation, making a more strong and dependable energy organization. It's like combining the best of both worlds to guarantee the city's bustling energy supply's stability and sustainability. 4. Adopting Solar Rooftops: Obstacles and Solutions Initial Cost and Return on Investment We understand that the initial cost of installing solar rooftops may appear to be the bad guy in this sustainability tale. However, rest assured! The return on investment for solar rooftops in Bangalore is brighter than a sunny day thanks to government subsidies, tax incentives, and lower panel prices. Consider it a long-term investment in the environment and your savings. Technical Considerations and Maintenance Although the process of maintaining solar rooftops may appear intimidating, it is not rocket science—rather, it is solar science! To keep your solar panels in top condition, all you need to do is clean them on a regular basis, keep an eye on how well the system is working, and do occasional maintenance checks. Navigating the technical aspects of solar rooftops has never been easier thanks to technological advancements and the assistance of local experts.

The Natural Law Argument Bertrand Russell: “There is, as we all know, a law that if you throw dice, you will get double sixes only about once in thirty-six times, and we do not regard that as evidence that the fall of the dice is regulated by design.” Russell's argument is a logical fallacy because we cannot impose our understanding and interpretation of playing dice on God or the natural law. We must first define or understand our subject to talk about anything with scientific precision. Since nobody has an understanding of the world before the world, to put it that way, we cannot have a clear understanding or grasp of the things that are beyond our cognitive powers. We still can think about them. To say that science is only what is proven by scientific experiments would be foolish because that would exclude the vast space of the unknown, even unknowable. Maybe God does not play dice, but maybe even God needs, metaphorically speaking, to throw out thirty-six worlds to make some effects, even if only two, that would otherwise not be possible. As we know, matter cannot power itself and organize itself without the underlying creative force empowering it. Matter is matter thanks to our perceptive and cognitive powers, not per se. Matter per se does not exist in the form we see it. What we see is a reality based on our senses. We cannot completely rely on our senses to tell the underlying reality. Reaching the underlying reality is possible only through abstract thought. This abstract thought will enhance scientific discoveries because we cannot reach the physically unreachable by experiments or strictly scientific means. Identification of God from religious books with God independent of holy books is prevalent in the books or arguments against God used by the most famous atheists, including agnostics like Bertrand Russell. However, a huge difference exists between a God from religious books and Spinoza’s God or the God of many philosophers and scientists. Once we acknowledge and accept this important difference, we will realize that the gap between believers (not contaminated by religions) and atheists (or agnostics) is much smaller than it looks at first sight. God is not in the religious books, nor can he be owned through religious books. The main goal of the major monotheistic religions is to a priori appropriate and establish the right to God rather than to define and explain God in the deepest possible sense because that is almost impossible, even for science and philosophy. For that reason, a belief in blind faith and fear mostly saves major religions, rather than pure belief, unaffected by religious influence or deceit.

Taking a deep breath, he tucked his shoulders forward and loosened his posture. In an instant he was transformed from an ageless, elegant elf to a slouching human snowboarder. “Humans see only what they expect to see,” he said. “Come on, Pippin. You can pretend to be my dog.” I barked in excitement as Aliiana removed my saddle. I trotted along beside Nelathen as we approached a convenience store on the outskirts of town. “Remember not to talk,” he said as we entered the store through automatic sliding glass doors. I woofed obediently. “Hey,” a poorly-groomed human teenager said from the counter. “Heyyy,” Nelathen drawled, perfectly imitating a Utah human accent. Nelathen wandered around the store, grabbing several bags of organic trail mix, some fresh fruit, and a loaf of whole-grain, organic cranberry bread. “Not as good as elven bread, but it’s passable,” he said in a low voice. He also picked up a bag of Uncle Rover’s Super Yummy Bacon Strips for Dogs. “You deserve a treat,” he said, smiling down at me. I wagged my little nubbin of a tail enthusiastically. Nelathen laid our purchases on the counter, and added a Montana road map. “Cool dog,” the teenager behind the counter remarked as he scanned the items. I remembered that I was supposed to be posing as a regular dog, but I couldn’t help but bark at the compliment. “We’re on our way to the park,” Nelathen said. “Anything we should know about?” The scruffy teenager shrugged. “Snow pack’s good for boarding. They said it sounded like someone was dynamiting east of Lake McDonald Lodge last week, but they couldn’t find anyone. Maybe seismic activity, they said.” “Hmm.” Nelathen paid for our items with human cash. “Thanks.” “Okay, dude. Have fun.

Conservative elites first turned to populism as a political strategy thanks to Richard Nixon. His festering resentment of the Establishment’s clubby exclusivity prepared him emotionally to reach out to the “silent majority,” with whom he shared that hostility. Nixon excoriated “our leadership class, the ministers, the college professors, and other teachers… the business leadership class… they have all really let down and become soft.” He looked forward to a new party of independent conservatism resting on a defense of traditional cultural and social norms governing race and religion and the family. It would include elements of blue-collar America estranged from their customary home in the Democratic Party. Proceeding in fits and starts, this strategic experiment proved its viability during the Reagan era, just when the businessman as populist hero was first flexing his spiritual muscles. Claiming common ground with the folkways of the “good ole boy” working class fell within the comfort zone of a rising milieu of movers and shakers and their political enablers. It was a “politics of recognition”—a rediscovery of the “forgotten man”—or what might be termed identity politics from above. Soon enough, Bill Clinton perfected the art of the faux Bubba. By that time we were living in the age of the Bubba wannabe—Ross Perot as the “simple country billionaire.” The most improbable members of the “new tycoonery” by then had mastered the art of pandering to populist sentiment. Citibank’s chairman Walter Wriston, who did yeoman work to eviscerate public oversight of the financial sector, proclaimed, “Markets are voting machines; they function by taking referenda” and gave “power to the people.” His bank plastered New York City with clever broadsides linking finance to every material craving, while simultaneously implying that such seductions were unworthy of the people and that the bank knew it. Its $1 billion “Live Richly” ad campaign included folksy homilies: what was then the world’s largest bank invited us to “open a craving account” and pointed out that “money can’t buy you happiness. But it can buy you marshmallows, which are kinda the same thing.” Cuter still and brimming with down-home family values, Citibank’s ads also reminded everybody, “He who dies with the most toys is still dead,” and that “the best table in the city is still the one with your family around it.” Yale preppie George W. Bush, in real life a man with distinctly subpar instincts for the life of the daredevil businessman, was “eating pork rinds and playing horseshoes.” His friends, maverick capitalists all, drove Range Rovers and pickup trucks, donning bib overalls as a kind of political camouflage.

La Familia has gotten into the consumer loan business. Reportedly, the organization approves loans within 72 hours at an interest rate lower than banks charge. Within a week of the transaction, customers allegedly receive a communication stating: “Thank you for your trust, now you’re a part of La Familia Michoacán.

Most of these gifts remain unopened or have been used only once. Admit it. They simply don’t suit your taste. The true purpose of a present is to be received. Presents are not “things” but a means for conveying someone’s feelings. When viewed from this perspective, you don’t need to feel guilty for parting with a gift. Just thank it for the joy it gave you when you first received it. Of course, it would be ideal if you could use it with joy. But surely the person who gave it to you doesn’t want you to use it out of a sense of obligation, or to put it away without using it, only to feel guilty every time you see it. When you discard or donate it, you do so for the sake of the giver, too.

will take it round back to the daadi haus.” John grabbed one of the suitcases with his free hand and carried it to the porch. The driver made quick work of the rest of the bags, and they were soon all lined up ready to be moved. The driver bid his farewell, got back in the van, and headed off down the lane. They all herded into the house just as Dat and Thomas came in from the barn. Dat offered his hand to John. “Welcome, John Beiler. We’re pleased to have you with us.” “Thank you, sir,” John answered with a smile. Mamm interjected, “Malachi, will you and Thomas take the teacher’s luggage around back to the daadi haus? Then hurry back in for dinner.” “Will do,” Dat agreed, and off the two of them went. A few minutes later, Mamm had everyone organized at the table, and Dat gave the silent blessing. After the amen was sounded, Susie got busy making silly

I Am a Church Member I am a church member. I like the metaphor of membership. It’s not membership as in a civic organization or a country club. It’s the kind of membership given to us in 1 Corinthians 12: “Now you are the body of Christ, and individual members of it” (1 Cor. 12:27). Because I am a member of the body of Christ, I must be a functioning member, whether I am an “eye,” an “ear,” or a “hand.” As a functioning member, I will give. I will serve. I will minister. I will evangelize. I will study. I will seek to be a blessing to others. I will remember that “if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it” (1 Cor. 12:26). I am a church member. I will seek to be a source of unity in the church. I know there are no perfect pastors, staff, or other church members. But neither am I. I will not be a source of gossip or dissension. One of the greatest contributions I can make is to do all I can in God’s power to help keep the church in unity for the sake of the gospel. I am a church member. I will not let my church be about my preferences and desires. That is self-serving. I am in this church to serve others and to serve Christ. My Savior went to a cross for me. I can deal with any inconveniences and matters that are just not my preference or style. I am a church member. I will pray for my pastor every day. His work is never-ending. His days are filled with constant demands for his time—with the need to prepare sermons, with those who are rejoicing in births, with those who are traveling through the valley of the shadow of death, with critics, with the hurts and hopes of others, and with the need to be a husband and a father. My pastor cannot serve our church in his own power. I will pray for God’s strength for him and his family every day. I am a church member. I will lead my family to be good members of this church as well. We will pray together for our church. We will worship together in our church. We will serve together in our church. And we will ask Christ to help us fall deeper in love with this church, because He gave His life for her. I am a church member. This membership is a gift. When I received the free gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, I became a part of the body of Christ. I soon thereafter identified with a local body and was baptized. And now I am humbled and honored to serve and to love others in our church. I pray that I will never take my membership for granted, but see it as a gift and an opportunity to serve others and to be a part of something so much greater than any one person or member. I am a church member. And I thank God that I am.

close body proximity, along with kissing and touching, was not a family tradition. Her matter-of-fact voice uttered her dying gift—“you really were a disappointment to me.” Oh…my…god, really?! That’s it? Nothing else comes to mind! Wanna take a minute or two to confer with your conscience? What happened to the benevolence of the dying—one’s legacy and all that? Damn, why aren’t you dead yet? Doesn’t matter, I have assurances that the morgue has a slab with your name on it. Thank god your organs can’t be donated; no part of you should live on.

Presents are not “things” but a means for conveying someone’s feelings. When viewed from this perspective, you don’t need to feel guilty for parting with a gift. Just thank it for the joy it gave you when you first received it. Of course, it would be ideal if you could use it with joy. But surely the person who gave it to you doesn’t want you to use it out of a sense of obligation, or to put it away without using it, only to feel guilty every time you see it. When you discard or donate it, you do so for the sake of the giver, too.

Thankfully, over time, I have come to realize those skills initially dismissed as “soft”—communicating a vision, providing feedback, or leading a team—are fundamental to everything we try to do in business. You don't create a successful, sustainable, and scalable organization unless you can engage the people within the organization to work together. The “best friend at work” from the

Where did you buy that particular outfit and why? If you bought it because you thought it looked cool in the shop, it has fulfilled the function of giving you a thrill when you bought it. Then why did you never wear it? Was it because you realized that it didn’t suit you when you tried it on at home? If so, and if you no longer buy clothes of the same style or color, it has fulfilled another important function—it has taught you what doesn’t suit you. In fact, that particular article of clothing has already completed its role in your life, and you are free to say, “Thank you for giving me joy when I bought you,” or “Thank you for teaching me what doesn’t suit me,” and let it go.

I lost my parents during adolescence. I know what you're going through," he says, as the bartender arrives with the coffees. Andrea freezes. How does he know? They start drinking, in silence. Ian is disarmingly slow while Andrea, leaning back on the counter, finishes his in two quick sips. "And what am I going through Ian?" he challenges him, leaning his elbow next to the small cup and looking at him. Ian takes his last sip and gets off the stool. "You’re broken and experience moments of perfect chaos: one moment you're happy and the next moment you want to cut your veins," he says seriously. "You fluctuate in everyday life, hoping to create your own, new balance with small rituals. You organize your time in such a way that you don’t stand still, because if you stand still, you think. And if you think, you suffer. You're unstable, restless." He pauses. "Am I close?" "Quite." "And you’re looking for something that will make you feel better." He raises an eyebrow. "Or, maybe, fix you." He nods. "Yes." "And you've found it, too." He steps towards the cash till. "But you haven’t made it yours yet." "You’re right," says Andrea, taking his wallet. "You’re my guest," replies Ian, lifting his hand. "Thanks." The

I couldn’t but feel a panic attack coming on for keeping secrets from my guardian. It was there and then I revealed my Nuremberg Cathedral great escape to Andy. No More Lying “Did you enjoy the concert last evening?” I asked Andy timidly. “Yes, thank you very much for asking. Did you?” asked my Valet. I took time to answer his question, “To be honest, the little I heard of the organ recital was fantastic.” Andy sensing I had some hidden agenda up my sleeves continued probing, “Do you have something you’ll like to tell me, young man? I sense you are hiding some secrets from me. You should know that honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.

• Launched Real Time Talent, one of the most innovative workforce development initiatives in the country. It links the curriculum and training for more than four hundred thousand postsecondary students with the skill requirements of employers in the state (RealTimeTalentMN.org). • Created the Business Bridge, which facilitates connections between the procurement functions of large corporations and smaller potential suppliers located in the region. As a result of this effort, participating businesses added more than $1 billion to their spending with local businesses in two years—a year ahead of their goal. • Helped to build the case for investing more aggressively in higher education. By strengthening relationships between business and higher education leaders, and using a fact-based set of findings to justify investing more than an incremental amount, a coalition organized by Itasca helped increase spending in the state by more than $250 million annually. That’s not bad for a group of people with no budget, no office, no charter, virtually no Internet presence, virtually no staff—but a huge abundance of trust.

When the Web emerged, companies, led by Yahoo, started to organize it for consumers. Yahoo began as a directory of directories. Anytime someone put up a new website, Yahoo would add it to its directory, and then it started breaking websites down into groups—finance, news, sports, business, entertainment, et cetera. “And then search came along,” said Cutting, “and Web search engines, like AltaVista, started cropping up.

Another way Mother Nature builds resilience is by being very federal in how she self-organizes. She nests her communities—which are analogous to states, counties, and towns—within a flexible framework that makes the whole more than the sum of its parts. That is, she’s built on trillions and trillions of small-scale networks, starting with microorganisms and building into bigger and bigger ecosystems. But each one is a little community, naturally adapting and evolving in order to survive and thrive.

Removing tyrants sometimes does indeed lead to freedom. At other times it merely leads to new kinds of tyranny. Happy the revolution where the revolutionaries are both freedom-loving and effectively organized for the long haul of political struggle.

The true purpose of a present is to be received. Presents are not “things” but a means for conveying someone’s feelings. When viewed from this perspective, you don’t need to feel guilty for parting with a gift. Just thank it for the joy it gave you when you first received it. Of course, it would be ideal if you could use it with joy. But surely the person who gave it to you doesn’t want you to use it out of a sense of obligation, or to put it away without using it, only to feel guilty every time you see it.

Find your own authentic leadership style; your own unique way of listening to, helping and engaging with your front line. Challenge the often formidable psychological distance between basement and boardroom. Your people will thank you, and so will your customers.

Practicing law had also taught him much about reality and perception. The two were not the same. It was impossible for any lawyer, no matter how organized or capable, to be prepared always. Good lawyers acknowledged this and focused instead on appearing prepared. There were survival techniques in court: Speak only when asked a direct question; if you did not know the answer to a direct question, rephrase the question to fit your answer; talk in general terms rather than specifics; get what information possible, be thankful for it, and sit down and shut up. Get in and get out. The less time you spoke, the less chance you had of making a mistake.