The Panda Bear this year is feels like she wants to enjoy the "lazy days of summer". There was time when the Panda Bear was young and more idealistic. She felt that with air conditioning summer could be more like the rest of the year. There were times in the Panda Bear's youth where she felt the summers could be too slow. Now in mid-life Panda Bear welcomes the summer. She now feels that this has been a downside to air conditioning that the "need" for a summer vacation has been reduced(in a few office buildings in Boston that aren't air conditioned many of them will offer a reduced summer schedule probably because of the heat). The Panda Bear is old enough to remember that things slowed down when there were fewer air conditioners because heat. Now the Panda Bear just wants to spend all day sitting outside enjoying the sun. In New England, there are so very days that it is nice to be outside and the Panda Bear just wants to enjoy them all.
Mr. Panda was very good this weekend and helped clean-up alot of dishes(the Panda Bear promised to reward him by giving him a good write-up in her blog). The Panda Bear has not seen many newly released movies for a while because the theaters in Boston are very few and they are expensive. In addition, she does not have a DVD player. At first the Panda Bear was mad at the movie industry for forcing people to upgrade from VHS tapes to DVDs. Now she has relented. She and Mr. Panda after deciding to buy a DVD over a year ago(they are slow) finally bought one. They returned it because it did not connect with their television set(they set if from about 1990). After, they returned it, some one in the store said they needed a kind of adaptor to make the connection in the set. Mr. Panda did not want buy the DVD player with the adapter the same day after they returned the DVD player because it might be an issue with store credits. However, hopefully, they will get a DVD player by September 1st. In contrast to the stereotype, it is the Panda Bear not her husband who is responsible for installing new technology in their household.
The Panda Bear does not want to bore her readers with further discussions about eReaders. However, in Boston they were in the news this weekend because a major book chain is going out of business here in part because of eReaders. This article appeared in the Boston Globe this Sunday on the effect eBooks on reading. However, the Panda Bear wants to stress to her readers that some eReaders more closely feel like a paper book than others. The Panda Bear would not want to read books on a tablet(i.e IPad) -she likes the "unplugged" feeling of reading and she likes the epaper screen(it tries to be like paper) over an LCD screen. To Panda Bear the advantages of eReading are that is is easier to carry a lot of books, the font size can be adjusted on some so people don't need reading glasses) and it is convenient just to be able to download books from the library rather than physically have to go there.
The Panda Bear notices that very many people who work or are otherwise very busy they like things because they save time rather than they are always the "best" way of doing things.
The Panda Bear will be cutting this posting short. She has being enjoying reading outside during the lazy days of summer.
Monday, July 18, 2011
Thursday, July 14, 2011
The Panda Bear on Name Calling, Bullying and Communism
The Panda Bear in thinking about her experiences of childhood bullying started to ask herself what similarities there are between childhood and adult social behavior. She thinks office relationships and classroom social relationships are similar in that there is a hierarchy to them.
However, where she thinks adult and childhood bullying and intimidating behavior are the most similar is that they call each other names.
The Panda Bear remembers both she and her best friend were taunted for being lesbians by the "popular:" girls when they were eleven. FYI, the Panda Bear remembers the school doing nothing to stop this name calling(lesbian was meant as an insult). The Panda Bear and her best friend actually turned out to be straight-not that this matters. Recently when programs have started to come to help bullied gays the Panda Bear remembered these girls thought they were so politically incorrect.
When the Panda Bear tells this story now people express sympathy for the Panda Bear and think it was very odd of these girls to be calling people lesbians when they were eleven. More to the point, many people have asked did anyone know at eleven what being a lesbian was. The Panda Bear and the "popular" girls knew that it had something to do with females preferring females to males(which the Panda Bear did at eleven-she did not get interested in boys until she was about seventeen). However, the Panda Bear does not think they understood the full meaning of the word.
However, the Panda Bear believes that in the political arena the name calling is very similar to what the "popular" girls did to the Panda Bear and her friend in elementary school. It can be insulting even ruin people but people don't realize what the word fully means. The Panda Bear will be starting a series of posts about political terms and/or insults and what they really mean.
For today's post, the Panda Bear will examine the word "communist". Both she and Mr. Panda have used the term in a technically incorrect way. According to Rodney Carlisle in his book The Complete Idiot's Guide to Spying and Espionage, a communist was someone who was took orders from the communist party in Russia and/or the former Soviet Union. The Panda Bear might expand this definition to include the communist parties of Cuba, China and North Korea. These people would technically be traitors to the US or other Western European countries because they pledged there loyalty to another country.
According to Dr. Carlise, under this definition of communism, there were some US communists in the 1930s and 1940s who were attracted to the USSR for ideological reasons and members of the US communist party were recruited to spy for the Soviets. However, most of the protesters of the nineteen sixties who where investigated by the FBI for being communists including Martin Luther King were not communists but just political protesters.
Both the Panda Bear and her husband having been guilty of confusing the term communism(allegiance to the communist party of a foreign government) with socialism. Once the Panda Bear was written up at work for calling her managers communists in an e-mail which ended up getting passed around b other workers What the Panda Bear meant was that the managers did not know how to motivate their work force and did not use merit based systems to reward the individual efforts of employees. However, the Panda Bear now admits that she was wrong to call the managers communists-they were not taking orders from hostile foreign governments.
However, where she thinks adult and childhood bullying and intimidating behavior are the most similar is that they call each other names.
The Panda Bear remembers both she and her best friend were taunted for being lesbians by the "popular:" girls when they were eleven. FYI, the Panda Bear remembers the school doing nothing to stop this name calling(lesbian was meant as an insult). The Panda Bear and her best friend actually turned out to be straight-not that this matters. Recently when programs have started to come to help bullied gays the Panda Bear remembered these girls thought they were so politically incorrect.
When the Panda Bear tells this story now people express sympathy for the Panda Bear and think it was very odd of these girls to be calling people lesbians when they were eleven. More to the point, many people have asked did anyone know at eleven what being a lesbian was. The Panda Bear and the "popular" girls knew that it had something to do with females preferring females to males(which the Panda Bear did at eleven-she did not get interested in boys until she was about seventeen). However, the Panda Bear does not think they understood the full meaning of the word.
However, the Panda Bear believes that in the political arena the name calling is very similar to what the "popular" girls did to the Panda Bear and her friend in elementary school. It can be insulting even ruin people but people don't realize what the word fully means. The Panda Bear will be starting a series of posts about political terms and/or insults and what they really mean.
For today's post, the Panda Bear will examine the word "communist". Both she and Mr. Panda have used the term in a technically incorrect way. According to Rodney Carlisle in his book The Complete Idiot's Guide to Spying and Espionage, a communist was someone who was took orders from the communist party in Russia and/or the former Soviet Union. The Panda Bear might expand this definition to include the communist parties of Cuba, China and North Korea. These people would technically be traitors to the US or other Western European countries because they pledged there loyalty to another country.
According to Dr. Carlise, under this definition of communism, there were some US communists in the 1930s and 1940s who were attracted to the USSR for ideological reasons and members of the US communist party were recruited to spy for the Soviets. However, most of the protesters of the nineteen sixties who where investigated by the FBI for being communists including Martin Luther King were not communists but just political protesters.
Both the Panda Bear and her husband having been guilty of confusing the term communism(allegiance to the communist party of a foreign government) with socialism. Once the Panda Bear was written up at work for calling her managers communists in an e-mail which ended up getting passed around b other workers What the Panda Bear meant was that the managers did not know how to motivate their work force and did not use merit based systems to reward the individual efforts of employees. However, the Panda Bear now admits that she was wrong to call the managers communists-they were not taking orders from hostile foreign governments.
Monday, July 11, 2011
The Panda Bear on Vacation, eReaders, Congress, Milatary Speding, Bullying
The Panda Bear has just returned from her vacation. At her daytime job, she is doing what many office workers do after returning from vacation which is catch up on her e-mail. She will probably spend the next couple of days mostly reviewing her e-mail. However, the Panda Bear is fortunate in that she does not have to check her e-mail while she is on vacation.
Yesterday, she spent the day discussing with other US citizens the larger amounts of vacation time most Europeans have over Americans. Someone said how in Europe, mostt workers take the entire month of August off. The Panda Bear does not think in her entireworking life that she will get to take a month of from work. However, the Panda Bear pointed out that Americans pay more for defense and military than Europe does-perhaps that is a major reason US citizens work harder and have less social services than their European counterparts. The Panda Bear believes that with the end of the cold war the US should reexamine its defense commitments to Europe since the US and Western Europe no longer have the common enemy of the USSR. She thinks Western Europe should take more responsibility for its own defense.
During her vacation, the Panda Bear watched the US congress discuss, debate and vote on US military actions on C-SPAN which is a cable television station that covers government hearings. (The Panda Bear and her husband do not have cable at home so cable television is a treat when they go on vacation). The Panda Bear was surprised that votes regarding US military policy did not follow party lines as much as she would have expected. She was impressed that the voting was not as partisan as she would have thought it was from the news.
The Panda Bear is in eReader heaven. As readers may know the Panda Bear bought an Kobo eReader during her vacation. (Economists and Retailers-please note, that vacations are when the Panda Bear spends the most money-the Panda Bear believes vacations should be seen as a highly economically productive and valueable activity). She finds her eReader is very easy on her eyes and she can adjust the font size to make it easier to read. She can download books from the library and no longer has to worry about returning them(on eReaders, you can't read the book on the eReader after 14 days-no more library fines for nonreturned books). The Panda Bear no longer has to strain herself by carrying lots of books around. She can carry around 1000 books in her eReader. Through Google eBooks there are lots of books Panda Bear can get for free. Alot of books whose copyright has expired become free eBooks and the Panda Bear LOVES old books. Through http://www.kobobooks.com/ she also found a lot of eBooks for ninety-nine cents. No more going to the bookstore or library for the Panda Bear!!!
The Panda Bear plans in the future to return to her discussions of childhood bullying. She has reviewed some information on the web regarding childhood bullying. She finds it interesting that many sites states that girls aren't violent when they bully. The Panda Bear and her bullied friends know this is not true-girls can be physically brutal when they bully.
The Panda Bear also believes that some of the information on the web does not deal with how mean children can be to each other. The Panda Bear believes that children are meaner than adults. Adults when they are mean try to justify and rationalize their behavior while when children are cruel it can be just for the sake of being cruel.
Yesterday, she spent the day discussing with other US citizens the larger amounts of vacation time most Europeans have over Americans. Someone said how in Europe, mostt workers take the entire month of August off. The Panda Bear does not think in her entireworking life that she will get to take a month of from work. However, the Panda Bear pointed out that Americans pay more for defense and military than Europe does-perhaps that is a major reason US citizens work harder and have less social services than their European counterparts. The Panda Bear believes that with the end of the cold war the US should reexamine its defense commitments to Europe since the US and Western Europe no longer have the common enemy of the USSR. She thinks Western Europe should take more responsibility for its own defense.
During her vacation, the Panda Bear watched the US congress discuss, debate and vote on US military actions on C-SPAN which is a cable television station that covers government hearings. (The Panda Bear and her husband do not have cable at home so cable television is a treat when they go on vacation). The Panda Bear was surprised that votes regarding US military policy did not follow party lines as much as she would have expected. She was impressed that the voting was not as partisan as she would have thought it was from the news.
The Panda Bear is in eReader heaven. As readers may know the Panda Bear bought an Kobo eReader during her vacation. (Economists and Retailers-please note, that vacations are when the Panda Bear spends the most money-the Panda Bear believes vacations should be seen as a highly economically productive and valueable activity). She finds her eReader is very easy on her eyes and she can adjust the font size to make it easier to read. She can download books from the library and no longer has to worry about returning them(on eReaders, you can't read the book on the eReader after 14 days-no more library fines for nonreturned books). The Panda Bear no longer has to strain herself by carrying lots of books around. She can carry around 1000 books in her eReader. Through Google eBooks there are lots of books Panda Bear can get for free. Alot of books whose copyright has expired become free eBooks and the Panda Bear LOVES old books. Through http://www.kobobooks.com/ she also found a lot of eBooks for ninety-nine cents. No more going to the bookstore or library for the Panda Bear!!!
The Panda Bear plans in the future to return to her discussions of childhood bullying. She has reviewed some information on the web regarding childhood bullying. She finds it interesting that many sites states that girls aren't violent when they bully. The Panda Bear and her bullied friends know this is not true-girls can be physically brutal when they bully.
The Panda Bear also believes that some of the information on the web does not deal with how mean children can be to each other. The Panda Bear believes that children are meaner than adults. Adults when they are mean try to justify and rationalize their behavior while when children are cruel it can be just for the sake of being cruel.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
The Panda Bear on Vacation, eReaders
The Panda Bear will not be able to do her usual posts because she is on vacation this week. Tomorrow, she will go away for a few days to a local hotel that is near the beach. The Panda Bear thinks that part of the pleasure of going away is getting away from home chores and household tasks. She thinks her female readers probably feel this way more than her male readers.
The Panda Bear finds it work getting ready for the vacation. In the United States, it is a long weekend. What the Panda Bear and her husband did is go shopping-the Panda Bear would rather go to a barbecue. The Panda Bear does not like spending her limited spare to shopping. She and Mr. Panda got a DVD player(yes, the Panda Bear knows that she is slow-she has not seen many recent movies because they don't have a DVD player). Mr. Panda was surprised to know how cheap televisions have become.
The Panda Bear also did some impulse buying. She brought a KOBO eReader. As the price of eReaders has gone down, the Panda Bear has gotten more interested in purchasing one. As she and Mr. Panda were in Best Buy, she saw an eReader that said "Buy me". What she liked about the KOBO e-Reader is that you can take books out of the library with it but you CAN NOT use it for email and web browsing. The Panda Bear likes the off-line, unconnected feel of reading. Also she likes the eReaders where the page tries to look like a book page. The computer screen bothers the Panda Bear's eyes after a while.
The Panda Bear has downloaded her first e-book and find eReaders easy on the eye. It is a bit of a challenge to read and not be holding a book. However, the Panda Bear thinks she will get used to it in time. On the whole the Panda Bear is happy with her eReader. It will make her packing much easier since the Panda Bear likes taking a lot of books on her vacation and in her e-Reader that fits into her purse she can hold 8000 books. Actually, the Panda Bear has gotten used to looking at magazines and newspapers online and now finds print periodicals a little unusual.
However, the Panda Bear is very busy running errands and preparing for her few day vacation. She has never been so busy for a while. She hopes to resume her normal twice weekly postings next week.
The Panda Bear finds it work getting ready for the vacation. In the United States, it is a long weekend. What the Panda Bear and her husband did is go shopping-the Panda Bear would rather go to a barbecue. The Panda Bear does not like spending her limited spare to shopping. She and Mr. Panda got a DVD player(yes, the Panda Bear knows that she is slow-she has not seen many recent movies because they don't have a DVD player). Mr. Panda was surprised to know how cheap televisions have become.
The Panda Bear also did some impulse buying. She brought a KOBO eReader. As the price of eReaders has gone down, the Panda Bear has gotten more interested in purchasing one. As she and Mr. Panda were in Best Buy, she saw an eReader that said "Buy me". What she liked about the KOBO e-Reader is that you can take books out of the library with it but you CAN NOT use it for email and web browsing. The Panda Bear likes the off-line, unconnected feel of reading. Also she likes the eReaders where the page tries to look like a book page. The computer screen bothers the Panda Bear's eyes after a while.
The Panda Bear has downloaded her first e-book and find eReaders easy on the eye. It is a bit of a challenge to read and not be holding a book. However, the Panda Bear thinks she will get used to it in time. On the whole the Panda Bear is happy with her eReader. It will make her packing much easier since the Panda Bear likes taking a lot of books on her vacation and in her e-Reader that fits into her purse she can hold 8000 books. Actually, the Panda Bear has gotten used to looking at magazines and newspapers online and now finds print periodicals a little unusual.
However, the Panda Bear is very busy running errands and preparing for her few day vacation. She has never been so busy for a while. She hopes to resume her normal twice weekly postings next week.
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