LYRICS:

  And I must admit I called the shots 
  For all the world to see 
  And when the play went sour, I can't blame them 
  For laying all the blame on me 
  For placing all the blame on me
  Maybe I'm too blind to see 
  Maybe you were good to me 
  Maybe I'm too blind to see 
  How I could have failed at all  When I first met you 
  You made sense of every particle I own 
  Even when present now 
  You're quite elusive 
  It seems I love a Higgs boson 
  You're my personal Higgs boson

  Maybe I'm too blind to see 
  Maybe you were good to me 
  Maybe I'm to blind to see That I could have been wrong... at all

  Now that you have grown quite elusive 
  You are my personal Higgs boson

I, personally, always felt that smaller classes, like the special ones that prepared us to our version of the SATs, were much more productive than the normal, super-sized, ones. So, yes, make'em smaller.

Dan Meyer, a math teacher, in his TEDtalk (http://tinyurl.com/323wup9), said this about his teaching subject: "I sell a product to a market that doesn't want it, but it's forced, by law, to buy it. It's just a losing proposition." So, in addition to make'em smaller, make'em interesting. In other words, allow the teacher to make the subjects as interesting as he can. I have a feeling that it's much more important to make the student care about a particular topic than to make him learn it. If he wants to learn, he will; the opposite is also true. As Roland Barthes wrote: "no power, a little knowledge, a little wisdom, and as much flavor as possible."

I don't think there's an easy answer to education problems. I also don't think they are anyone's specific fault. The system is broken, or maybe it just seems too screwed to fix. The difficulties are numerous: the teacher's low salary and appreciation, the schools poor infra-structure, the questionable effectiveness of the assembly-line model of education -- or, as thenewgreen put it, the "post industrial model of curriculum". These are hardships I know exist in my country and I think also exist in other parts of the world.

Anyway, here are some good examples of alternative schools. Maybe they're doing better than the rest of us.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escola_da_Ponte http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summerhill_School

alpha0's comment touches on one of the main threads I have been considering. The Bible and Shakespeare are types of literature that impart cultural literacy. You can't help but notice after you have read a handful of Greek plays references to those plays which well educated/intelligent people make to help illustrate all manner of situations. All of a sudden you get the joke and feel richer for it intelectualy and regret the time spent in ignorant darkness. What seemed before to be intellectual snobbery is realized to be a pretty insightful way to compare one thing to another for the sake of understanding.

Cultural literacy is pretty powerful stuff, unlike so many things, you don't realize what you have till you get it, and it can't be taken away. Been making my own list (haha, after my attack on lists) of books that deliver cultural literacy.

Proposed reading list: The Bible (pretty much any holy books will deliver some pervasive cultural understanding). Major Shakespearean Tragedies Handful of Greek plays Plato's Republic The Iliad and Odyssey Atlas Shrugged Cannery Row The Jungle Some kind of summery of Wealth of Nations and the Communist Manifesto

I have some odd books that I think should be added, Stendhal's "Red and the Black" is something I would like my kid to read but probably never made it on a must read book list that wasn't written by an avowed socialist. What would you add to a cultural literacy book list?

  Impromptu by Byron

  BENEATH Blessington's eyes
  The reclaimed Paradise
  Should be free as the former from evil;
  But if the new Eve
  For an Apple should grieve,
  What mortal would not play the Devil?

   It was a midnight shorn of pretensions
   I was high as a kite, nearly a child.
   Avenue A behind me on the 11th, Alpha-Bet C-T,
   As I sang aloud the first Canto of the throb'ler of hearts.
   The night is vivid, etched in gray matter with light
   The presence of Friend, the vital uplifted heart.

   Yes, I sang that Canto aloud in the streets
   For I seek the Avenger of the Human Heart.

Elderly people who have to wear diapers are exposed to strip searches by TSA employees, as are infants, unable to crawl or walk. I am absolutely disgusted by this administration. They have no decency.

Obama hasn't fought for a single progressive issue, he has continualy stood back and allowed fools like Harry Reed and Nancy Pilocy lead us to crippling compromises that have rarely if ever done much service to our nation. The only fight he has led is the one to increase the debt ceiling, and if you thought that turned out for the best well.....

On the up side he as appointed competent administrators to many positions in the government in general and has ran much better wars then the previous administration. These are truly significant upsides compared to the Bush administration.

If you thought that Bush was an idiot than you were the one that was fooled. Bush ran one of the most successful presidencies in ages. He ran government into the ground, crippling over site and red tape. He got his war in Iraq, and he expanded the power of religion in government. An incredibly successful presidency, just not a liberal progressive one. Wake up to the vile powers of your enemies, stop underestimating them by labeling them idiots and terrible leaders, it just paints you as a fool.

Obama is ineffectual or believes in nothing that he feels is worth fighting for, maybe he will change his stripes, but I won't hold my breath, I like living.

I still manage to not answer the phone, though, thanks to Caller ID :) Yay! That's been a huge change for me. Before that, I used to dread picking up the phone until I knew who it was.

The whole thing of feeling old when technology changes - I know what you mean. I feel old anyway, regardless, but it does feel strange to have witnessed society changing so drastically. But maybe the changes tend to fade into the background after a while. I once asked my grandmother what it had been like to live through all the many changes she'd seen over her lifetime (she died aged 99) and her answer was the equivalent of "Meh!" She'd experienced the introduction of electricity, home phones, cars, planes, space travel, television, mobile phones, computers, and then the introduction of the internet age, and it was like she hadn't really noticed any of it as being unusual. Maybe that was just her, though.

registration? sheesh. what do I care what my neighbor believes? a relationship with a god, or not believing in a god is such a deeply personal and intimate thing, I struggle to see the point of this guy's blog, or "righteous cause".

it's just sad really.

August 2016 - US contractors in Syria

March 2017 - 400 more troops US Troops to Syria

October 2016 - What US Special Forces are doing in Syria

Remember - (1) We've had troops in Syria for years (2) Tillerson didn't rule out a military response to North Korea, either. "We're weighing all options" is basically Rex's version of "no comment."

Just as a gentle reminder, back when your dad and I were kids? The Soviets blew fuckin' airliners out of the sky. Had a rep from Georgia on it and everything. They did this because we - "allegedly" - had a bunch of spy gear on it (flight 007 indeed). Wasn't even the first time. Hell, the Turks blew a Sukhoi out of the sky not 18 months ago.

You give the average angry man on the street an option right now and he'll say "we gotta do something!" Give that guy half an hour with Wikipedia first, on the other hand, and "something" becomes "uhmmmmumblemumblemumble" because there are no easy options in Syria. That's one reason it's such a pigfuck.

Does Trump have half an hour's worth of attention span for Wikipedia? Prolly not. But there's a long list of people under him that know shit Wikipedia doesn't.

Syria has every possibility of being the downer Iraq was only without that awesome "Mission Accomplished" photo op. Trump may not realize that but everyone else does. The successful playbook is to dump shit-tons of guns'n'money on the Kurds, bait the Russians into playing in Syria and let them send in troops. Doing something active with the uniformed military? No upside. None.

tim mccarver just told a great rickles story on the cardinals broadcast, which i think i understood correctly. apparently one time rickles was trying to make it with someone at a club in nyc, and sinatra was there, and either they were friends or else knew each other through someone else, i'm not sure. anyway rickles passed word along that it would mean a lot to him (and to the woman) if sinatra wandered up and said hello.

so halfway through dinner sinatra comes up to say hi don, as a favor, and don turns to him and says, "frank, i keep telling you not to bother me when i'm having private dinners"

or something like that.

if you're not at 10000 lifetime views the amount of money you are making is negligible

10,000 views is a drop in the bucket. auto-narrated clickbait gets 10,000 views before Youtube even starts counting.

We target a lot more stringently than you.

- within 10 miles

- Female between 25 and 35

- College-educated

Our Facebook ad links to our landing page. When I look at our mailing list, to see where our subscribers are from,

- 11% Facebook

- 10% "Drove by the clinic"

- 8% Web Search

We've got a whole bunch that didn't fill out that box.

Keep in mind - Facebook is just part of our strategy. We've also got an active Pinterest page and Facebook drives to our mailing list (64% open rate, thankyouverymuch) but we're also local. We're basically trying to hit everything with a uterus and a health plan within an easy drive of the clinic. Your strategy should probably be a little different. I feel pretty bashful giving a salesman tips on selling. Somewhere on here I've got a link about sales strategies for ultra-high net worth individuals. It spoke to a completely different approach. It's possible you'll capture clients with Facebook - I'd try an approach other than keywords - but it's more likely you'll capture them through a referral network.

My wife has a new client. She's the sister-in-law of a former client.

In Los Angeles.

Facebook won't help you with shit like that.

yeah, less than 10$ most probably. It's no big deal.

How many FB adds have you clicked on in the past month, year or in your life?