I don’t have this yet, but supposedly all US users will have it within days. I’ll say more when I have the feature. There is a video demo at the following link. peace, mjh
The Official Netflix Blog : US & Canada: Introducing Netflix Social
Starting today, Netflix members in the U.S. can share their favorite shows and movies on Netflix with friends by connecting to Facebook and agreeing to share.
The Official Netflix Blog : US & Canada: Introducing Netflix Social
I might say “wealth” instead of “luxury.” peace, mjh
Eugene Robinson: Paul Ryan’s make-believe budget – The Washington Post
Voters were supposed to believe that Ryan was an apostle of fiscal rectitude. But his real aim wasn’t to balance the budget. It was to starve the federal government of revenue. Big government, in his worldview, is inherently bad — never mind that we live in an awfully big country.
Ryan and Mitt Romney offered their vision, President Obama offered his, and Americans made their choice. Rather emphatically.
Now Ryan, as chairman of the House Budget Committee, is coming back with an ostensibly new and improved version of the framework that voters rejected in November.
Eugene Robinson: Paul Ryan’s make-believe budget – The Washington Post
I am sitting home alone on Saturday night, under the light of one lamp, the only sound the whoosh of a humidifier. Not quite alone: the dog sleeps in my chair. Not quite alone: I’m reaching out to untold numbers of others (at least 3, to tell). I used to think I was shy, but I had trouble reconciling that with my pleasure in teaching a classroom of students. (Not too many, though I have lectured to 200.) Merri and I are both introverts, although that probably surprises more people about her than about me. And, some of my best friends are introverts. (We should have a big party. Kidding!) peace, mjh
Leonard Pitts: For introverts, working alone works best – Leonard Pitts Jr. – MiamiHerald.com
[W]here shyness is an outsized fear of other people’s disapproval or of social embarrassment, to be an introvert is to be inward turning, more at home in small, intimate groups than large, boisterous ones. It is to prefer the quiet to the loud, reflection to exhortation, solitude to socializing. …
[I]t is not that the introvert doesn’t enjoy the company of others. Rather, it’s that after a certain point, it leaves [one] feeling physically drained. That’s who I am — less Bill Clinton than Al Gore — and I’ve given myself permission to stop fighting it.
Leonard Pitts: For introverts, working alone works best – Leonard Pitts Jr. – MiamiHerald.com
Has anyone read Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain. (I have not.) peace, mjh
I’ve never been in a *growing* minority — oh wait, computer users, Windows 8 users, etc — never mind. When wheat-free becomes majoritarian, I’ll return to baking bread, ever the contrarian. peace, mjh
30% of US adults trying to cut down on gluten, claims NPD Group
Almost a third (30%) of American adults say they are trying to reduce or exclude gluten from their diets, according to The NPD Group, which conducted a consumer survey in January 2013.
And interest in gluten-free menu items at restaurants is also growing fast, said the consultancy, with the incidence of consumers ordering food described as gluten-free or wheat-free now more than double what it was four years ago.
“The number of US adults who say they are cutting down on or avoiding gluten is too large for restaurant operators to ignore”, said Bonnie Riggs, NPD restaurant industry analyst
30% of US adults trying to cut down on gluten, claims NPD Group
OMG, I’m in a cult. peace, mjh
Baking industry acknowledges the impact of Wheat Belly | Wheat Belly Blog
Hopefully, [new converts] will also recognize the essential differences between the arguments articulated in Wheat Belly and the common and awful mistakes made by the “gluten-free” world that relies on junk carbohydrate sources, typically cornstarch, rice flour, tapioca starch, and potato starch—foods that cause weight gain, inflammation, insulin resistance/diabetes, visceral fat accumulation, cataracts, arthritis, hypertension, heart disease, dementia, and cancer. Yeah, don’t go down that path unless making full use of your healthcare insurance is part of your lifeplan.
Wheat Belly is about understanding that modern wheat, via the efforts of the Green Revolution to increase yield-per-acre, was inadvertently turned into a nutritional monster, complete with appetite-stimulating and other mind effects. But it is also about understanding what to replace wheat with: We don’t want to replace a problem–wheat–with another problem–gluten-free junk carbohydrates.
Make no mistake: The Wheat Belly message is making headway [thanks to you, my proselytizing disciples].
Baking industry acknowledges the impact of Wheat Belly | Wheat Belly Blog
All kidding of Our Leader aside, modern wheat may be poison. Just like carbonated beverages. There is precedent for the Food Industry selling poison. And the Unhealth Industry selling cures for the ills that poison causes. peace, mjh
I made the wrong choice of watching a dull, ponderous sci-fi-ish movie called One Day Like Rain. Instead of watching this film school exercise (C-), read the Rumi quote the title is drawn from. I shall spoil this 90 minute waste of time for you: moody adolescent girl uses "physics and chemistry" to grow crystals in her parents’ garage and concocts a liquid from said crystals that causes hallucinations, catatonia, and, in the case of her best friend, death. I don’t follow the leap from there to the end/beginning of the world and rain on troglodytes on Mars (owing something to the rock monster in the original StarTrek). A troupe of surprisingly eclectic bibliophilic homeless people figures in, somehow.
In the end the moody girl has sex by the lake with her boyfriend, beginning or ending the world; "this is what the garden was for." Only a horny teenaged boy (redundant) could ignore her coital soliloquy (the third recitation of Rumi). All I could think about is how her boyfriend, twice as tall as she, must be humping her knees for their face-to-face missionary lovemaking. That tells you something about how riveting this movie is. Even the cameo by Jesse Eisenberg (Social Network) as the 20-year-old virgin brother was disappointing. At least, he didn’t confuse screaming with acting, favoring perplexed silence (as in, “how will this help my career?” — he may be the only one whose career didn’t sink after this). Five minutes of rain yesterday exceeded the best 5 minutes of this movie, if you can find that many. It is fitting that the stars all wink out near the end — the perfect metaphor for a zero star movie. Please don’t watch it.
Leap ahead.