Playing with iCalendar Feeds
We're talking about calendar management at work so I got to looking around at the iCalendar standard and its use. What I learned is that I am way behind the curve on this topic and that people have put some fantastic tools in place already.
Over at netvibes.com they offer a little portlet through which you can subscribe to different calendars offered in iCal format.
Google Calendars offers the ability to subscribe to external calendars in addition to those of other google users.
Outlook can handle individual iCal files, but using an extension called Remote Calendars I read about over at Wikipedia's article on iCalendar, you can subscribe to calendar feeds as well.
PersonalDNA - Personality Test
Yet another personality test, true, but this one seems to accommodate a wide range of variation using sliding scales instead of numbers or letters.
The relative size of each colored box reveals the strength of a particular personality trait. Hover the mouse to see each trait, or click on the name of my type to read a profile or to take the test yourself...
Mento + Diet Coke Fountain
Okay, so there are some things I think I will never get too old to enjoy... Here is a well-documented method to turn Mentos and Diet Coke into a raging fountain of soda.
Gotta try this with the kids!
Planarity Game
A fascinating logic puzzle using dots and lines you must untangle: Planarity
Small but Tough
Not politically correct, but definitely clever! (borrowed from from here)
Starting with Evil - Ending with Trust
I recently received this thought-provoking story via email identifying Albert Einstein as the student. Always skeptical of such attributions, I looked it up on the sites that investigate these things and it turns out not to be an actual account involving Albert Einstein. His name was added to the story in 2004, but a nameless version of the story was around before that so I've removed his name and printed it anyway. Read it for yourself, then I have a comment or two...
Does evil exist?
The university professor challenged his students with this question. Did God create everything that exists? A student bravely replied, "Yes, he did!"
Stein: Confessions for the Holidays
CHARLES OSGOOD, host: We all have our own thoughts about the holidays. Here's Ben Stein with his.
BEN STEIN: Here at this happy time of year, a few confessions from my beating heart. I have no freaking clue who Nick and Jessica are.
(Footage of People magazine; Us magazine)
STEIN: I see them on the cover of People and Us constantly when I'm buying my dog biscuits. I still don't know. I often ask the checkers at the grocery stores who they are. They don't know who Nick and Jessica are, either. Who are they? Will it change my life if I know who they are and why they've broken up? Why are they so darned important?
(Footage of People magazine)
STEIN: I don't know who Lindsay Lohan is either, and I don't care at all about Tom Cruise's baby.
(Vintage footage of congressional hearing)
STEIN: Am I going to be called before a Senate committee and asked if I'm a subversive? Maybe. But I just have no clue who Nick and Jessica are. Is this what it means to be no longer young? Hm, not so bad.
Next confession: I am a Jew and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish, and it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautifully lit-up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees.
(Footage of Christmas trees)
STEIN: I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are — Christmas trees. It doesn't bother me a bit when people say 'Merry Christmas' to me. I don't think they're slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. I shows that we're all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year.
It doesn't bother me one bit that there's a manger scene on display at a key intersection at my beach house in Malibu.
(Footage of manger scene; menorah)
STEIN: If people want a creche, fine. The menorah a few hundred yards away is fine, too. I do not like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat. Or maybe I can put it another way. Where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and aren't allowed to worship God as we understand him? I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we used to know went to.
Site Pal
SitePal.com has a couple demo tools that make fun toys:
Dr. Sultan on Muslim Tensions: Barbarism vs Rationality
From For Muslim Who Says Violence Destroys Islam, Violent Threats - New York Times: "The clash we are witnessing around the world is not a clash of religions or a clash of civilizations," Dr. Sultan said. "It is a clash between two opposites, between two eras. It is a clash between a mentality that belongs to the Middle Ages and another mentality that belongs to the 21st century. It is a clash between civilization and backwardness, between the civilized and the primitive, between barbarity and rationality."
Redistribution?
A young woman was about to finish her first year of college. Like so many others her age, she considered herself to be a very liberal Democrat, and was very much in favor of redistribution of wealth.
She was deeply ashamed that her father was a rather staunch Republican, a feeling she openly expressed. Based on the lectures that she had participated in and the occasional chat with her professor, she felt that her father had for years harbored an evil, selfish desire to keep what he thought should be his.
One day she was challenging her father on his opposition to higher taxes on the rich and the addition of more government welfare programs. The self-professed objectivity proclaimed by her professors had to be the truth and she indicated so to her father.
He responded by asking how she was doing in school.
Taken aback, she answered rather haughtily that she had a 4.0 GPA and let him know that it was tough to maintain, insisting that she was taking a very difficult course load and was constantly studying, which left her no time to go out and party like other people she knew. She didn't even have time for a boyfriend and didn't really have many college friends because she spent all her time studying.
Her father listened and then asked, "How is your friend Audrey doing?"
She replied, "Audrey is barely getting by. All she takes are easy classes, she never studies, and she barely has a 2.0 GPA. She is always invited to all the parties, and lots of times she doesn't even show up for classes because she is too hung over."
Her wise father asked his daughter, "Why don't you go to the Dean's office and ask him to deduct a 1.0 off your GPA and give it to your friend who only has a 2.0. That way you will both have a 3.0 GPA and certainly that would be a fair and equal distribution of GPA."
The daughter, visibly shocked by her father's suggestion, angrily fired back, "That wouldn't be fair! I have worked really hard for my grades! I have invested a lot of time and a lot of hard work! Audrey has done next to nothing toward her degree. She played while I worked my tail off!
Her father slowly smiled, winked and said gently, "Welcome to the Republican Party."