firehose

Greenpeace Activists Denied Bail in Russia | News & Notes, What Matters Today | BillMoyers.com:

Activists being held in Russia have been charged with piracy and three have been denied bail so far.

Six Myths About Food Stamps | The Poverty Line, What Matters Today | BillMoyers.com:

The right-wing echo chamber has vilified food stamp users with a variety of absurd lies and myths. As a result, people will go hungry.

Learn.

And in even more words, I made a freaking pie!

So here’s the deal.

I have now come to believe that in order to make a pie, you have to own it. You have to own the fact that you are going to make the darn pie. There can be no “oh, I’m going to try to make a pie” or “I’m going to make a pie and I hope that it works out.”

No. You have to think “I am going to make this pie or else.” Wait. No. Not even or else. Just – I am going to make a pie. It’s happening and I’m making it and that’s it. Boom.

Yeah yeah – you might remember that I tried to make pie crust three years ago and claimed that there must be a pie gene and that I didn’t have it and that I had no clue who Mother Lovett passed it on to. I’m sort of calling BS on myself. I mean, I think it’s kind of true – pie making definitely comes easier for some that others. Especially when it comes to BEAUTIFUL pie making, which I really can’t do.

Sidebar: that’s why I topped my pie with a crumble because dealing with TWO pie crusts (i.e. a top and a bottom) totally broke my brain. Well, that and the fact that… I don’t really like pie crust. Yeah. There. I said it. It’s true.

I just don’t love it like some people do. In fact, pastry crust in general is not my cup of tea. Pies aren’t what I lose my you-know-what over – that’s more like cheesecake and massively trashed up desserts. I love puff pastry, but that’s a whole new ballgame. However, apple pie? If it’s GOOD apple pie, like homemade apple pie, I can handle a hot slice with some ice cream. And if it’s apple pie made with, like, bourbon!… that can definitely be done too.

So there’s that.

I still stuck with Mother Lovett’s never fail pie crust that I discovered in her recipes a few years ago, but let me refresh your memory. We are pretty convinced over here in this family that it wasn’t the true recipe that she used. Actually, she didn’t use a recipe at all, hence why none of us have the slightest clue on how to make a pie. Also, she made her pie crusts with lard – yep, real life LARD! Someday I would like to attempt that but given that it’s not easily accessible and that for some unknown reason I am scared to ask for things and talk to my local grocery store employees, meaning I have no idea where the lard would even be, I stuck with butter.

So yes, this is an all butter crust.

On top of that, I made the entire thing in the food processor. It was SO easy. Had that not been the case, like if I hadn’t learned that I could make it in a food processor, I never would have done this. I can’t be bothered to cut cold butter into flour. Read: I’m too lazy and impatient.

The actual reason behind how I got up the confidence to attempt the pie again? I do some freelance photography for relish magazine and back in the summer, had to make THREE pies. Three freaking pies. Anxiety ensued. Not only did I have to make the pie crust and make the pie and eat the pie, I had to photograph the pie which to me, is just impossible. I loathe photographing anything in a triangle shape and I mean… getting the perfect slice? Oomph.

But. It’s life and work and I had to do it, and that’s when I learned that in order to make it I had to do the whole owning thing. And it happened. That’s when I knew I could make one on my own accord.

My pie crust didn’t turn out to be the prettiest – I didn’t prebake it and I still really have no clue what I’m doing when it comes to pie. In a few weeks I’ll do a more in-depth post (like one of my exactly how I do it posts) on making it, but that sure doesn’t mean it’s the right way. I simply tossed the dough in the plate, threw in some apples, topped it with the crumble and baked the heck out of it. The edges shrunk a bit but it was so buttery and flakey.

I ate it for dinner.

I ate it for breakfast.

I had to give it to my parents before I sold my soul to the pie devil. Serious love.

I’m still not a pie person and I don’t think I ever will be, but I feel semi-complete that I got it together enough to make one. And of course… to eat one.

The end.

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©2012 How Sweet It Is

“The purpose of literature is to turn blood into ink.”

- T.S. Eliot (via libranta)

To support its research, academia has created a flood of PhDs who fare poorly in the job market.

Read The Blog Post Here »

Giffords and husband Mark Kelly, a former combat pilot and astronaut, are scheduled to be with New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman at the Saratoga Springs Arms Fair on Sunday to highlight a voluntary agreement to monitor gun show sales and stricter state gun control law. It will be latest event by Giffords and Kelly in their national campaign for expanded background checks for gun sales.

A gay rights rally in St. Petersburg has ended in scuffles after several dozen protesters were confronted by about 200 conservative and religious activists. The police standing nearby waited until clashes broke out between the two groups before intervening. According to Russian news agencies, the police detained 67 people from both sides. The scuffles started after anti-gay protesters tore a rainbow flag out of a woman's hands.

I dont even know what to say about this. I am almost speechless. The only possible scenario would be if this person just got out of Clown School.

 

 

There is no way this person is sane.

Do Americans—and many Europeans working in American-dominated fields such as investment bank, consulting and ventures—work too hard?

Economic data show that in 1950, Americans worked around 1,900 hours per year. That’s now down to 1,700. But the French, who used to work 2,150 hours annually, now clock up fewer than 1,500 hours—they used to work much more than Americans, now they work less. And Germans work even less than the French. On the other hand, people in Singapore, Korea and Hong Kong work more hours now—around 2,300—than Americans did in 1950. And whatever the average number of hours, most high earners in the US put in 60-80 hours a week. With only three weeks vacation, that comes to 3,430 hours a year, way more than any international comparison.

To make sense of these numbers we need a longer term perspective. During the Industrial Revolution in Britain, men, women and children in factories worked up to 15 hours a day. Lord Ashley campaigned for the Factory Act of 1847, which limited hours for women and children—but not men—to 10 hours a day, six days a week. Mill owners warned that the legislation would lead to disaster. Yet in Britain today, average real incomes are 20 times higher than in 1847, and income per hour is 40 times higher.

What the Industrial Revolution eventually did was to smash the hobbling link between hours worked and wealth. Machines increasingly took over the worst human work. The computer, the microchip and the internet have taken this a stage further. Today the most valuable creation—such as inventing a new product or business system, or making decisions about how to use resources—is almost totally delinked from time and physical toil.

If you still need convincing that long hours destroy wealth, look at 2012 OECD figures. The country with the longest hours was Greece, followed by Hungary and Poland—and they ranked 26th, 33rd, and 34th out of 34 countries in terms of productivity. By contrast, the countries working the fewest hours were the Netherlands, Germany and Norway, which rank fifth, seventh and second, respectively, for productivity. Overall, the more hours worked, the poorer the productivity and wealth creation.

And yet, old habits die hard. Though we do it through endless meetings, emails and calls, rather than the plough and the loom, we still slog away, as if our lives depend on it. For an illustration of this pathology, just look at Michael Eisner, the legendary leader of Paramount movies and then the Walt Disney Company who worked seven days a week. He once said he had taken only one week off in 28 years. When his Disney colleague Frank Wells died, Eisner lauded Wells’ work ethic with these chilling words, “Sleep was Frank’s enemy. He thought that it prevented him from performing flat out 100% of the time. There was always one more meeting he wanted to have.”

Frank Wells died in a helicopter crash, rushing from one meeting to another.

Did hard work make Eisner successful? In his first three years, the profits at Disney soared from under $300 million to nearly $800 million. Yet, an internal analysis showed that nearly all the surge came from just three decisions. Eisner raised theme-park prices; increased the number of Disney hotels; and started to sell videos of the animated classics.

How long did it take him to make those three decisions? The great majority of his impact came from a tiny fraction of his time.

When we reflect, we realize that small amounts of time can lead to prodigious results; and that huge amounts of travail go largely unrewarded. When we examine our routines, we see that the value per hour of different kinds of work varies enormously.

Working hours are dictated by culture, not economics. Of course long hours undermine productivity—as C. Northcote Parkinson said, “work expands to fill the time available.” Whatever our religion or ideology, we are still trapped by the centuries-old Protestant ethic, which viewed long hours as a badge of moral seriousness. Most firms still value such “intensity.”

But not every firm. Netflix encourages its workers to focus on great results, “We don’t measure people by how many hours they work…sustained A-level performance, despite minimal effort, is rewarded with more responsibility and great pay.”

Isn’t that sensible? Why don’t you copy that in your own business, or, if you can’t do that, join a firm that allows you time-freedom? By only working where we can achieve a great deal with little time, and by uniting extreme ambition with extreme time parsimony, we make our most precious and limited resource—our energy and inspiration—go much further. If we are confident in our ability to create great results, then we don’t need long hours; and if we limit our time, we force ourselves to be more creative.

We welcome your comments at ideas@qz.com. 

I am here for a few days, so my attention turned to a new paper by Kim and Jung, entitled Investor PSY-chology, here is the abstract:

The global success of “Gangnam Style,” the 18th K-pop single by the South Korean rapper PSY in 2012, was an exogenous shock to international investor enthusiasm about DI Corp., because the company’s chairman and CEO is PSY’s father. The stock price of the semiconductor equipment company jumped by almost 800% in three months without material information. Using Korean microstructure data that identifies non-resident foreign individual (NRFInd, hereafter) investors and resident foreign individual (RFInd, hereafter) investors by nationality, we study international individual investor behavior. The count of flash mob videos and parody videos uploaded on YouTube from each country is our proxy for the enthusiasm of individual investors. We find that NRFInd (RFInd) investors in specific countries become net buyers (sellers) of DI Corp. when a flash mob or parody music video is uploaded in their country. This is because RFInd investors had already purchased the stock on the day PSY left Korea to meet Scooter Braun, the producer of Justin Bieber. Our results support a “resale option” explanation about the bubble in the asset price.

Hat tip goes to @EmanuelDerman.

The Guardian

Senate to try again to end fiscal crisis, after nixing Collins' plan Fox News The Senate will return to work Sunday and attempt to find another way to end the partial shutdown of government services and reach an agreement on the nation's borrowing limit before an October 17 deadline after Democrats rejected a proposal by Maine ... Senate Leaders Seek an End to Debt CrisisNew York Times Reid: Soft-Spoken, Combative Obama Partner Vs GOPABC News Fiscal Impasse Widens as Deal Focus Turns to U.S. SenateBloomberg Washington Post -Voice of America -Chicago Tribune all 1,491 news articles »

deviatesinc:

L’aiglon megapost, just because

Dan Aykroyd was heard outside ranting and raving about his frustration with SBS and the interview he had just been in. The blow-up was of course edited from the interview but on his way out of the studio complex he reportedly told an SBS minder at the door that he was a “f***ing hosebag.”

The brand new Star Wars animated series Star Wars Rebels just released the very first, all new villain for the Empire. Take a gander at the Inquisitor.

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Sadly, The Venture Bros. won't return for its sixth season until January 2015. But the creators may release an hour-long special in 2014 to assuage our Monarch-withdrawal.

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Killer Instinct, the Xbox One-exclusive fighting game based on the 90s classic of the same name, is getting a boxed edition for $59.99, available only through the Microsoft store. There will be no disc within said box however, as the "Pin Ultimate Edition" is a joint venture between Microsoft and Penny Arcade designed for displaying Pinny Arcade trading pins. Each copy of the Pin Ultimate Edition comes with one Jago pin and one Killer Instinct logo pin, with room for others, which will be revealed during the game's first season of content.

Customers who purchase the Pin Ultimate Edition of Killer Instinct still get the game. A download voucher for the Ultra Edition of the game, which includes all Season 1 characters, a season pass for all costumes and accessory packs, early access to all Season 1 content and a copy of the original Killer Instinct will be included. The case will double as a folio for a 16-pin set designed by Mike "Gabe" Krahulik.

The Pin Ultimate Edition's page doesn't specify how many units are being produced, but pin designer Krahulik wrote in a Penny Arcade post that it's "not a lot." Pre-orders are currently live through the Microsoft Store.

Limited Killer Instinct boxed version holds pins instead of a disc originally appeared on Joystiq on Sat, 12 Oct 2013 21:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. showed up to New York Comic-Con and screened the entire next episode, which, had some pretty funny parts. But the real gem we gleaned from the NYCC panel was what was implied.

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“Q: Do you, Matt smith, and Tom Hiddleton have cheek bone polishing parties?
Benedict Cumberbatch: We like nothing better than buffing our Zygoma. And imagining a horny time traveling long overcoat purple scarf wearing super sleuth nordic legend fuck fantasy. Get to work on that, internet.”

- for real. Zygoma is a term for cheekbones.

Mitt Romney's famed car elevator mansion receives final approval for construction to begin.