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List of Seven on Sunday 4.1: DREAM

1. Lifelong learning

Did you know if you press the space bar twice after a sentence while you are texting on your iPhone it’ll automatically add a period, space, and ready the CAPS for the next sentence?

They don’t call it a smart phone for nothing!

2. Personal progress

I’m trying to up my game in the kitchen this year.

So far, I have made zero new recipes.

See how hard I’m trying!

3. Writer’s world

Last week I had a dream the Pioneer Woman invited me over to her house for dinner. You know, just a casual five-course meal at the lodge with the fam. After dinner she invited me to guest post on her blog about anything I wanted. Anything I wanted. It was like the best writing dream I have ever had. Ever.

I guess it’s just a good thing she didn’t ask me to cook one of the new recipes for her show on the Food Network. Which reminds me, I really need to open those cookbooks Jan got me for our anniversary after I begged and swore I wanted to cook more.

Hmm. Is there an Apple short-cut for that kind of thing?

4. Photo of the week

There are no words.

5. Picture-less moment

Lately when we go to the Wise Old Owl’s for our weekly Wednesday visit I’ve been giving Lance a head start while I get Vivian up from her nap.

Last week Lance wanted to wear his Spiderman costume to her house. As I stood watching out the door like I always do just to make sure he gets in ok, the pure sight of Spidey traipsing down the hill made my heart smile.

He was carrying a giant floor puzzle far too large for a steady grip and practically tripping over his own feet every time the mask slipped the wrong way off his face. But Spidey was full of determination. Armed with gummy bears inside his jacket pocket he happily marched along, in his own little world, singing a German song (Fiderallala, Fiderallala, Fiderallalalala) on his way to pay our dear neighbor a visit.

Lord knows what they talk about before I get there, but The Wise Old Owl always tells me “they had the nicest visit.”

Twenty minutes later when Vivi and I arrived he invited us to, “Come in the house!” as only The Wise Old Owl would do.

6. Parenting tip

When your toddler is talking to you nonstop and begging you to play with them while you are trying to cook dinner, go to the bathroom, or whatever tell them that you two are going to play a fun game called, “Pretend Mommy’s not here.”

In your mind it will seem like the best idea ever, but in reality it won’t work at all.

7. Humor

Last week on Downton Abbey Lady Cora put Lord Crawley in his place when he neglected to invite a famous singer staying in their home to dine with the family.

She bristled the line, “You will have her next to you at dinner and YOU. WILL. LIKE. IT!”

I made Jan (as he rolled his eyes) hit rewind just so I could watch it again.

Since then, I’ve been saying things to him like:

You will cook dinner for me tonight and YOU. WILL. LIKE. IT!

You will do the dishes tonight and YOU. WILL. LIKE. IT!

So far, he’s really not that into it, but I’m still getting mileage out of the line.

Hey honey! You will massage my feet tonight and YOU. WILL. LIKE. IT!

One can dream.

Now go watch Downton tonight.

The Banter Lady

About britta326

blogger, picture-taker, diaper-changer, runner

5 thoughts on “List of Seven on Sunday 4.1: DREAM

  1. Ah…love Downton… and loved the line. We all know who the real “boss” is in that house. The pic of the kids is priceless. Your monkeys are a little closer in age than mine, but it amazes me just how good a friends (partners in crime if you will) they are.

    • It’s really fun to watch their relationship unfold. I have a brother two years older than me and we were hot and cold growing up, but now we get along so it’s nice. Hope you enjoyed Downton last night. I sure did!

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Frozen in time

I finally thew away an acorn squash that had been sitting in the fruit bowl on my kitchen counter since last September. Much like myself right now, due to the current winter weather conditions, it had become frozen in time. Time, the ever elusive place.

Having never cooked an acorn squash before, I bought one at a local pumpkin patch with high hopes of trying to replicate a yummy recipe that an acquaintance had made. For whatever reason, I couldn’t seem to muster up the motivation or courage to cook a new recipe. So it sat there through the whole fall season and into winter like an unknown intruder trying to find its place.

At some point, I must have realized I was not going to cook it, but I also could not throw it away. That would be a waste, despite its growing discoloration and slow deterioration into a paltry excuse for a gourd.

There it sat.

The butternut squashes came rolling in and out of my kitchen all season. I baked them in stride or used them in soups like years prior. Their warm goodness found ways into my belly, but that acorn squash remained dormant.

Which leads me to my current mentality: Dormant.

Since moving to Pennsylvania last summer, I energetically raked my way through mountains of fall leaves and I am currently shoveling, though now half-heartedly, my way through piles winter snow. I knew winter in the north was way more intense than winter in Virginia. I tried to prepare by purposefully making a pact with myself to embrace the bluster of the season through the last day of February, at which point I could slowly allow myself to long for warmer weather and buds on the trees. I braced myself. And then, I relaxed into a sled with my kids and threw some snow up in the air. The powdery white stuff sprinkled all around us with festive buoyancy.

Somehow about a week or so ago, my mentality about “embracing” the winter weather until March 1 got swept away by a snow squall. Much like the extreme cold temps of late – I am talking below zero at night for days on end – I am literally frozen. And not in an Ice-Princess-Elsa-I-am-going-to-conquer-my-powers-and-take-back-my-kingdom-in-green-fashion kind of way. More like, frozen in time with no desire to do much of anything, except survive this wicked season and long for spring.

I need sunshine!

I need park play dates!

I need daffodils!

And for the love of God, I need to throw away that acorn squash.

So I did.

As if I thought that would somehow keep the seasons moving along, I slam-dunked that sucker back to where it came from. Somehow in doing so, it gave me the motivation to try to surge some momentum out of hibernation.

The snow and ice and negative temperatures have remained since Acorn Squash Purge Day, but somewhere underneath I know there is a blade of green grass. March 1st is on the horizon and still seems like a (somewhat) safe time to start washing and storing scarves and long underwear. Although March can sometimes lash out in late-winter brutality, at least its arrival means the start of spring.

Spring. Less than four weeks away.

Even though I still feel somewhat trapped in the doldrums of my dormant self, the birds will eventually start chirping again, right? Spring temperatures will arrive and seem that much toastier having endured the wretched winter, right? I imagine that going through such an extreme seasonal shift must feel like being frozen in time, too. Although the ever-ellusive this time I will be at the height my jump on a big Trampoline basking in all the glory that comes with triumph over someone such as Jack Frost.

I’ll thaw to that thought.

I do not feel any waves of heat just yet, quite the contrary with no break in the weather forecasted, but at least when hubby arrives home from work it is, in a literal sense, still light outside. The days are getting longer, and I am gripping my frozen fingers around that ray of spring hope.

Until then, I am more than longing to escape outside and breathe fresh air without seeing a cloud of condensation escape from  my mouth due to the bitter cold air. I have a feeling that after filling my lungs with warm air, a magnificent exhale of gratitude for the renewal that comes with spring will exude energy. Just like our Creator intended. Here comes Peter Cottontail.

And then I bet, before I know it, life will roll right  along into summer like a beach ball floating effortlessly on water. My family and I will celebrate our one-year anniversary of living in our new home, and we’ll be all the wiser for what is to come as more seasons cycle ahead.

Indeed, the seasonal shifts render purpose: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”

Now go read Ecclesiastes 3:1. After you finish, put Turn, Turn, Turn by The Byrds on repeat and have yourself a cup of cheer. Chirp, chirp.

Ever the (dormant) optimist I am always eager for what lies ahead. Preferably green meadows and sun glasses. Maybe next fall I’ll give that acorn squash recipe another try, but for now I am dreaming of other kinds of produce with seeds – strawberries would be nice. I speak not of the frozen kind.

Time Marches on.

About britta326

blogger, picture-taker, diaper-changer, runner

2 thoughts on “Frozen in time

  1. Hi Britta, Just got in from fishing and the darn temp. was up to 83*.
    I forgot my sun hat and got burned again but enjoyed the day. You and the
    family could come down and visit us. We’d love to have you!
    Cheers! Rick & Claire

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" Synchromysticism:
The art of realizing meaningful coincidence in the seemingly mundane with mystical or esoteric significance."

- Jake Kotze

March 26, 2017

'Those Conspiracy Guys' Makes You Tink, I Think ;-)

I came across a pod-cast show on iTunes called
'Those Conspicary Guys' just before St.Patrick's Day this year and this show is run by a bunch of Irish guys out of Dublin, Ireland.
I bought a carton of Guinness stout the week of St.Patrick's Day this year, so it felt like I was sitting in an Irish pub somewhere in Ireland listening to a group of Irish guys at the next table in a drunken ramble...and boy do these guys ramble on, sometimes for seven and a half hours when you look through the times their various pod-casts run for.
And what is it with Guinness these days?
It tastes like shite (to use an Irish term) now compared to how it used to taste years ago.
Admittedly these bottles I bought were only brewed under licence in Australia, but the tins that were brewed and exported from Ireland were only 1.5 standard drinks per can compared to the bottles which were 1.8 standard drinks per bottle and I bought the tins last year and they tasted worse than than the stuff in the bottles that I bought this year.
I was listening to the Peak Oil and the 9/11 podcasts, but didn't get through to the end of either.
It's not that they were boring, but the Peak Oil one runs for 6 hours and 41 minutes and the 9/11 one runs for 2 hours and 14 minutes.
So, if I was on a long haul flight from say LA to Sydney and had nothing else to do, these podcasts I could probably listen to, but I just can't stand listening to podcasts that go for over an hour and a half, unless the podcasts are really interesting to me...but unfortunately these guys ramble all over the place, instead of sticking to the subject matter of the podcast they are meant to be discussing.
Mind you, I have only listened to part of three of their pod-casts (I'm listening to the Titanic Conspiracy pod-cast right now) (because I had listened to the 'Mysterious Universe' pod-cast this morning where the guys brought up the Titanic Conspiracy) so far, so I can't really comment on their other shows, although some of them do look intriguing to me and other subjects they discuss hold no interest for me personally.
Down Among The Dead Men
I do like the t-shirts these guys sell in their e-store though.
A Full Plate of Shrimp...with Only One Shrimp?
It's not only the shrimp t-shirt that caught my attention here, there was also the picture of the pug that was on their subscribe to their show on iTunes page that got me, as I saw a news story about pugs in the news on March 13th this year that has recently tied a bunch of synchs together for me recently
Pugs and bulldogs living miserable lives because of reckless breeding, vets say
"Australian veterinarians and the RSPCA have called for all short-nosed dogs including pugs, Boston terriers and bulldogs to receive corrective surgery because "reckless breeding" has left them struggling to breathe.
Brachycephalic breeds are known for their wide skulls, squashed muzzles, short coats and stocky builds.
Pugs and bulldogs have become increasingly popular around the world because they cope well in apartments.
They are also the breeds of choice for celebrities, with Hugh Jackman, Lady Gaga and Leonardo DiCaprio all owning French bulldogs.

According to the RSPCA, over 80 per cent of British bulldogs are delivered by caesarean section because their large heads and narrow pelvises make natural birth virtually impossible.
Some brachycephalic dogs have trouble breathing while lying down, so they are often sleep deprived.

Others develop oesophageal issues which require their owners to feed them in a baby's high chair.
The dogs are also susceptible to heat stress, exercise intolerance, eye problems, dental disease, skin infections and spinal deformities.
Because of their respiratory issues, most US airlines refuse to transport short-nosed dogs.
Qantas does accept brachycephalic dogs, but owners must sign a form absolving the airline of responsibility if the animal dies on the flight.

RSPCA veterinarian Dr Jade Norris blames unethical breeders who she claims are deliberately pairing parent dogs with exaggerated features.
"The flattened face and the shortened muzzle is caused by defective cartilage, and that is deliberately selected by breeders. It is an artificial selection, and it can cause man-made health problems," she said.
But Karen Hedberg from the Kennel Council of Australia (ANKC) insists that responsible breeders prioritise the health of their dogs and do not aim to exaggerate their features.
Ironically, I just listened to the latest 'Mysterious Universe' podcast, which is about the Titanic Conspiracy and Tree Therapy
(Forrest (Trees?) Gump/Shrimp?!) and they mention pugs at around the 48 minute mark of that podcast.
I'm currently writing a post to explain all the latest Pug synchs and how they link hold your horses on the pugs in the current and past synchromystic pop culture.
But in the mean time, if you like guys talking conspiracy theory in an Irish accents in marathon pod-casts then check out
'Those Conspiracy Guys'.
But Crust no one.
Follow the signs?

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Robert P. Moroz, AIA, LEED AP
Vice President

Mr. Robert P. Moroz, AIA, LEED AP, Vice President for Broaddus & Associates, possesses over 35 years of experience in the planning and design of hospital, medical education, and biomedical research facilities in the roles of owner, project manager, consultant, and builder. He currently serves as Program Director where he is responsible for managing the design, construction and owner activation of the $778-million University Hospital at the Medical Center for University Health System in San Antonio, Texas.

Mr. Moroz serves on the Steering Committee of The Green Guide for Healthcare, and has become a member of the Regional Action Committee of the Gulf Coast Application Center at the Houston Advanced Research Center, and Ascension Health System's Patient Centered Design Committee.

Prior to joining Broaddus & Associates, Mr. Moroz served as Vice President of Facilities at the Seton Healthcare Network, where he directed Real Estate, Design and Construction activities on 137 active projects with capital budgets of $468 million. Several projects developed during his tenure received design awards. In particular, the Dell Children's Medical Center of Central Texas obtained a LEED Platinum rating from the United States Green Building Council. This is the first hospital to be so recognized in the world.

In his previous role as a Project Executive for Gilbane Building Company, Mr. Moroz directed program management, construction management and general contracting assignments for capital facilities programs exceeding $300 million in value in aggregate.

As owner of his own architecture and healthcare consulting firm, Mr. Moroz offered traditional architectural design services on projects including OR surgical suites, positron diagnostic research centers, level three trauma center, and intensive care units. His firm also completed biomedical research laboratory renovation projects for the Children's Nutrition Center in Houston, Texas.

Mr. Moroz, a registered architect in five states, provided “Project Launching” services for the Children's Nutrition Research Center's new clinical and research facility. He provided similar services for the West Virginia University Ambulatory Care Center in Morgantown and the Batchelor Children's Center, Research, and Diagnostic Institute at the University of Miami/Jackson Memorial Medical Center in Miami, Florida.

Robert P. Moroz, AIA, LEED AP | Vice President


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Brp305's Blog

Just another weblog

Miami-Dade County Budget: Take All the Entitlements Back!

Take-Home Vehicles Cost Miami Dade Millions

95% of Miami-Dade County Employees work 5 days-40 hours a week. So, why are they given perks and entitlements, county sponsored, to enjoy on their own time, that have nothing to do with the performance of their job?

The rule of thumb is! The higher you climb up the ladder the more perks you receive. Unfortunately, we are living in very different times and perks and entitlements are putting some of your co-workers in the unemployment lines and others are forcing financially sound departments to be eliminated forever.

“Drastic times call for drastic measures” That’s just the bottom line. So, if you had to choose, which would it be: Eliminate the perks and entitlements, all of them or stand a good chance at losing your job?

Yes, you read it right! “Perks or Jobs?” Think of it like the choice to vote. If you don’t vote, someone will make the decision for you. There is no time to present a lot of fluff over why you should make a choice, only that if you don’t make a choice, it will be made for you, period. No time for playing nice. “Drastic times call for drastic measures!”

Let’s take a quick look at some but not all perks but this is a good start:

1. Discretionary Expense Accounts – why? Each department is given a budget, why do you need discretionary funds – At taxpayer’s expense?

2. County sponsored cars / Gas Cards – why? Are you on 24 hour call – At taxpayer’s expense?

3. Laptop computers – why? Are you really going to work two or more hours at home- At taxpayer’s expense?

4. Mobile Phones – why? So that you can keep up with your family members – At taxpayer’s expense?

5. Complimentary Monthly Metro Passes – [normally given if you earn $100,000.00 or more} – why? [Everyone else has to pay their own way to and from work] – At taxpayer’s expense?

6. Work for 4 hours but get paid for 8 hours – why? What is it that you are doing away from the office that you can’t do at the office – At taxpayer’s expense? Just sayin’

7. Why do you charge the county overtime to read your emails? – At taxpayer’s expense?

8. Who approves the department that gives each other raises every 3 months until they reach a certain level? – At taxpayer’s expense?

9. Office Furniture – Do you really need $50,000 worth of furniture to do your job? – At taxpayer’s expense?

10. Who started the practice of having two sets of financial books? – “Books for Your Eyes” & “Books for My Eyes only?” – Why? – At taxpayer’s great expense?

11. Why do you have so many employees with impressive titles and no real job? – At taxpayer’s expense?As you can see, there is plenty room for improvement!

Remember: “The State of Florida remains a right to work state.”

July 12, 2011 - Posted by | Community News | , , , , , ,

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Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member

When you listen to a song like NWA’s “Gangsta Gangsta” and hear Ice Cube talking about stomping out people at parties and gunning down others for the hell of it, it might sound strange considering the only member of the group who had a criminal record at the time was the late Eazy-E. However, Public Enemy’s Chuck D once described hip-hop as the “black CNN” and like many rappers, NWA had to get their stories from somewhere. Read “Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member” and you’ll find real life tales of everything you could imagine hearing on a record.

Sanyika Shakur, aka “Monster” Kody Scott’s tales of life as a gang member and his subsequent reinvention as a black national make for a raw, yet irresistible read. The news and most media use static depictions of gang members as domestic terrorists with no thought of hearing their side of the story. Instead Shakur takes you into his mind while giving the reader a better understanding of the culture that surrounds Los Angeles gangs.

As someone that grew up in Lake Oswego, which couldn’t be any further from L.A., phrases like “Can’t stop, won’t stop” would fly over my head on Snoop Dogg songs but Shakur breaks down Crip terminology as well as illustrates the dynamics of gang violence. He describes life in military terms, which should give the reader a chillingly familiar feeling because he refers to much of the same reasoning that compels the US military to murder all across the globe. There’s little reflection on what initially caused rifts between rival gangs and an urge to decimate the enemy rather than come to any kind of a resolution. What Shakur describes is a cycle of brutal vengeance.

However in the midst of the war, the reader doesn’t lose sight of the combatants’ humanity. They all seem to understand the destructive nature of their actions but they accept it as life. Relationships with girlfriends and parents are explored as well as the need to use substances like PCP to maintain the mind frame for war (much like soldiers used heroin in Vietnam).

Shakur’s story takes a turn when he begins to spend more time in prison than on the streets and eventually finds Islam and political consciousness in the way that was somewhat mythologized in The Autobiography of Malcolm X. His rebirth as man trying to unite gangs against a society that has created their condition is as inspiring as the first part of the story is vicious. It also counters the overtures from police and the media that say we should lock these young men up and throw away the key rather than reach out and try to change the conditions.

The lesson “Monster” teaches is that gang warfare is like any other warfare, both in tactics and in the potential for a resolution. Gangs are bastard children of revolutionary movements like the Black Panthers. The rebirth of “Monster” into Sanyika Shakur and his mission to bring others back to the revolutionary roots is a blueprint for ending the violence that plagues black communities as well as ceasing dependence on authorities that don’t care about their welfare. Change can only come from within. The transition from self destruction to black empowerment proves that no one is irredeemable and that simple guidance can transform lives.

2 Responses to “Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member”

  1. […] L’Overture, Nat Turner, Harriet Tubman and George Jackson. Even a video game version of “Monster” Kody Scott would be better than the static characters that dominate games […]

  2. bloods vs crips Game…

    […]Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member « Trickle Down Truth[…]…

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Tablets Rapidly Democratizing and Consumerizing Mobile BI

image Unless you’ve been a castaway on a remote south Pacific island, you probably have a sense that things are changing rapidly in mobile business intelligence. There’s no shortage of companies expressing a desire to grab attention by claiming that their latest incarnation of mobile BI has fundamentally changed. Often, these proclamations herald in a “new BI era” designed to be personal, more democratized, and intended to focus on individual worker needs and not the interests of IT or the enterprise.

I think most of them are lying.

But there is a shred of truth in their press releases and market positioning. They have all recognized that the second wave of IT consumerization – the consumerization of business apps – is indeed a force that must be harnessed. BI vendors and enterprise executives steeped in the mobile climate that is shaking like an 8.0 earthquake under foot, are well aware that to ignore the consumerization of business intelligence, is perilous.

Forrester, in a Q1 2011 survey of 5,102 information workers in North America and Europe, has directly linked consumerization with business outcomes that IT and every other part of a business cares about: innovation, advocacy, and leadership.

The percentage of information workers in North America and Europe who do something with technology outside of IT control was pegged at about 35% in Q1 of 2011. Employees bring their personally provisioned smartphone or tablet to work, they use unsanctioned Web sites for business tasks, or they download unapproved applications to a work computer. Why? Because they care about the quality of their work and the satisfaction of their customers. The study suggests that by-and-large, they do this in the best interests of their company.

Mobile BI is not immune to the consumerization movement, and if anything, it is on the leading edge of change because tablets have proven to be the most ideal, most useful innovation to occur in business intelligence since the invention of pivot tables. Tablet apps for BI fundamentally transform analytics and data visualizations. But it doesn’t end with the BI basics. Always-on connectedness through social networks, collaborative systems, email, and peripheral news feeds, combine to elevate the science of awareness and knowledge about business operations unprecedented in the checkered history of business intelligence. Almost in the blink of an eye, mobile BI has reinvented itself and not a single BI vendor can be credited with making this happen.

Despite lack of early involvement in the consumerization movement, BI vendors are not sitting idle as workers reshape the intelligence landscape. Yellowfin recently announced the availability of its new iPad app which takes a more consumerized approach to a business intelligence user interface. It uses a Flipboard-like interface which makes it a little easier to locate and drill into business data.

Eduardo Ferrin, creator of Balanced Scorecard for iPad, indicates that businesses of all sizes are adopting his simple but effective strategic planning tool because it is a reflection of what people want, not what enterprises want for their people. According to Mr. Ferrin,

“Users are not happy with current mobile BI offerings because (for the most part) they are just an extension in mobility of their desktop applications which fail on many levels to address key requirements for individual’s work styles and their objectives concerning business data. These current offerings were designed just as another spoke, not as the hub of an entirely new user-focused experience.”

BI is a Dialogue, Not a Monologue

The introduction of social networks, collaboration, and gamification into the folds of business intelligence activities, is as much a disrupter of the BI market as tablets and apps that free workers from physical and information access constraints. Today, the challenge for BI vendors is to find ways to blend information at the edge of the enterprise with operational and performance data to create a new kind of BI experience – one that is designed for more for workers and less for IT.

Encapsulating and institutionalizing scorecard and other business intelligence methodologies in a lightweight and simplified software form factor, magnifies the opportunities to accelerate the capacity for business intelligence deeper into the enterprise. This is the essence of leveraging consumerization to effectuate the democratiation of business intelligence.

The vehicle for achieving this does not yet exist.

Posted in Articles about Business Intelligence, Productivity | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

iPad Creates Unexpected BI Demand, Workers Involved with BI Yield Tangible Results

The consumerization of IT has started to create some interesting opportunities that will open the doors to more pervasive use of business intelligence in enterprises. Our paper on the subject (Strategic Planning for the Entire Organization) points out accurately that:

“The alchemy of business intelligence, agile strategic planning, and mobile computing have combined to produce a seriously compelling value proposition for businesses and most important – everyone in the organization.”

Ann All recently published similar feelings about the democratization of BI in a timely piece entitled “Creating a Business Intelligence Culture”. In it she wastes no time indicting the IT community:

“Companies are limiting the potential usefulness of BI by making it available only to specialists, who create reports from centralized data and make those reports available only to select decision makers.”

imageThis, as Ann would likely agree, is flawed thinking.

Several companies featured in a recent Computerworld article are seeing tangible results from getting more users involved with BI. The story indicates that at, users with access to real-time sales data created a quicker checkout process for fast-selling items, and likely reduced costs and increased customer satisfaction. Bobby Nix, director of BI and analytics at consumer services company Allconnect, noted a 26 percent sales increase in 2011’s first quarter to staff access to business intelligence data. The cause — it helped sales associates focus on the best sales opportunities. And the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden realized a 30.7 percent per-capita increase in food and beverage sales from October 2010 through the first quarter of 2011 that the director of park operations attributes to availability of BI data deeper in the organization.

A reluctance by IT groups in general to embrace the democratization of BI, underscores a general attitude in the IT community concerning the definition of BI. IT groups have a traditional view that BI must include a hefty dose of analytical processing, a task reserved only for “analysts” capable of making sense out of data. However, there are really two hemispheres of BI – one concerned with big data, analytics, and strategic objectives. The other BI hemisphere – the one used by companies in the Computerworld article — is kinder, gentler, and focused on performance indicators, micro-strategies, and delivering information that improves operational decision-making. This is a more tactical tilt to BI and in some regards, it suggests that there’s an ongoing evolution of how IT and employees view the separation of strategic and tactical information.

iPhone Kicked the Door Open, iPad Kicked Down the Entire Wall

iPhone started a micro-revolution in businesses by enabling access to data more easily and in visual contexts that were more useful than any mobile devices before it. It set the stage for an information-starved workforce that quickly realized a consumer product could provide fundamental information access benefits.

On the heels of iPhone use in the enterprise, iPad has created an unexpected demand for BI in the second hemisphere. Employees needn’t be classified as “mobile workers” to benefit from mobility and pervasive access to business intelligence. And BI vendors have been quick to validate these new mobility requirements.

Deep down in the enterprise, there’s a movement that is tactifying the domain of BI which was previously isolated to strategic planning activities. Businesses – mostly mid-level managers responsible for operational performance – are reshaping the fabric of BI and the core definition of this term. Balanced Scorecard for iPad is one such tool that has embraced this movement.

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Balanced Scorecard for iPad Selected as Seedcamp Finalist

According to a recent post from Seedcamp,

“We’re excited to announce the teams attending Mini Seedcamp Prague, once again we had some very technical, ambitious, and creative teams applying to participate. This time we received entries from a total of 31 countries! As a result this will be our most international Mini Seedcamp yet with 16 countries being represented on the day. We have more than 70 mentors signed up to spend the day with these twenty teams.”

This is a big step forward for BsC, which has created a new market for the balanced scorecard methodology on iPad.

According to Eduardo Ferrin, founder and creator of this popular app,

“I am very excited to learn we are a Seedcamp finalist. Our team has worked very hard to make an ideal app for strategic planning for more people to use in the enterprise. At Seedcamp we will be showing just how easy it is to create and managed a business dashboard to achieve planning and monitoring control – all without high costs or PCs.”

Seedcamp is slated for 20 October 2011 in Prague.  It is a one day event designed to connect the 20 best web-tech, mobile and software talent with some of the leading entrepreneurs, developers, and experts from all across Europe and all over the world.

Twenty finalists get to connect and learn from prominent entrepreneurs, investors, developers and other web technology experts. The day consists of 5 minute presentations by the teams, a panel discussions, and four 1:1 mentoring sessions. The format is designed to maximise interaction between the teams and mentors, and has proven to be exceedingly popular with mentors at previous Seedcamps.

Posted in Articles about Business Intelligence | 1 Comment

Consumerization of Apps Spreads to Business Intelligence

This paper on the consumerization of apps by Bill French, founder of iPadCTO demonstrated a rapid slide toward apps as a second wave of IT upheaval. If true, companies will need to not only deal with consumerization of mobile hardware and personal provisioning, but user provisioning of apps themselves.

On the heels of this paper which foretells the coming consumerization of apps, today I saw a promotional email from QlikTech (the makers of the iPad BI app QlikView) and the subject line promoting their new white paper says:

“White Paper – BI as easy as consumer apps”

As evidenced by their attached white paper (and subject line), now the bigger BI players are consumerizing themselves. I guess Bill’s white paper is spot on – apps are now officially the second wave of consumerization.

As the QlikTech email promotion accurately states,

Traditional BI solutions delivered the same thing for years: static monitoring reports that addressed only a fixed set of predetermined questions. But suddenly there’s a radical shift shaking things up, and the force behind the transformation has caught many by surprise.  The QlikView white paper, Business Discovery: Powerful, User-Driven BI explains how empowered consumers are demanding the same functionality at work that they get from their personal technology.

Hmmm… “… consumers are demanding the same functionality at work that they get from their personal technology.” Let that sink in for a minute.

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Balanced Scorecard for iPad: Good for Tracking Performance Across Projects

While most of us think of strategic planning as this big mysterious process that only executives get involved with, the balanced scorecard methodology is patterned such that it can be leveraged in many use cases.

Even the smallest projects, seemingly tactical in nature, have a strategy, and this is where the BsC app shines. In minutes, and while standing on a trade-show ﬂoor, I was able to create a few business development objectives and track my progress over a four day conference.

It’s not difﬁcult to imagine using BsC for these projects in addition to your overall corporate planning.

  • Event planning
  • Software engineering
  • Advertising projects
  • Competitive intelligence

One misleading aspect of the BsC app is the nomenclature used for strategic projects. It assumes strategic projects are synonymous with a company name, but it also provides the ability to create strategic plan documents for many companies. However, there are no problems for using the app for one company with multiple strategic plans.

If you use balanced scorecard in wild use cases, we want to hear about them.

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[Free Giveaway] Peak Meetings for iPad, An Incubator for Strategic Execution

Update: Send me an email ( if you’d like a free promo code for this app. Limited supply.image

There are so many meeting planner apps available for iPad, but only one stands out as a vehicle for creating seamless connectedness between your company’s strategic plans and execution. And this one also blends nicely with Balanced Scorecard for iPad.

Peak Meetings, by Creating Thunder, has hit on an idea that has always seemed to escape the meeting management process. We hold meetings far too often that last far too long. And yet, few of them can actually be mapped to key performance metrics let alone, strategic plans.

It seems as though businesses, large and small suffer from a chronic disconnect between the many elements of a vision and the implementation steps necessary to reach for the visions. I believe that the glue that binds vision with implementation steps and details lay in the meeting planning and management DMZ.

Institutionalizing a process that creates a tightly bonded relationship between meetings and strategic plans is likely to pay big dividends. In my own business activities I’ve begun to use Peak Meetings to establish key touch-points that bind specific implementation steps with my strategic objectives.

Simple Example

As shown in the screen shot above, I’m working on a project that leverages Google Docs and Google Apps scripting to integrate business data with lightweight BI solutions. Google Docs has become the best alternative for companies that need to manage and collaborate on financial and operational data without spending a fortune on seat licenses for Microsoft Office.

On this strength also comes many other benefits including the collaboration and document sharing features of Google Docs. However, utilizing Docs-bound data for automated, and near-realtime dashboards requires a little scripting and a keen understanding of XML interfaces. My strategic vision is to help companies, who lack these resources, to liberate key performance data so that mobile dashboards can be created and maintained with little effort, no intrusion on current processes, and at affordable costs.

This is what the strategic vision looks like in Balanced Scorecard, also an iPad app for strategic planning.

This is a snapshot of recent planning meeting concerning this strategic initiative in Peak Meetings. Can you see the pattern? I’ve been using both apps for a long time now and I find it difficult to engage in strategic planning without bost apps.

Successful Meetings Redefined

It’s obvious that the designers of Peak Meetings has really stepped outside the traditional scope of the definition of “meeting”. They’ve taken great liberty to innovate on the essential responsibilities of meeting planning and created a much broader concept that redefines what it means to have a successful meeting.

In this app, the envelope has been opened so widely that the mere process of setting up a meeting invites you to justify it in the context of strategic objectives. This app doesn’t make it easy for you to take the latitude of calling a meeting without expressing merit, conditions, and outcomes that everyone must be aware of.

If your company insists that this app is the framework for planning and managing meetings, a natural success pattern starts to emerge and a knowledge base reflecting intimate planning and execution details, begins to form. One must ask – have the app designers considered the inherent relationship between Peak Meetings content and the bigger scope of knowledge management, deep collaboration, and pervasive awareness tools such as RoamBI, Geckoboard, GroupME, and

It’s Not Just About Meetings

One thing I’ve noticed about this tool is it’s ability to function as an inward, thought-provoking planning tool. You don’t have to have a physical or virtual meeting to benefit from the process that Peak Meetings encourages.

In this context, where you may be the only attendee to a meeting, you might compare this app with note-taking tools, to-do lists, or other project management solutions. But unlike the unstructured approach many of these tools deliver, Peak Meetings provides structure to help you capture key data points when trying to flesh out ideas based on current business conditions and the facts necessary to accurately assess a given problem.

Peak Meetings, A Keeper

Peak Meetings is a keeper and it’s just one of those apps that raises the bar for companies that know just how useful iPad is as a business tool. Peak has the potential to change the meeting game in your company, and because of this, I have to give it one big ding – it needs better integration capabilities.

It could become so useful that the expectation of deep collaboration and integration with other systems is mandatory as it gains traction. As I mentioned above, the data embodied in this app is likely to become extremely valuable. If integrated wisely, it could represent a way to a voice corporate amnesia, potentially saving organizations lots of money in repeated mistakes.

We’re familiar with the phrase “Email is Where Knowledge Goes to Die“. Meeting content is typically dead when the team folds up their notebooks and absconds with the remaining cookies and sandwiches. Peak Meetings is in a unique position to change the game before, during, and long after the meeting has ended.

Posted in Articles about Business Intelligence, Integration, Productivity | Leave a comment

Balanced Scorecard for HR Gains Popularity, Strategy Map Seen As Critical Success Factor

image I’ve been following a group conversation about balanced scorecard and HR and while I’m not an expert in these matters, the people driving this conversation seem to be zeroing in on some key elements that are important for HR organizations to consider.

According to Joe Clark, Chief Executive Officer at Prana Business, Arvato’s case study reveals a key success factor of HR is to provide measurable value to the business and shareholders.

As outlined by the Vice President, the HR team created a vision to transform the function of human resources into a leading-edge work team that delivers measurable value to the business and shareholders. The emphasis of the vision was on strategy execution and enabling the business to create sustainable competitive advantage.

The study follows a balanced scorecard approach to align and link the activities of the team to the firm’s objectives. While the case study provides clear guidelines for implementing an HR-centric approach to using balanced scorecard, Joe chimed into the real-time conversation adding,

“HR and many other functional units within an organization often lose site of the fundamental reason for any company to exist. That reason is to answer this question: ‘Why does our customer buy from us versus the competition?’ HR executives should rigorously focus their team’s activities on helping the firm answer that question.”

This seems like a reasonable method of focusing introspection on an organization and its ability to raise the value of the company. I suppose asking why customers but from your competition is also a worthy analytical point of view. But the ultimate test of of this introspection – can you answer the question – lay at the foot of strategic analysis. Joe makes it clear in this advice.

“If you can’t figure out how those items help answer that question then why is your group performing them?”

This is the nexus that leads to proper strategic alignment of functional support in a company such as the HR function. Joe’s company also provides a brief guide on this topic – 6 tips for HR execs to “get a seat at the table.” It’s a quick read and very useful guidance.

Alan Fell, Director at Alan Fell Consultancy Ltd, validates this approach.

“Challenge # 1 is to have a good corporate strategy map and then to develop an HR function strategy map as a subordinate exercise. That usually clarifies the questions of what is the real business purpose of HR. In other words – strategy alignment.”

Alan makes clear that a key problem is the existing role and capabilities of most HR departments – they are really not strategic. So a great outcome of creating an HR Scorecard is to open the debate concerning the strategic role of HR in a company. James Creelman, Senior Strategy and Quality Expert, Ministry of Works, Bahrain, echoes Alan Fell’s sentiments concerning strategy maps.

“… we should not use the term Balanced Scorecard unless it includes a Strategy Map. Remember a Balanced Scorecard is a Strategic Performance Management Framework not a performance measurement (or even management) framework.”

SHRM India provides a useful example of using scorecard to drive direct alignment of corporate goals with one aspect of HR, recruiting.

  • Objective: Reduce turnover costs.
  • Description: Develop effective recruiting methods and new-hire orientation methods to optimize the retention of new hires.
  • Actions:
    • Identify key attributes of successful employees who stay at company for two or more years.
    • Utilize technology more effectively for recruiting and screening applications.
    • Identify selection methods that will contribute to successful hires
    • Integrate branding efforts into recruiting.
    • Revise orientation program to ensure new-hire retention.
  • Measures:
    1. Cost-per-hire (financial).
    2. Turnover rates and costs (financial).
    3. Time-to-fill (business process).
    4. Customer satisfaction with new-hire performance (customer).
    5. New-hire satisfaction with orientation (learning and growth).
    6. Supervisor satisfaction with orientation (learning and growth).

As evidenced by a study conducted by SHRM India, slightly more than a third of executives view HR as a strategic partner, yet everyone gives enthusiastic lip service to the idea that its people are a company’s greatest asset. As I follow HR discussions concerning the application of balanced scorecard, it has become increasingly apparent that organizations which undertake the challenge of identifying clear and compelling connections between the company’s strategic plans and the work of each employee, naturally raise the HR performance and the company’s performance. This single directive seems to provide strategic continuity.

When I first started learning about balanced scorecard and how it can be used in a company, I assumed this approach was designed for the C-suite; the domain of executive management. But as I learn more about the unique relationships established through strategy maps and HR’s role, I can clearly see why democratization of scorecards and utilization down to every worker’s role in a strategic sense, is such a valuable idea and Balanced Scorcard (HR) for iPad is an ideal tool to embrace this emerging trend.

Posted in Articles about Business Intelligence, New in Balanced Scorecard for iPad | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment


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Submission + - American Kids & Science Education: The Exaggerated 'Dismal' Claims ( 2

TaeKwonDood writes: We've all seen the stories about how 'dismal' science education in America is. It turns out that it's kind of a straw man. America has long led the world in science but the 'average' score for Americans on standardized tests has never been good. Instead, every 2 years American kids get better but we keep being told things are terrible. Here is why.
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American Kids & Science Education: The Exaggerated 'Dismal' Claims

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  • ... go ahead, check out the names of those scientists / techies that are making waves

    Do they sound like Americans?

    Or do they have Indian sounding names, or Jewish sounding names, or names that sounds like Japanese, or Russians (and eastern Europeans), or Chinese/Koreans ?

    America's "glory" in technology for the past 3 decades has largely been advanced by foreigners living in the United States of America

  • One of my kids' friends is a high school student looking to pursue an education in science and math. She was among 13% of applicants accepted into the COSMOS Summer School program at UC Santa Cruz, but has to raise donations to cover her tuition.

    We made a flyer to help her gather donations, if anyone is interested:

Bus error -- driver executed.


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Saturday, December 25, 2010

Stumblebum Brigade Iten for this week

This will be the last week of Stumblebum with the format we knew until now, there will be more participating stores than the usual and all of these goodies will disappear after the event, so go grab them all :)
My iten is a posture collar, non-scripted, copy with resizer, already @ mainstore.

Additional Info : Used in this vendor the *REDGRAVE* Vampire-Hunter Skin --Trinity--  and the piercings .:ellabella:. Laniebutt 2.0.

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Wizards blow the Blazers out on MLK Day, win 120-101.

Six Wizards players score in double-figures as the Washington blows the Portland Trailblazers out on Martin Luther King day, 120-101. The house of guards combined for 49 points (Beal-25, Wall-24) while Kelly Oubre Jr. had one of his best games in a while with 18 points (10 in the first quarter). Meanwhile, Tomas Satoransky, who’s suddenly found himself back in the rotation, chipped in with 10 points and 10 rebounds. The win is the Wizards’ 12 straight at Verizon Center.

This one got out of hand early. Washington hit six of seven three-point attempts led by Beal who had three of them in the first quarter. Kelly Oubre stepped in and provided instant offense off the bench with 10 first quarter points as the Wizards found themselves up 37-21.

The Wizards tightened up on the defensive end which resulted in an extended 17-0 run that started late in the first quarter and carried its way over to the second quarter.

Wall would poke the ball away on his patented wrap around steal as Beal would throw him a touchdown pass for an easy dunk.

Wall found Otto Porter in the corner for three to end the half as they led, 75-50.

The Wizards were able to stretch the lead out to as big as 30, 95-65 late in the third quarter so Scott Brooks yanked his starters. The Blazers were able to cut the lead to 17 in the fourth quarter that forced Brooks to reluctantly, reinsert his starters.

A corner three-pointer from Wall would stretch the lead to 20 as the starters were then able to sit for the rest of the game. Wizards win back-to-back blowout games, 120-101.

Wizards on fire from three

The Wizards shot 57 percent (13-23) from three-point range including 6-7 in the first quarter. Beal was hot to start as he hit his first three attempts of the game. Oubre was a huge spark off the bench today knocking down three of his four attempts from range. Hell, even Satoransky knocked one down.

Tomas Satoransky reemerges

After being buried on Brooks’ bench, Satoransky has appeared in back-to-back games and played very well. Today, he had 10 points and 10 rebounds in 19:25 minutes of play. This is what the Wizards thought they would be getting when they brought Satoransky over from Europe. He looks to have regained his confidence as he’s now attacking the basket and is no longer hesitating to shoot. If Satoransky can be another scoring threat off the bench, that will pay dividends down the road.

Another all-around, great team victory

Morris notched another double-double with 26 points and 13 rebounds, the bench combined for 36 points, and the House of Guards controlled the game from the start. Not a whole lot more has to be said.

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Grilled Pork Tenderloin

December 2, 2010 § 2 Comments

Can you believe there’s only 23 more days until Christmas? Thanksgiving is over and I’ve started my holiday baking. Have my first package of holiday cookies ready to send out. Only a half dozen more to go. Anyway, hope everyone has had a chance to think about Christmas presents. Luckily this year I started a little early and we’ve all decided to go light on the gifts. But that usually means I do more baking and cooking to make up for it. Oh well, on to the topic at hand.

During one of our grocery shopping trips a while back, the Mister picked up a pork tenderloin and said, “Hey, how about cooking this up?” Okay, sure. I said that but didn’t know how I would “cook it up” at the time. But I’ve had Alton Brown’s pork tenderloin recipe marked for over a year now and have yet to try it. Now was the time.

After reading some of the reviews, I adjusted the recipe by adding more chipotle pepper to a total of 4. Other than that, I stuck to the recipe. It turned out to be a decent amount for us although the heat from the chiles was not as prominent as I would have expected. I might try adding a bit more the next time. I marinaded the tenderloin for 6 hours. Fired up that chimney starter and got to work.

I decided to turn the tenderloin every 1.5 minutes because for some reason only known to my subconscious, I thought it would keep the tenderloin from drying out. Admittedly, I was nervous about overcooking a rather large piece of meat. Pork tenderloin is very lean, leaner than chicken as a matter of fact. So the recommended way of cooking this lean hunk of meat is high and fast. That’s where charcoal (lump charcoal in my case) comes in. The total cook time took longer than the 15 minutes the recipe stated. It actually took about 20 minutes for meat to reach 140 degrees F. Maybe turning at every 2 minutes would have shortened the cooking time, I don’t know. Here’s what it looked like after resting in the foil pack. Yummmm.

The meat was very moist (whew) and I think the 10 minute rest with the remaining marinade really helped boost the flavor. I don’t know if you can tell how moist the meat was in the picture below but it was nice. I served it along with some baby greens from the garden with some heirloom cherry tomatoes.

Although the pork had nice flavor, I kind of wished I made more of the marinade for reduction to serve along side of it. Mental note for next time.

Hope everyone is having a good week!

§ 2 Responses to Grilled Pork Tenderloin

  • Mike says:

    Looks great! I really like pork tenderloin – I think it is an underrated cut. It is relatively inexpensive, flavorful, cooks quickly and stays moist.

    • CAB says:

      Thanks Mike! I really like the fact that it cooked so quickly and stayed moist. Good thing because the Mister really likes pork tenderloin too and has asked for it again.

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Posts tagged ‘Kevin Baughan virgin media’

Cable operators look to wireless access as next frontier

Wireless access is now emerging as the next frontier for cable operators, and operators want to tap demand from their customers for pervasive high-performance connectivity, Cable Congress attendees heard.

image“We would like to create a step change in connectivity in the same way we did with fixed broadband,” said Kevin Baughan, Director, Metro Wireless, Virgin Media Business, who was responsible for the company’s recent deployment of WiFi on the London Underground, speaking on a panel session on WiFi at Cable Congress.

Virgin Media is working with mobile operators to deploy small cell networks and WiFi networks, said Baughan. The company has put together a hosting service to work in partnership with cities to deliver small cells that can be used for mobile backhaul, which Virgin media already provides from a smaller number of access points, in addition to WiFi.

The company has also won concessions from Leeds and Bradford to deliver WiFi networks across both cities.”It’s a business model based on the success of small cells,” said Baughan. The WiFi networks Virgin Media is building are powerful enough to give coverage inside buildings as well as in outdoor areas, which was important, he said. The Leeds and Bradford WiFi networks are branded by the local city authorities and operated by Virgin Media.

Baughan said Virgin Media had not yet taken a decision to go down the FON-type approach of partitioning its own subscribers’ cable modems using second SSIDs to deliver wider WiFi coverage. He said that the company had made sure its modems were capable of supporting this type of deployment, but had not yet taken a decision on this.

ZON Multimedia, VOO and Sea Change Honored With Awards at Cable Congress

ZON Multimedia, VOO and Sea Change Honored With Awards at Cable Congress

ZON’s Jose Pascoal wins Cable Europe Fellow Award
VOO Motion takes home Cable Europe Innovation Award

(London, 6 March) Cable Europe, the trade association representing the European cable industry, announced today the Cable Europe Award winners in the categories of innovation and individual achievement. Peter Percosan, Managing Director, Cable Europe Labs, and Caroline Van Weede, Managing Director of Cable Europe presented the awards on the second day of Cable Congress, taking place this week in London.

The second annual Cable Europe Innovation Award, voted on by delegates at Cable Congress, was awarded to Belgian operator VOO and Sea Change for their multi-screen TV solution VOO Motion. The innovation won against a competitive field, including Virgin Media’s WiFi on the London Underground, ZON’s Timewarp, Kabel Deutschland and ARRIS for their world record 4.7 Gbit/s downstream throughput speed, and Liberty Global’s Horizon, done in partnership with Cisco, Samsung and Intel. The Innovation Award recognizes a special project that stands out as a bright spot in helping cable innovate and stay ahead of the customer. Accepting the award on behalf of VOO and Sea Change was Nico Weymaere, Chief Technology Officer at VOO.

Jose Pascoal, Planning, Engineering & Services Architecture Director, ZON Multimedia was honored with the Cable Europe Fellow Award in recognition of his individual dedication, talent, consistent excellence and contributions to the cable industry. In accepting the award, Pascoal thanked his colleagues, noting: “This is not an individual award, it is a team achievement.”

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Category Archives: classic

(Almost) Sugar-Free Vanilla² Cupcakes

Well, I’m back at it again with the sugar-free baking experiments.  This time, instead of using the dreaded Splenda though, I thought I’d give Stevia a try instead.  I’ve never been a huge fan of Splenda because of how heavily … Continue reading

Posted in classic, cupcakes, sugar free | 1 Comment

The World’s Best Chocolate Chip Cookies

Well, it’s another 90 degree September day in Northern Alabama and that can only mean one thing…Fall is right around the corner!  Growing up in Kentucky, Fall was always my favorite season, hands down, because of the crisp, cool air, … Continue reading

Posted in chocolate, classic, cookies | 8 Comments

New York Cheesecake

As promised, here is my cheesecake recipe… For the crust: 1 1/3 cups finely grated graham cracker crumbs 1/3 cup sugar 5 tbsp. melted butter Pinch of salt For the filling: 4 (8-oz) packages cream cheese, softened 1 3/4 cups … Continue reading

Posted in baking, cakes, cheesecake, classic | 2 Comments

Cherry Pie

In honor of Memorial Day today, and because it is one of my Dad’s favorite desserts, I made an all-American cherry pie.  Simple, delicious, and fun to make. 🙂 What You’ll Need: For Pie Dough… 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour … Continue reading

Posted in baking, classic, pie | 1 Comment


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Huancayo, or Life in a Central Highlands Town

Huancayo: a town with a population of 400,000, and located at an altitude of 3244m above sea level. A place described by Lonely Planet as giving the traveller “the impression of arriving in some Wild West frontier town. Tumbledown outer suburbs, dusty, chaotic streets, people wandering seemingly at random and all around the mountains rise […]

20 things that happen on buses in Peru

I know, 20 seems a lot, doesn’t it? But the thing is, I’ve spent a lot of time on buses here. Of the last 48 hours, over 30 involved me sat on a bus (I know, I know: when I told the woman at the travel agency that I’ve arranged my time here in Huancayo […]

Ten things that happen when you go to a show in Peru

I know, I know… It’s been a while, so long that I’m now in a different country… But I blame South American internet, and too much time exploring and eating cake to write about it. Anyway, I’m back (at least for now!) and here with yet more observations of the oddities of life. You see, […]

Ten weird things that happened in Chile

So, here’s the thing. I am and always have been a little bit scared of random patriotism. I blame my dad, since when we used to watch sports on TV, he’d make me root for the athlete/ team from the country I’d never heard of, and we’d desperately hope that Britain would drop the baton, […]

Ten things you notice at the supermarket in La Paz

This may not sound like the most promising of blog topics. But trust me, everything over here is a little bit crazy, and so going to buy some food can become a bit of an adventure. Especially when you go with certain ingredients in mind… 10. As soon as you walk in the door (or […]

Alasitas, artesanías and api

As anyone who’s ever met me or read anything on this blog probably knows, I love markets. Any kind of markets: food, craft, Christmas… And La Paz, with it’s streets behind the plaza San Francisco full of stalls selling alpaca jumpers, alpaca gloves, alpaca hats, small fluffy alpacas (seeing a theme here?) etc is amazing […]

German cheesecake, or, why do they even bother giving out the menu?

Not even two weeks in La Paz, and I’m already starting to feel like a native. OK, so that’s a slight lie. There are many things that I don’t and never will understand here, and the fact that most of the time I and my fellow interns are the only non-Bolivians in a place can […]

My first cake with altitude!

Sorry for the bad pun. I was going to make an excuse, but I can’t actually think of an acceptable one, so I won’t bother. So, my first Friday in La Paz! It already feels like I’ve been here a lot longer, and not just cause I’ve been to the Plaza Avaroa a good dozen […]

A farewell to Paris

And so it comes to an end. One final day of ticking off the last few things on the list I made on the train to Portsmouth back in June, a fit of giggles at ‘Last Christmas’ in a French cookware shop and enough dodging gormless tourists and awkward Parisians to qualify for the next […]

Ten unexpected food experiences in Paris

So, we all know about croissants, baguettes and Camembert, but if we’re honest, it’s far more exciting and interesting when we have slightly unexpected encounters with food: something we didn’t expect to find, or, at least, not where we found it… 10. The Cuban stall at the Christmas market at La Défense. A combination of […]


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Monday update

SHORT TERM: gap down opening, DOW -108

Overnight the Asian markets lost 0.3%. Europe opened lower and lost 1.6%. US index futures were lower overnight as well. At 8:30 the NY FED was reported lower: -2.0 v +3.1, and at 9:15 Industrial production was reported lower: -0.2% v -0.3%. The market gapped down at the open to SPX 2077, and continued to 2072 before rebounding. The market had closed at SPX 2094 on Friday. After the low the market rallied to SPX 2087 by just past 11am. Then after a pullback to SPX 2081 by 11:30, the market bounced back to 2088 just before 2pm. A pullback to SPX 2082 followed by 3pm, then the market bounced to close at 2084.

For the day the SPX/DOW lost 0.50%, and the NDX/NAZ lost 0.45%. Bonds gained 9 ticks, Crude lost 30 cents, Gold rose $5, and the USD was lower. Medium term support drops to the 2070 and 2019 pivots, with resistance now at the 2085 and 2131 pivots. Tomorrow: Housing starts and Building permits at 8:30, and the FED starts its FOMC.

The market gapped down at the open today, sold off to the 2070 pivot (2072), then rallied to the 2085 pivot (2088), before ending the session at 2084. Today’s decline was a continuation of the decline that started last Thursday at SPX 2115. It is interesting that the market sold off until it hit last week’s SPX 2072 low, and then rallied. Another temporary double bottom? Since today’s SPX 2072 low was followed by a notable reversal to 2088, we will count the low as wave 1, and the rebound as wave 2, of Minute c. When the SPX 2072 support is broken to the downside, wave 3 should be underway. Short term support is at the 2070 pivot and SPX 2058, with resistance at the 2085 pivot and SPX 2099. Short term momentum rebounded to just below neutral from quite overbought this morning. Best to your Tuesday trading!

MEDIUM TERM: downtrend

LONG TERM: bull market

About tony caldaro

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103 Responses to Monday update

  1. magnus1234 says:

    I have four words for this w2: Max pain for all.

    It will be higher than expected.

  2. fotis2 says:

    Decision time looks like 3waves done EW and resistance should be kicing in around this level technically Daily CCI close inside 100= swing long thoughts?

    • stmro says:

      The weekly middle band is around 2095 so it could halt here, but the move from the overnight low looks like one endless ramp to me. Doesn’t look ready to stop and turn on a dime. Maybe at 2103 – 2106, between the 50ma and daily middle band.

      Also read somewhere that every FOMC under Yellen bar one has been positive. Bearing that in mind, i think we put in a high tomorrow.

      • $$$NEWBIE$$$ says:

        a wave 2 before a wave 3 is to fool and get bulls excited and sucker them in and than you know what comes next- a no mercy wave 3 down!

      • blackjak100 says:

        If the market character has truly changed, a down market after Yellen will confirm it. I think it has a shot to drop quite a bit tomorrow. More so than in the past anyway.

  3. Peter Sliney says:

    I think the market is shaking out weak or over leveraged bears. Typical before a big drop.

  4. H D says:

    VIX, I’m not trying to be a guru, I could be totally wrong, people are doing technical analysis/ patterns on the VIX like it has buying and selling. It’s a math formula, not even priced in dollars, that gives less than 70% likely hood of a directional move, either direction, so SPX options can be priced,,,, and some complain about EW accuracy. Ok, I’ve said my peace. Carry on.

    • uncle10 says:

      The vix moves with the market ( inversely). If you know what the vix is going to do then you know what the market is going to do.( most all the time, every once in a while the vix may be up along with the market or vice versus but not very much). Its not better or worse to look at the chart or technicals of the vix because they move together. If you look/watch you will see this is true. Move together is not the same thing as price levels or percentages. I think price levels are obviously much more important on the market indexs than price level of vix. The few price levels I keep in mind on vix is 12 handle (low meaning careful on longs),15 handle ( medium risk), and 20 ( a hold above 20 is a fast risky market, when it gets back under 20 after being above is lower risk usually good time for buying the market/stocks).

  5. Took some profits after Dow rose 200 points since yesterday’s buy-in as posted here yesterday and the night before.

    Drew/stmro, sorry you’ve found the market tough to decipher but I gave you all the info in advance, anyone here could have made the same profits I just did. This is too easy lol.

    • stmro says:

      Give it a rest dude. I don’t want, or need what you’re selling.

    • uncle10 says:

      nice call FRB. keep posting and trying to help people.
      I read you are thinking about a sub. service. something to think about:
      on more than one occasion I have know people that had great system that worked most all the time and very soon after they started charging people for the info it stopped working.

      • Thx Unc, I’ve seen that too. I am highly confident that my indicator has broken through to what truly moves/determines nearly every market move of 300+ points but I know it could stop working some day, that’s why I’m betting and winning huge while the getting is good. Did you see the DIA & SPY calls last Wed and, since yesterday’s low? I love this game!

        • uncle10 says:

          Hey FRB, no i didnt see them. Which strikes and which expire? Did you look into futures? I think you would like them given you can buy or sell anytime. Say when you have a buy signal and futures are way down over night or am you could buy and not have to wait for the market open after they have recovered most of their loses.

    • The guy with unlimited funds to absorb unlimited losses is back. 😀
      Let us know when your website is up with a track record (longer than a week) of verifiable results (i.e. audited showing gains and losses). Until then, just another dude on the web. 😉

      • Funds not unlimited but growing nicely. Losses very rare. A week? I know you’re fairly green here but I’ve been here a while. Verifiable – just look back at my past posts, all in real-time and BEFORE the predicted move, why fight the facts? Wish you the best but no need to settle for small returns, this is a game that can be (has been) beaten consistently if one simply knows how to correctly decipher the markt’s data.

    • reddragonleo says:

      FRB, I can see another push up as I do think nothing will be said about raising interest rates tomorrow after the FOMC minutes are released. But I think we’ll top out closer to your 500 Dow points up then the 1000 points up. Most likely we’ll be just under a double top later this week.

      • Very possible Red, I too am leaning toward +500 vs. +1000 this time around but will let my indicator do its thing and wait for the next Sell signal. Tomorrow should be fun.

  6. $$$NEWBIE$$$ says:

    Seatbelts on, market is about to Drop VERY hard! Best of luck to all!

  7. uncle10 says:

    Hey TBoys. I saw you posted that CNN fear/greed index yesterday. That thing is going to nail the bottom again!! 😉

  8. mjtplayer says:

    SPX & DOW have now both tagged the 50% retrace – both on very light volume.

  9. uncle10 says:

    Thanks Tony.
    Everyday usually more than once per day, there is a stock that goes up a lot based on false and untrue news report from one of the major news outlets. Someone or more likely a group of people are making a fortune on this little side game.

    • tony caldaro says:

      up and down
      did you notice Avalanche?

      • uncle10 says:

        I dont think that fall was due to a false and untrue news story. looks like a bad trial for a drug they working on? Im talking about during the trading day a stock flies up and gets halted for volatility and it is because a major news outlet reports an untrue false story about someone that is going to buy them. Happens everyday. Who ever is doing it knows how to not get caught.

  10. Hi Tony!
    Is there a pos RSI(5) divergence in Dow daily?

  11. fotis2 says:

    This slow grind up must be a bit unnerving for bears.

    • Nothing different then the last 6 years. Greece will default interest rates will rise in sept. Yet Bulls Jack it up. Par for the course. Good luck. Over 2003 as a bear I would be concerned

  12. INDU, SPX, DAX & CAC all look to be in 5 of C of this wave 2. Then wave 3 down. Now for the curve ball. What if the correction ended overnight or in the cash market yesterday? Daffy DAX made it down to 10798 earlier today which is not that far away from a host of targets in the 10600-10700 area and is now back above 11050. The Greek saga has not improved yet the market doesn’t appear to care today and therefore why should it care tomorrow. INDU made a lower low yesterday. The SPX did not but a marginal failure of a C wave is not extraordinary. 5 waves down is 5 waves down and maybe that completed the whole decline. The market could be in a wave 3 as part of an impulse right now instead of a corrective wave C. Food for thought. In either case the market will have to drop back when the wave is complete. The nature of the drop will give us our clues.

  13. Okay, first gap filled. Next one at 2107’ish. Hmmm…

  14. $$$NEWBIE$$$ says:

    wave 2 finishing up here withing the next handful of points, soon wave 3 will start target is 2010 on s&p

  15. stmro says:

    The US markets have been incredibly frustrating to follow over the last few months. Breaks out of one range only to fall into another. Compare and contrast that to the DAX, which moves 6-7% in one direction with barely a pit stop – a swing trader’s dream.

    If this is what a QE-less market looks like, they need to turn the spigots back on. I want epic bull rallies and equally epic corrections!

  16. stmro says:

    2070 held for the 3rd time today (in overnight). We’re heading for 2103 next. Whether we break up or down might be event driven.

  17. mjtplayer says:

    Another day where someone forgot to tell the Greek bond market that we’re rallying. Greek 2yr notes up over 100bps today at 29.92% and now testing the critical 30% area from April’s high.

    I’ve mentioned several times that the 30% area is critical resistance, as there’s nothing but “open space” and uncharted territory above 30%. The exact high from April was 30.01%. Today’s intra-day high: 29.983%

  18. MR C what do you think of Trump? He sounds good…he s got the Perot style down pretty well.

  19. budfox9450 says:

    The DJ30 is up 84, the DJ20 is down 32.
    What’s wrong with this picture?

  20. rc1269 says:

    boy, what if the Fed raised rates tomorrow. i wonder…

    • tommyboys says:

      Sure hope they do rc but I doubt any move until fall. We need the uncertainty of – an uptick in rates = certain market demise – taken away. History shows the first few moves higher are bullish for the market, it’s just those last couple that screw everything up. The last couple are likely a few years down the road – jmho…only the best to all!

  21. mjtplayer says:

    All eyes on the Fed tomorrow and EU Finance Ministers meeting on Greece Thursday. Unless there’s a surprise headline or statement, today should be relatively quiet.

    Oversold conditions getting burned-off with yesterday’s intra-day rally and today’s bounce. The VIX is acting very well, closing near the highs yesterday with the SPX up over 10pts off the low – that’s excellent price action. Market up slightly today, but the VIX is flat and holding in the 15’s.

    This is the best price action I’ve seen in the VIX in months

    • H D says:

      The vix is only measuring the price of index options (making puts expensive). During OPEX week, I’m not sure there’s much to interpret at 15%? pricing 2100 or 2168 $SPX
      What’s your take?

      • H D says:

        *2000 (not 2100)

      • mjtplayer says:

        My comments on the VIX weren’t exactly focusing on the level, but the price action. 15% is relatively low, but not over the past 3 months of suppressed volatility it isn’t. Each and every time the market has rallied, even intra-day, the VIX has been smashed. Put buying drys-up and traders come-in and buy calls.

        Yesterday and today have been different, the SPX rallied over 10pts off the morning low, but the VIX not only remained near the highs of the day but actually closed there. Same story today, a morning rally in stocks but no sell-off in volatility, it’s just hanging in the 15’s as put buying continues through the market bounces – quite different behavior than over the past few months.

    • ariez5 says:

      MJT, Always good info from you. Thanks.

  22. I find it interesting that the 2099 resistance level is right at the 61.8% fib level. Might be a good short entry point.

  23. Thanks TC; I would like to see 2040 and perhaps even 2020 to help me establish another position. Come on bears, get to work!

  24. They can t break support so it must go up….have a profitable day everyone.Amazing how important 2070 must be to the algos and their programmers–the Central Bankers.

  25. 90 minutes before the US open the US futures again find themselves in the red. What’s more the 1st wave down could still be play. Yesterday’s bounce was only a 40% retracement on the SPX and whilst there’s no reason why a wave 2 can’t be only 40% it simply doesn’t look right having halted at the prior 4 and being relatively short in time duration. So in my eyes either the market has finished wave 1 overnight and is in wave 2 up or its dancing around in yet another 4 (4 of 5 of 1) which, if correct, means yet another lower low before sucker rally wave 2 can make it’s move.

  26. Dow Jones fulfilled our primary target. So today if respect the support ……..
    complete analysis on the link below

  27. ABchart says:

    Thanks Tony and all posters!

  28. I m going with the theory of a bullish last part of triple witch week…back over the 50d and slightly past our previous high.Then–more fun to the downside.All pretty well contained right now unless Yellen presses the sell button by mistake…

  29. Posted Wed & Thur that I took some profits after the big pop after my Strong Buy signal at last Tuesday’s close. Posted update here yesterday saying I’d be buying back in at Dow 17750-17700, low of the day was 17698.42 – closed nearly 100 points above the low at 17791 … like I said, easy money.

    Drew/stmro, go back and read my past comments, all posted in real-time, BEFORE the move, rarely wrong. The facts speak for themselves. Don’t resent/envy it, BENEFIT from it while you can.

    • reddragonleo says:

      Good Calls FRB…. I could see one more dip tomorrow morning and then another rally into FOMC and probably topping on Thursday or Friday. I’m not sure how high but I don’t think it’s ready yet to make a new “higher high” of any significance. Probably a low high but enough to scare the bears and get the bulls all long.

      Next week is a very bearish week and I do think that will start our move down to take out the 2040 low by some amount. Best guess is 2020 area but it’s all about how many bulls’ buy stops are below 2040 I think… as well as how many bears they can get short. They need a full bus of bears if they want to then squeeze back up to a new higher high into mid-July I think. But one day at a time…

  30. Food for thought on Top of Primary 3

    If you look at Tony’s big picture SP 500. 666 to 1370-1 1370-1074- 2 and 3 is 1074-xxxx right?

    Well at 2130… that is 150% of 1…. and it stopped cold in the tracks there right?

    Was that it for Primary 3?? Or will be do a 161% which is about 2207??

    • hooloo1957 says:

      I thought you thought that the October 2014 low was primary 4?

    • blackjak100 says:

      I think it stopping cold in the tracks at the 161.8 % extension of the 2007-2009 decline is more important than the 150% of 1.

  31. esvxm says:

    Thanks Tony for the analysis!

    S&P 500, Dow Industrials, NASDAQ 100 and the German DAX next key levels and the pattern formation…

  32. Alan Eckert says:

    A similar setup occurred in early Aug. 2007 and it fell below support then but within a few days rallied off that low. I still think right now we should drop to test SPX 2020 at the gap and breaking below the 200 SMA. Then it would be a matter will it rally to 2150, or continue a bit lower and then rally to a lower high? It is likely to rally to 2150, so we wait and see.

  33. It looks as though the A-D ratio may want to fall to it’s March 10, 2015 low of 98, 500. It is currently at 100, 600.$NYAD

  34. Possible double bottom on the daily Dow Jones.

    chart link

  35. Interesting. We double bottomed in March around 2039 then April 2049 and May 2099 every time we rallied. Is today 2072 different?

  36. fotis2 says:

    Many thanks mr.T so bellow 2070 short.looking for swing long once daily CCI closes above 100.GL to all

Comments are closed.


text:
snapshots of mexico, literal and figurative

Back on the Taco Train
April 4, 2009, 1:22 pm
Filed under: Photo, Short | Tags: ,

Current count:  32 tacos

A day without tacos is a sad day, but yesterday, it was necessary to preserve my stomach for the rest of my quest.  Following my medical team’s advice (ie myself and a few emails from friends), I spent the day doing shots of Pepto-Bismol and avoiding heartburn-provoking foods (caffeine, spicy foods, greasy foods, alcohol… ie pretty much my diet in Mexico).  The day of eating nothing but rice and corn tortillas (and a couple beers that snuck in somehow) seems to have paid off, however, and I need to pick up the pace as I get back on the rails to taco town.

3:30 PM it’s off to Villamelon, a highly recommended taco shop near Estadio Azul, where I’ll be taking in a futbol match later in the evening.  UUUU NI VERRR SI DAAAAD!

Taco-ing at Los Arbolitos, San Angel

Taco-ing at Los Arbolitos, San Angel

1 Comment so far
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the guy in the background looks like he wants in on your taco challenge

Comment by aislinn

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Too Ugly for Love?

Last week I received an email from a TV production company in the UK. They wanted to know if I’d be interested in talking to them about a documentary they were working on. They thought I would be a good candidate, based on some of my blog content.

I figured it had something to do with ectrodactyly, as my blog stats page was showing lots of hits on my Lobster Girl and Exploring Ectrodactyly posts.

Now, I’m a pretty skeptical person, so before I envisioned myself starring in a tell-all documentary about my life with EEC, I knew I needed to do some research. I wrote back and said I might be interested, but obviously wanted more information. I Googled the production company to see what kind of shows they’ve done.

It turned out that the show in question was called “Too Ugly for Love?”

I wasn’t terribly surprised at this revelation, though I will admit to being a little hurt. Too ugly for love? Is that a thing?

After doing some research it appears that the show’s focus is on people who have some sort of disability or disfigurement and are having trouble finding a romantic partner. From the clips I have seen online, and the articles, it is not as horrible as it’s title. However, it’s not exactly an empowering take on dating with disabilities, either. It seems to insinuate that if you have anything different about yourself – if you are somehow “ugly”- that no one would want to date you.

Aside from some awkward years between the ages of 11 and 16, I did not find this to be the case for myself. I believe that personality far outweighs physical beauty. I’m sure there are guys out there who would not want to date me because of my scars or my missing digits, but those aren’t people I’d want to spend my time with anyway. There are plenty of people who are capable of looking past whatever external flaws you have and seeing your true beauty and value. Regardless of what your face or body looks like, if you have an ugly personality, you’re not going to have much luck in love.

I wasn’t the only one who was contacted about this show. Jen Campbell was too, and she was pretty pissed. You can see her YouTube response here. She brings up a lot of valid points about representation. She’s really passionate about this.

What do you think? Is it just another silly reality show with a bad name? Would you go on it if asked?

2 thoughts on “Too Ugly for Love?

  1. Paganaidd says:

    Oh. My. God.

    When I first read this I had no words. I took a deep breath and now I have too many.

    Suffice to say I am appalled. I fear to melt down into a rant.

    I’m getting that gut level, “Don’t mess with MY People” feeling I get when disabilities are badly represented.

    Liked by 1 person

  2. Sickly Stardust says:

    That is so ridiculous. Due to my maloclussion I have been called ugly most of my life. Due to everything else wrong with me I have been told that no one ever wants to date a sick girl and I’d never get married.

    There is so much ignorance regarding chronic illness and disability including the idea that our differences are negative and are all there is to us.

    I am terribly sorry that you had to go through this as I’m sure it was hurtful, but from following you you seem to come off quite confident, as you should, because you’re truly lovely. And the rest who think otherwise can feel free to go fuck themselves ^_^

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Some bass-ic fun

June 16, 2008

I had the opportunity to go to a get-together with some of my technical friends last night. Nothing unusual there, except that this time they had a little ‘stage’ set up with a piano, drums, some mics, and a couple of guitars. I had a little advance notice, so I brought one of my basses along. (Not the basses in the chorus, an electric bass guitar…)

It was the usual ‘what do you want to do?’ kind of get together – we ended up doing some 12-bar blues, ‘Mustang Sally’, ‘Get Here’, and a Beatles tune or two. Next time, I’m going to bring some fake books – there were a lot of “I know this, but can’t remember the words” experiences.

That’s why I took the bass – just tell me what key we’re in, and off we go.

I still can’t immediately visualize where I am on a 5-string as well as a 4-string; I need more practice.

It was fun, musical, and I had the chance to make some new friends. That’s a good evening!