Consciousness: Who We Are

After a month full of intense work related stress, I've finally come around to finish my WIP (work in progress), David Lodge famous novel Thinks. Lodge's main character is called Messenger, a persona that many of us can either relate to or have acquainted. Messenger is a philosopher converted to computer science specifically AI (Artificial Intelligence). The mastering of the English language along with his passion of the human mind has landed him a job as a Director of Human Science in a university and a TV show on qualia. Lodge, in his rather fascinating rambling about human consciousness, gives a definition of it that truly struck me in a different way: "The privacy of consciousness, the secrecy of thought, it's the filing cabinet to which only we ourselves have the key." The veracity of this statement led me to muse over human relationships. We can't never come to totally, completely know someone. We may know their habits, their routine or even their character but we will never be able to permeate the hidden cage of their thoughts unless they're revealed to us. In this novel, Messenger uses a pearl recorder to chronicle his reflections and he comes to share some rather "disturbing" thoughts about his relationship with his wife. He entertains for a quick second the thought of copulating with his step daughter before dreaming of an affair with a colleague of his.
Had you known that your friend would not hesitate to steal from you or slander you, would you have still befriended them? Had the groom known that his bride would use surrogates for her sexual desires, would he have married her? I remember reading a long time ago about a survey suggesting that more than half of us would go ahead and do something totally unthinkable, were they given the reassurance they would not get caught.
Personally, I believe each and everyone of us have two sides: a good and a bad one. The truth is, at some level, in different circumstances, we're a fraud. Some of us are just better than other at hiding or revealing it.
However, we also have a free will that allows us to cultivate more of the bad or good side in us, which ultimately weighs in a lot in determining our personality. And as far as relationships are concerned, one can only take a leap of faith and hope that they've made the best choice for themselves and ultimately for those surrounding them.

Goodbye 2008!!

All of the five posts that I've written, I couldn't decide which to publish, neither could I just leave the year pass away without an homage to 2008. So here are some few thoughts that I've collected here and there:
"Be careful the mistake you make as God forbids you live a long time as you'll spend the rest of life remembering them."
"Although, one doesn't always get back what they give away, one can only give what they have".
"Do not define your life only by the money you have or your job. The money can be gone in a twinkle of an eye, and you can't always be replaced at your job."
"Be kind at all time even to strangers as you never know what may come your way."
"Money is the root of most evil; if your neighbor wants to borrow some from you, always give them an amount that you won't cry after if they don't reimburse you."
"Don't be a fool, stop repeating your mistakes. I repeat, don't be a fool."
"If there's for one, there's always for two. Make a difference in someone's else life today."

My Interests for year 2008

Throughout the year I've recorded, all the movies and books I read. And I intended to post this on Dec 31st, but with everything that has been planned I hope not to find myself glued to my computer on that day. So here it is my selection for this year reading and watching.

Movies:
- Vantage Point
- Mr&Mrs Smith (re-watched)
- Superbad -- stupidly funny movie
-Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins - A "feel good" movie
-Tyler Perry's Meet the Browns - another Feel good movie
- The Bank Job -- I just like Jason Statham
- 21 -- For Smart people
- Freedom Writers -- Inspirational
- Fierce People -- Quite disturbing
- Nancy Drew - Teenage stuffs
- Juno -- funny
- Forbidden Kingdom - so corny!! A better plot combining Li and Chan talents could have been written.
- Love and 4 other letter words - corny romantic black comedy
- Made of Honor - another corny romantic comedy
- Mad Money
- The Bucket List
- The Negotiator
- Irina Palm - Independent movie about a grandma who found herself whacking men off for money in order to pay for her grandson surgery.
- La TV d'Elie Kakou - French comedy, hilarious!!
- Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis - The "best" French comedy of summer 2008: Despite the French dominance in so many art domains: Culinary (hum hum, I love french cuisine!!), Cosmetics, Fashion and others, movies remain their lame duck.
- Sex and the City - One of Hollywood Hits Best romantic movie of the year!!
- What happens in Vegas
- You Don't Mess with the Zohan
- Wanted w/ Angeline Jolie
- Knocked out
- College Road Trip: stupidly funny w/ Martin Lawrence and Raven.
- Steps Brothers: I'm marked for life by Will Ferrel's nuts on a drum
- Hancock
- The Dark Knight -- astounding performance of the Joker and the cute Chris Bale
- Tropic thunder - A funny war parody w/ an astounding performance from Tom Cruise
- Traitor - Don Cheadle under a new light
- Burn After Reading - (I should've waited for this movie to come on DVD)
- Tyler's Perry the Family that Preys.
- Body of Lies - An amazing thriller with Leonardo Di Caprio
- Fireproof - For every couple on the verge of divorce
- Role Models - Americans comedy have gotten worse
- Changeling - Angelina Jolie, despite being a mother in real life, just doesn't strike as a mother type in her movies.
- Quantum of Solace - A meaner, swifter and blonder Bond than ever!! -- Adrenaline Rush.
- Four Christmases - Vaughn and Witherspoon not boring at all!!
- Transporter 3 - Totally worth my money just seeing those chocolate bars on Statham, yum yum --JB007 or JS? The choice can be hard. -- Adrenaline Rush.
- The Tale of Despereaux --> I have really grown up, I no longer enjoy cartoons as I used to.
- Seven Pounds --> such a depressing and traumatizing movie that I've dreamed of an alternative ending the next day.
-----The list is far from being done as I'm planning to watch "Doubt", "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" , "Marley & Me".
There are few movies that I would recommend: the independent one "Irina Palm" was quite intriguing, it's the type of movie that one would watch as a last resort. However it makes you wonder: "What would you have done, were you in the woman position?" Many of us, under "extreme" circumstances have found ourselves doing the exact opposite of what we believe, the negation of what we show to the world daily.
I very much enjoyed Don Cheadle in "Traitor" and DiCaprio was a bliss in "Bodies of Lies".

Books:
- Dossiers extraordinaires: part 2 by Pierre Bellemare & Jacques Antoine.
- 7 habits of highly effective people
- Le Combat Ordinaire - a cartoon about a psychoneurotic character who's been seeing a shrink for 8 years.
- Cul-de-sac by Douglas Kennedy
- Changement de Decor by David Lodge: I hate the guy, he got me w/ his ending. No actually, I think the guy hates his readers, what an ending!!
- Le Bucher des Vanites by Tom Wolfe -- English Version: The Bonfire of the Vanities. A 911 pages beast -- every page worth my time.
- Ten thousands of online articles (does this count?)
- CakePHP (would this count?) -- A complete guide to rapid development framework.
- David Lodge Thinks... By David Lodge --> Work In Progress.
From my reading collection I would highly recommend "Changing Places" which is the English version of "Changement de Decor" by David Lodge.
My selection of french books (or should I say books in French) was driven by the desire to reconnect w/ Moliere's Language. And I would like to thank my very good friend Oliver for his help on this.

What Must A Woman do During Recession?

It's official, we're in a recession!! Girl, it's time for you to get in charge of your finances. Stop clinging to your baby daddy, your sugar daddy or your rent daddy and start acting like the real woman that you are. I've gathered a few tips here and there, some from friends, others from experience and thoughtful articles:
- Keep on paying yourself first whenever you get that paycheck. Whether you're making $1000.00/month, more or less, whatever the amount you can always save. I used to make $1200.00/month, that's $600 every two weeks and I would put away $100 every pay day, then locked in a short period CD account. That money sure was handy in times of turbulence.
- Call those credit card companies and request a lower interest rate. Most of them will automatically increase your line of credit but will never proactively offer you a lower rate. Why would they? The higher the rate, the more money they're making.
- Stop running your mouth on the phone, reduce your cell phone rate plan and asks your BFFs, Frienemies and sugar daddy to call after 9pm (or 7pm if you're with Sprint).
- It's definitely not the time for a new car, especially with the Big 3 going down. Fix the one you got. Forget about Toyota and Honda, credit is tight, you'll be lucky to get a loan. And even if you get the loan, you could be handed a pink slip instead of a paycheck next month. 250,000 jobs went down last month, preceded by 154,000 the month before, you think you're secure? Think again.
- Don't buy what you can't afford, buy what you need and not what you want. I know I'm guilty here, I bought a $2.50 Santa hat amongst other things.
- Don't stop funding your 401(k), get it to the minimum 6% (or whatever it is) to qualify for your company match and the extra cash, dump it in a Roth IRA.

That's it for now. Do not hesitate to add to the list and to share your own tips and tricks.

Mitt got it Right

I have to admit, Former Massachussetts Gov. Mitt Romney got it right, we should let Detroit go bankrupt!! Not only does he clearly explain the problem, he also offers a solution. Please take time to read the article in its integrality on the NY Times. In time of crisis like now, experience may come handy but it's judgment that counts. Mitt got it right!!.

SERIOUSLY??

Oh no, he didn't!! "Half of that sum, in a worse economy, simply isn't enough firepower", seriously?!!! You must be kidding me Hank!!(please, I hope you don't mind the familiarity, after all, I just gave you almost a trillion dollar of my money)! How much more of our tax money do you want to "rescue" your friends on Wall street? "More, baby, more" I bet that's your answer. After blatantly confessing your incompetence and I quote: "There is no playbook for responding to turmoil we have never faced", why should I trust you with more money? And don't get me wrong, as much deference I give you for your shrewdness regarding some economical matters (excluding the current crisis), as much disdain you'll get from me as you so openly mismanage this financial carthasis. Your Wall street friends should be held accountable for their unscrupulous deeds. Their assets should be seized and their offshore accounts frozen, then they should be prosecuted and be sent in vacation to ones of those FCIs. Thousands are seeing their retirement account shrink by the hour, some are forced to stay longer in the work force and others will just have to file for Chapter 11. And to your friend Bernanke who thinks "it will not be productive to disclose the names of the banks" that are lining up for a piece of the big pie (SERIOUSLY??!!) , I have a question: If any significant other of yours were to ask/borrow from you only $1million, wouldn't you inquire what they intend to do with the money and how and when you'll get it back? So what makes you think we, the tax payers, we, the people on main street, do not deserve the same respect? This is not about experience, PhDs and other big diplomas from Ivy League schools, it's about judgment, astute judgment and accountability.

Whose Bailout is it anyway?

How should the Bailout money be used?
No need to be a savvy to understand the current lockdown in our economy. As a matter of fact that's Econ 101, ok granted maybe Econ 102, but it was rather bemusing to notice how long it took Mr. Treasury Secretary Henry (Hank) Paulson to conclude that he needed a way to force banks to loan money again. For beginners, the financial market is in such deep doo-doo because of markets freeze on cash lending. Even an 850 fico score does no longer guarantee that you'll get a loan to pay for that new "beemer", and let's forget about that Heloc you thought you could tap into.
This whole mess started with the subprime mortgage. "Predatory borrowers" as would say Phil Gramm, bought houses with money they didn't have, took loans they couldn't afford, and got ensnared into payments they couldn't make. Gramm, who has been quoted lately, thus coining the phrase "a nation of whiners" referring to America, is a strong advocate of free market and an ardent forceful voice of market deregulation, argues that "subprime lending is the American dream in action" as he recounts how his mother, a young nurse working double shifts to support her family of 5, bought a bungalow as a "result of a finance company making a mortgage loan that a bank would not make".
On a slightly different note, Gramm goes as far to say it is hard for him "to feel sorry" for Social Security beneficiaries and has urged for a reduction, if not an extermination of the food stamp program. I used to think like him, more so as an Immigrant who has worked her behind off to get where I am today, until about two years ago I watched a video of this middle age woman who had to rely on such program and charity to support herself and her family to meet ends. She had two bachelor degrees and a master, had a good job, owned her house. Then one day she got ill, very ill and was forced to take some time off her job, then some more time off, ran over her FMLA and finally got axed because her company could no longer afford her absences. With her source of income been cut off, her medical bills started piling up, she had to get rid of her house (or did she lose it through repossession? I can't quite remember), finally found herself on the street. I had no choice but soften my views on federal aids and their recipients. Of course, there are some abuses and I would agree for some more stringent laws that can curtail them. However, no need for a PhD to figure out that GREED will break loose if not carefully "monitored". Greed got hold of Fannie Mae executives as they would fattened up their pocket books with bonuses as high as $11.6 millions in salary for its former CEO Franklin Raines, $86k in bonuses for 749 lucky as reported by Peter Miller from the Realty Times. Even at a microsystem scale, we've seen spouses kill their partner in a hope of cashing some life insurance money, or empty their bank accounts and flee to greener pastures with their "grinner" lover. We've seen people confessing of the most gruesome acts thinking they would not get caught. What's make Mr. Gramm & Cie think the same wouldn't not have happened with those big shots that, we, tax payers are now imposed on to bail out? With the "blamees" been identified, what about an effective solution to get us out of the ditch? Paulson has shown some modicum of intelligence by first stopping short from buying bad assets from those companies that need "help" and second by recognizing that banks need to resume lending. For a small illustration, this is what the lending freeze is creating. For a company that sells goods and services, their clients need to borrow money that will allow them to acquire the good or service (may it be a new software that enhances or improves in many aspects the way they conduct their business and overall increase profitability). Now if the banks refuses to loan the cash, the client can't purchase the good or service, the selling company no longer makes money, thus can no longer afford to pay its employees, which leads to some layoffs, and the laid off employee can't pay their bills, which leads to more credit card debts, ultimately bankruptcy. Third, Henry Paulson need to find a way to force those banks to lend again and let the economy flow. The law does not currently oblige banks to lend money, that's why the term "negociations" exist. Paulson could upon pouring our tax money into those troubled companies require them to:
- Fire all those execs who were incompetent enough to allow this mess to see daylight;
- Improve lending practices using regulatory methods that would still generate reasonable profits for them and permit small and big businesses to keep current jobs and why not, expand.
Home owners should definitely be given priority (although some of them should not qualify) as well. It would reduce the exponential rate of foreclosures, which in turn will help deserving homeowners to keep the value of their house if not higher than what they were bought for, then equal to their selling price.
Hopefully, this economical downturn will teach each one of us a lesson: America please learn to live within your means.