We’ve all heard how few vacation days Americans take in comparison to other countries. This Washington Post article, however, notes a very innovative policy:
At least one company, however, has put the vacation dilemma into the laps of its own employees. UCG, a Rockville publisher of business newsletters, electronic magazines and directories, has had an open leave policy since 1994. That means none of its 1,000 employees has a set amount of sick leave or vacation time.
The enlightened plan stemmed from a realization that no matter the policy any employer puts in place, someone will ask to change or bend the rules. Because many employers have to go through all sorts of machinations when it comes to vacation time anyway, UCG decided to let its employees judge how much vacation they need and when. "We have a lot of respect for our employees, and they know what they need to get the job done," said Jerry Purcell, director of human resources at UCG. The employees need to work through their managers when they determine which days they need off. But there is no limit.
[HT: The Cranky Professor]
Monday, June 26, 2006
Sunday, June 25, 2006
Matt Dancing
Okay, World.
The weekend is almost over. I dare you to watch this without smiling.
[HT: Tammy Bruce ]
The weekend is almost over. I dare you to watch this without smiling.
[HT: Tammy Bruce ]
Back By Popular Demand
The following essay has bounced around the Internet for years. Supposedly, it is from an actual college application to New York University although that's far from certain. Anyway, it is a classic and I thought I'd pass it on:
3A. IN ORDER FOR THE ADMISSIONS STAFF OF OUR COLLEGE TO GET TO KNOW YOU, THE APPLICANT, BETTER, WE ASK THAT YOU ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTION: ARE THERE ANY SIGNIFICANT EXPERIENCES YOU HAVE HAD, OR ACCOMPLISHMENTS YOU HAVE REALIZED, THAT HAVE HELPED TO DEFINE YOU AS A PERSON?
I am a dynamic figure, often seen scaling walls and crushing ice. I have been known to remodel train stations on my lunch breaks, making them more efficient in the area of heat retention. I translate ethnic slurs for Cuban refugees, I write award-winning operas, I manage time efficiently.
Occasionally, I tread water for three days in a row.I woo women with my sensuous and godlike trombone playing, I can pilot bicycles up severe inclines with unflagging speed, and I cook Thirty-Minute Brownies in twenty minutes. I am an expert in stucco, a veteran in love, and an outlaw in Peru.
Using only a hoe and a large glass of water, I once single-handedly defended a small village in the Amazon Basin from a horde of ferocious army ants. I play bluegrass cello, I was scouted by the Mets, I am the subject of numerous documentaries. When I'm bored, I build large suspension bridges in my yard. I enjoy urban hang gliding. On Wednesdays, after school, I repair electrical appliances free of charge.
I am an abstract artist, a concrete analyst, and a ruthless bookie. Critics worldwide swoon over my original line of corduroy evening wear. I don't perspire. I am a private citizen, yet I receive fan mail. I have been caller number nine and have won the weekend passes. Last summer I toured New Jersey with a traveling centrifugal-force demonstration. I bat 400.
My deft floral arrangements have earned me fame in international botany circles. Children trust me.
I can hurl tennis rackets at small moving objects with deadly accuracy. I once read Paradise Lost, Moby Dick, and David Copperfield in one day and still had time to refurbish an entire dining room that evening. I know the exact location of every food item in the supermarket. I have performed several covert operations with the CIA. I sleep once a week; when I do sleep, I sleep in a chair. While on vacation in Canada, I successfully negotiated with a group of terrorists who had seized a small bakery. The laws of physics do not apply to me.
I balance, I weave, I dodge, I frolic, and my bills are all paid. On weekends, to let off steam, I participate in full-contact origami. Years ago I discovered the meaning of life but forgot to write it down. I have made extraordinary four course meals using only a mouli and a toaster oven.
I breed prizewinning clams. I have won bullfights in San Juan, cliff-diving competitions in Sri Lanka, and spelling bees at the Kremlin.
I have played Hamlet, I have performed open-heart surgery, and I have spoken with Elvis.
But I have not yet gone to college.
3A. IN ORDER FOR THE ADMISSIONS STAFF OF OUR COLLEGE TO GET TO KNOW YOU, THE APPLICANT, BETTER, WE ASK THAT YOU ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTION: ARE THERE ANY SIGNIFICANT EXPERIENCES YOU HAVE HAD, OR ACCOMPLISHMENTS YOU HAVE REALIZED, THAT HAVE HELPED TO DEFINE YOU AS A PERSON?
I am a dynamic figure, often seen scaling walls and crushing ice. I have been known to remodel train stations on my lunch breaks, making them more efficient in the area of heat retention. I translate ethnic slurs for Cuban refugees, I write award-winning operas, I manage time efficiently.
Occasionally, I tread water for three days in a row.I woo women with my sensuous and godlike trombone playing, I can pilot bicycles up severe inclines with unflagging speed, and I cook Thirty-Minute Brownies in twenty minutes. I am an expert in stucco, a veteran in love, and an outlaw in Peru.
Using only a hoe and a large glass of water, I once single-handedly defended a small village in the Amazon Basin from a horde of ferocious army ants. I play bluegrass cello, I was scouted by the Mets, I am the subject of numerous documentaries. When I'm bored, I build large suspension bridges in my yard. I enjoy urban hang gliding. On Wednesdays, after school, I repair electrical appliances free of charge.
I am an abstract artist, a concrete analyst, and a ruthless bookie. Critics worldwide swoon over my original line of corduroy evening wear. I don't perspire. I am a private citizen, yet I receive fan mail. I have been caller number nine and have won the weekend passes. Last summer I toured New Jersey with a traveling centrifugal-force demonstration. I bat 400.
My deft floral arrangements have earned me fame in international botany circles. Children trust me.
I can hurl tennis rackets at small moving objects with deadly accuracy. I once read Paradise Lost, Moby Dick, and David Copperfield in one day and still had time to refurbish an entire dining room that evening. I know the exact location of every food item in the supermarket. I have performed several covert operations with the CIA. I sleep once a week; when I do sleep, I sleep in a chair. While on vacation in Canada, I successfully negotiated with a group of terrorists who had seized a small bakery. The laws of physics do not apply to me.
I balance, I weave, I dodge, I frolic, and my bills are all paid. On weekends, to let off steam, I participate in full-contact origami. Years ago I discovered the meaning of life but forgot to write it down. I have made extraordinary four course meals using only a mouli and a toaster oven.
I breed prizewinning clams. I have won bullfights in San Juan, cliff-diving competitions in Sri Lanka, and spelling bees at the Kremlin.
I have played Hamlet, I have performed open-heart surgery, and I have spoken with Elvis.
But I have not yet gone to college.
The Code's Code
Michael Novak dissects The Da Vinci Code:
During the two-millennium age of the goddess of fish, Pisces, Brown says that the Christian ideal was that “man must be told what to do by higher powers because man is incapable of thinking for himself.” But does Dan Brown of Phillips Exeter and Harvard really believe that towering intellects who became Christian converts by the thousands in the first one thousand years, such as Ignatius of Antioch, Tertullian, Origen, Clement of Alexandria and Augustine, did not think themselves out of the ancient paganism, Roman and Greek philosophy, and all that they then heard from the seers of Persia and Egypt? He is surely too smart a man not to have read in such sources himself. Christianity vanquished pagan Greece and Rome by giving better arguments to ancient human perplexities and hungers. It did not win over the Empire by force of arms, but by force of ideas.
During the two-millennium age of the goddess of fish, Pisces, Brown says that the Christian ideal was that “man must be told what to do by higher powers because man is incapable of thinking for himself.” But does Dan Brown of Phillips Exeter and Harvard really believe that towering intellects who became Christian converts by the thousands in the first one thousand years, such as Ignatius of Antioch, Tertullian, Origen, Clement of Alexandria and Augustine, did not think themselves out of the ancient paganism, Roman and Greek philosophy, and all that they then heard from the seers of Persia and Egypt? He is surely too smart a man not to have read in such sources himself. Christianity vanquished pagan Greece and Rome by giving better arguments to ancient human perplexities and hungers. It did not win over the Empire by force of arms, but by force of ideas.
Science of Superheroes
National Geographic has a science of superheroes analysis of Superman’s strength:
As any fan knows, the original explanation for Big Blue's power and skyscraping leaps was gravity. He comes, the story goes, from the destroyed planet Krypton, where gravity was stronger than it is on Earth.
Under this theory, Superman on our planet is like a human astronaut bounding around on the moon, only more so. The same applies to any of his other feats of strength, Kakalios says.
The biggest problem with this idea, says Michael Dennin, a physics professor at the University of California, Irvine, is that he can also walk normally—rather than bounding around like an astronaut on the moon.
Another problem is that he remains powerful no matter how long he stays on Earth. Because weightlessness forces people to use their muscles less, "astronauts get weaker with time," Dennin says.
As any fan knows, the original explanation for Big Blue's power and skyscraping leaps was gravity. He comes, the story goes, from the destroyed planet Krypton, where gravity was stronger than it is on Earth.
Under this theory, Superman on our planet is like a human astronaut bounding around on the moon, only more so. The same applies to any of his other feats of strength, Kakalios says.
The biggest problem with this idea, says Michael Dennin, a physics professor at the University of California, Irvine, is that he can also walk normally—rather than bounding around like an astronaut on the moon.
Another problem is that he remains powerful no matter how long he stays on Earth. Because weightlessness forces people to use their muscles less, "astronauts get weaker with time," Dennin says.
Servant Leadership
Producer and director Frank Marshall (Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Sixth Sense) on his approach to producing:
I like to be the support system. I like to give the director what he wants and help him realize his vision. I like working with the director, rather than be the guy who comes in and says, 'we don't have the money here,' which is kind of a style that some producers have—they're in there just for the fiscal responsibilities. Because I worked so closely with [director] Peter [Bogdanovich] and [his ex-wife and collaborator] Polly [Platt], it was always about getting it right. I have this rule: never show them anything you know you can't get.
I like to be the support system. I like to give the director what he wants and help him realize his vision. I like working with the director, rather than be the guy who comes in and says, 'we don't have the money here,' which is kind of a style that some producers have—they're in there just for the fiscal responsibilities. Because I worked so closely with [director] Peter [Bogdanovich] and [his ex-wife and collaborator] Polly [Platt], it was always about getting it right. I have this rule: never show them anything you know you can't get.
Courtesy Study
Reader's Digest conducted an international survey to determine which city is the most courteous and New York City came in first!
[I've always thought that New Yorkers got a bum rap in the courtesy category.]
Bombay came in last. Moscow also didn't fare too well.
Asia was the rudest continent.
[HT: Kottke ]
[I've always thought that New Yorkers got a bum rap in the courtesy category.]
Bombay came in last. Moscow also didn't fare too well.
Asia was the rudest continent.
[HT: Kottke ]
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