everyone should do this

if you've got cool phones that let you record your own ring tone ...


http://lifehacker.com/software/cell-phones/the-inconspicuous-cell-phone-ring-194312.php

funny nuns

Near Mercy Medical Center, they have these cardboard photo cutouts of various Sisters of Mercy ( these sisters, not these), welcoming patients to the hospital. I'm willing to start a betting pool on when the first act of vandalism will occur.

But also: are these nuns lifesize, or have they been blown up to greater heights?

revelation

A transcript of a recent e-mail conversation I had with my sister, after trying to reach her for a few days:

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: dancing monkey <dmonkey@elefkay.com>
Date: Aug 23, 2007 6:37 PM
Subject: older niece's birthday party?
To: Anne-Anne <anneanne@bigsis.com >

can u confirm it will be sat., sept 22?


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Anne-Anne < anneanne@bigsis.com>
Date: Aug 23, 2007 10:50 PM
Subject: Kayla's party
To: dancing monkey < dmonkey@elefkay.com>


It was supposed to be that day but niece's dad changed it.  Don't know what the new day is yet.
Sent from my iPhone

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: dancing monkey <dmonkey@elefkay.com>
Date: Aug 23, 2007 10:55 PM
Subject: Re: Kayla's party
To: Anne-Anne <anneanne@bigsis.com>

Since when do you have an iPhone?!?!

(furious dialing)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: dancing monkey <dmonkey@elefkay.com>
Date: Aug 23, 2007 10:55 PM
Subject: Re: Kayla's party
To: Anne-Anne <anneanne@bigsis.com >

Is that why your voice mail is not set up yet?!

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Anne-Anne < anneanne@bigsis.com>
Date: Aug 23, 2007 10:58 PM
Subject: Re: Kayla's party
To: dancing monkey <dmonkey@elefkay.com>

call me back

Sent from my iPhone

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Anne-Anne <anneanne@bigsis.com>
Date: Aug 23, 2007 10:59 PM
Subject: Re: Kayla's party
To: dancing monkey <dmonkey@elefkay.com>

yes

Sent from my iPhone

(furious dialing)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: dancing monkey <dmonkey@elefkay.com>
Date: Aug 23, 2007 11:06 PM
Subject: Re: Kayla's party
To: Anne-Anne <anneanne@bigsis.com>

you know, if you were getting a new phone, you should have at least gotten one that you can hear when it rings.





The backstory: her Blackberry Pearl was stolen, she was still under contract so it would have cost more than $400 to replace it, so she figured she'd just get the iPhone. The funny thing: she couldn't hear it when the Pearl rang, and she still can't hear the iPhone either. And, as a result, she can look forward to bills that are 64 pages long.

Read a Book, addendum

P.S. I'm sure many sports reporters would object to D'mite's instruction to put down the sports section ... I mean, that's a gateway medium, right?

Read a Book

Fellow METPRO graduate Sufiya Abdur-Rahman writes about "Read a Book" by Bomani "D'mite" Armah ... check it out!

traffic ticket myths

From Bankrate.com, via Consumerist: Don't believe these myths about traffic tickets.

is conspicuous consumption worse

when it takes place in a country with a greater disparity between the rich and the poor? Or a larger population of poor? Or is it just easy to turn up one's Western nose at people in developing nations who espouse the same zest for material goods as we do?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article2199285.ece

From The Sunday Times

August 5, 2007

My big fat Indian birthday party

Dean Nelson, Delhi

Two-year-old Ishan is too young to remember the extravagant party his parents threw to celebrate his second birthday, but the hungry young beggars outside the tall wrought-iron gates of their Delhi farmhouse will never forget it.

Ishan was dressed in his favourite Noddy outfit to match the theme and to welcome his 100 guests to a party that had set his parents back £4,500.

The guests would barely have noticed the traffic light beggars pleading for coins as they drove their 4x4s through Delhi's exclusive Chattarpur suburb.

They were taking part in a ritual that is becoming a booming business among the city's elite: the big fat Indian kids' birthday party is now starting to rival the country's all-consuming wedding industry. According to industry insiders, it is now worth around £10m a year in Delhi alone, and it is growing fast.

Driving the phenomenon is a ruthless competitiveness among India's largely Hindu upper-middle classes, whose wealth has grown enormously over the past 15 years.

As their fortunes have soared, their children's weddings, and now birthdays, have become opportunities to display their new riches and social contacts. At little Ishan's party, no detail was overlooked in his parents' campaign to impress their friends and acquaintances.

The guests arrived through a specially commissioned Noddy gateway (£300), onto the sweeping lawns and swimming pool of their mansion. There were 20,000 balloons in Noddy's colours, and thousands more bearing his face and name, costing £750. There were 40 Noddy car models and statuettes dotted around the garden (£150), and four specially built Noddy bars for popcorn, chocolates and sweets (£150). A Noddy clown wandered among the children as they toyed with their Noddy-car goodie bags (100 at £12.50 each – £1,250).

And then there were the fairground rides: A "Columbus" swinging ship, three 40ft bouncy castles, a merry-go-round and a mini-train ride. The games and rides alone cost another £1,100.

There was a running buffet of pizza, burgers and sandwiches, all laid out on tables with matching Noddy glasses, napkins and plates.

The family could have laid on elephants at £25 each for garden rides (a herd is kept by the banks of Delhi's Yamuna River, and hired out for events), or camels at £15 per beast, but these animals are increasingly seen as the pass? preserve of lower-scale parties, according to one party planner. "One Indian family last month asked me to lay on live lions and tigers," he said.

Rakesh Gupta, of the Gift Palace toy and party store in Delhi's exclusive Khan Market, said over the past 15 years, his party business has grown to at least 60 a month, more than 40 of which are staged at five-star hotels, and cost up to £5,000.

"In the early days it was a family affair, but now children's parties are more of a social gathering, more like business parties," he said. Of the 100 or so guests attending most birthday parties, 60 will be business contacts of the parents.

The competitiveness of Delhi's new rich is not limited to the scale of the parties they throw, the social standing of the guests or the choice of exotic rides. It also extends to the goodie bags for guests to take home. According to Gupta, these now include expensive electronic toys such as Xbox game consoles, iPod nanos and Game Boy Advance pocket computer games.

As Ishan's guests boarded their Land Cruisers, they passed the Chattarpur Mandir temple complex, where barely dressed children as young as six paint their faces, sport Hanuman mon-key-god tails and tap on the tinted windows, begging for small change.

According to Pavan K Varma of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations, the discrepancy in wealth will have passed the party-goers by.

"There is a new class in India with more money than ever before. There's no reticence among them about flaunting it. It's glaring in terms of the unacceptable poverty still around us," he said.

"The more invitation cards we send, the more our status and that of our children is assured. It's about hierarchy. The point isn't to celebrate a birthday, but for people to know how you celebrated it."

You think you've got it rough?

Over the last few months, I've realized that things aren't so bad. There have been quite a few changes, but it really could be worse. Like when you find out you're suddenly working nights but then come to appreciate that at least you have two consecutive days off. That's a good thing. Or if you get a schedule you expect to dislike but it lets you see your nocturnal significant other more frequently.

Or when your back paws don't work and there's no way you can leap or pounce, maybe you can figure something else out.