George G Smith Jr's No Sense of Time

Don’t “scarf” this down…

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 29, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

You Can’t Be Serious

The idiocy:
Conservative commentator Michelle Malkin complained that the scarf wrapped around her looked like a kaffiyeh, the traditional Arab headdress. ”The kaffiyeh, for the clueless, is the traditional scarf of Arab men that has come to symbolize murderous Palestinian jihad,” Malkin wrote in her syndicated column.

“Popularized by Yasser Arafat and a regular adornment of Muslim terrorists appearing in beheading and hostage-taking videos, the apparel has been mainstreamed by both ignorant (and not-so-ignorant) fashion designers, celebrities, and left-wing icons,” she said.
Some rational thinking:
“I think that a right-wing blogger making an association between a kaffiyeh and terrorism is just an example of how so much of the complexity of Arab culture has been reduced to a very narrow vision of the Arab world on the part of some people in the U.S.,” Bishara said in a phone interview. “Kaffiyehs are worn every day on the street by Palestinians and other people in the Middle East – by people going to work, going to school, taking care of their families, and just trying to keep warm.”
My Take:
Closed Minded Thinking has terrorized this country far more than any Palestinian ever will. It has killed more people – from the murdering Native Americans to the Slave Trade to our current racist Police practices – than any religious extremist in the Middle East would ever dream to. When will us Americans truly evolve?

?uestioning the past, ?uestioning the future

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 29, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

There was a time where I would buy on the day of the release anything that ?uestlove had his hand in. D’angelo’s Voodoo, any Roots/Common album, heck – even some of his production work on Pop albums (x-tina’s Stripped and Joss Stone’s cover of “Fell in love with a (insert gender here)”). I was a die hard okayplayer – an original in fact. I lived and breathed anything that was a part of that family of music. It opened my horizons to all music – which ultimately made me the person who I am. I would mark release dates on my calendar. I was obsessed…

Well – The Roots’ 10th album was released in April and I still don’t own it. In fact, I haven’t even listened to it. It’s not like I still don’t love hip hop (I’m currently listening to the ?uestlove produced “Like Water for Chocolate” by Common in my Car). He also produced (along with James Poyser) the new Al Green album. I’m tempted to purchase both of those but haven’t yet…

I don’t know what’s stopping me.

It’s funny how you outgrow a phase. From being put on Roots’ show guest lists, to not even buying their latest CD. Is it a sign of growth or have I gone too far from my own roots….

Machu talking about, Willis?

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 23, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

The fourth Indiana Jone – in my humble opinion – was everything that I thought it would be. While people critique and criticize, It was very similar to all the other movies. The mythos that those movies have attained over the course of 20 some years makes it difficult for people to accept – but I really stand by that.

One thing that movie rekindled inside me was the desire to visit Machu Picchu. Perhaps sometime in the next year I can do this. Here’s to setting some goals and finalizing some plans…

TEAL

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 23, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

Ahhh…TEAL.

Such a noble cause brought to my attention by my friend Josh (pictured above as a TEAL Team Member).

Featured here, here, here and here (among countless other places)

Web fame is great :)

The Way I See It #288

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 22, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

“My cousin in Tibet is an illiterate subsistence farmer. By accident of birth, I was raised in the West and have a Ph.D. The task of our generation is to cut through the illusion that we inhabit separate worlds. Only then will we find the heart to rise to the daunting but urgent challenges of global disparity”
– Losang Rabgey, Ph.D.

National Geographic Emerging Explorer and co-founder of Machik, a nonprofit helping communities on the Tibetan Plateau

(As seen on the cup of my Venti Soy Chai (No Water) from Starbucks)

If the Shoe Fits

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 21, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

I was at my local Fleet Feet store getting my foot fitted for the proper running shoe. I hadn’t actually tried on a pair of shoes in years – simply relying on the sizing that I somehow conjured up through years of growth spurts, feeling for toe room, etc etc. The woman at the store whips out the Brannock device – this archaic machine that I remember playing with in my youth when my mother was shopping for shoes at the mall. I thought to myself “people still use these things?”

They do! Enough so that Design Observer paid homage to this subtle machinery that still propagates itself into stores year after year.

With all the technology I surround myself with each and every day, it’s somewhat comforting to know that something so simple is still alive and kicking.

(By the way – through this wonderful machine, I found out that I have two different sized feet. Without pressure, my right foot is a 10 and my left foot is a 9. When standing, the right foot grows to a size 10.5/11 (my shoe size) and the left grows to a 9.5/10. I also discovered (not with the machine) that I over-pronate and that I need stability controlled running shoes. Fun stuff…)

Text-Action Lawsuit

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 21, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

According to Engadget – there’s an upcoming class-action lawsuit over the cost of received text messages.

Here’s the quote:
Text messaging rates have always been a little ridiculous, but a new class-action suit filed in Mississippi alleges that virtually every wireless carrier you can think of is basically cheating you by charging you for received texts and not allowing you to turn the service off. The suit names AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, US Cellular, Cellular South, and Virgin Mobile (surprisingly, T-Mobile didn’t make the cut), and says that members of the class are entitled to relief for the unauthorized charges, wrongful collection, and unjust enrichment. Of course, this will all likely end in a useless settlement that nets subscribers like three extra text messages and a 20 percent discount on an “approved accessory,” while the plaintiff’s law firm banks millions, but we’ll see how things go.

Personally, I always wondered about this. In fact, my vindictive nature contemplated texting someone from various web portals to the point that their bill would skyrocket. Obviously, this was pre-”unlimited” plans; but it stems from the fact that one unjustly gets charged for receiving something they didn’t ask for. As text plans have become “unlimited” in scope – I see this as less of a problem, but it will be interesting to see where this goes. Obviously, I’m signing up ASAP and, hopefully, will recoup something – even if it is a crappy 20% discount.

Henry Miller "Reflections on Writing" excerpt

By georgegsmithjr ⋅ May 15, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

Writing, like life itself, is a voyage of discovery. The adventure is a metaphysical one: it is a way of approaching life indirectly, of acquiring a total rather than a partial view of the universe. The writer lives between the upper and lower worlds: he takes the path in order to eventually become that path himself.