At the risk of sounding like one of my beloved Tom Waits‘ songs, here’s some clippings from the underbelly of society.
- Ruby’s arms: it seems that both tertiary student males and tertiary student females prefer the same things when it comes to both ‘quickies’ and longer term relationships, especially their partner being ‘well-rounded’ (in maturity and life experience, not necessarily being Rubensesque). A recent study notes that women prefer both physical attractiveness and good
jeansgenes in their one-night-stand conquests, but no mention is made of what men prefer. Possibly because serious scientists must not mention breast size and ‘amount of air in the tyres’ in academic journals. ‘A storm in a young and perky c cup’ is what I say… - Tom Traubert’s Blues: the APA reports on teachers who bully students; it’s more prevalent than you thought. Interesting to Mrs BetterComms and myself because there has been a recent focus in our own little world about such possibilities
- My piano has been drinking: there’s studies that show that older women are at risk of alcoholism — so too are parents and step-parents of teenagers, trust me!
- Clap hands: Sir Ken Robinson reflects sagely and passionately that creativity is something we are educated out of, not grow out of. Thanks to Garr for pointing us to six videos that highlight the importance of being who we instinctively are but somehow consciously and unconsciously breed out of ourselves in order to be something else (Corporate Man and Woman, perhaps? — perhaps we need to be more like the glabrous Steve Crescenzo)
- Warm beer and cold women: Steve Dubner highlights that despite the legalisation of prostitution in Germany, male World Cup fans might be feeling so screwed by the refs that having a shag is the last thing on their mind. I know that, as an Australian, I can’t help but look at the next round and wonder how the Socceroos would revel in it (look at this and this)
Rain dogs: the ever-wonderful Kathy Sierra points out that what you think your graphics say may not necessarily be what your audience thinks. Case in point — the image to the right. Tell me what you think it says — that German Shepherds and Old English Sheepdogs are okay but Springer Spaniels are definitely verboten? Visit Kathy’s post to find out what it really means- Frank’s wild years: Mrs BetterComms and I will be investing heavily in the next ‘big thing’ that Nova Spivak has uncovered. Should we ever decide to go our separate ways, exceedingly unlikely as that is, we will be able to date those who are currently one half to one third our age with ease. Mind you, they probably won’t know who Iggy Pop is, hey Allan, so wither the conversation after we’ve bonked ourselves into stupor?
- What’s he building?: Some Christians and savvy investors tithe ten percent of their income, aware that it very often comes back at them in ways that they never dream of, and in larger amounts. But they always give with a spirit of gratefulness and as a way of ‘giving back’, the boomerang effect is a happy by-product. But what if you are so successful you give away ninety percent of what you earn? No, not Bill Gates. No, not Warren Buffet (who recently gave US$31billion to Gates’ foundation). We are talking a humble pastor who starts preaching in living rooms and ends up growing a church to 20,000 members and selling 30 million copies of his book, arguably the best-selling hardcover book ever. He has a simple hope: If “2.3 billion people in the world claim to be followers of Jesus,” then why not take the next step and mobilize those people to do important things, like stop poverty, improve literacy, feed the hungry, heal the sick? Conventional relief organizations are fine, but why not tap what Rick calls “the faith sector,” the armies of motivated religious volunteers who are sick and tired of polarizing rhetoric and professional crusaders? Hat tip to Mark Edwards, who also highlights no family is immune from suicide
- Small change got rained on with his own .38 (my favourite Waits song, by the way — stunning lyricism almost but not quite matched by the Ireland ‘live’ (not the studio) version of ‘My piano has been drinking’; only equalled by Tom’s mind-numbingly brilliant delivery in ‘Frank’s Wild Years’): Tom Keefe says what every person over the age of 25 has silently prayed for since email and instant messaging emerged as corporate and personal communication tools — that the network would somehow seize up and prevent the message from getting delivered.
‘Tis Friday night, a bottle or three of fine Aussie sparklin’ (since we are not allowed to call it ‘champagne’, even though it is grown from the same grapes, the original vines and bottled in the same method — sheesh!) await me and Mrs BetterComms.
May your God go with you, as he most assuredly does with me
p.s. Coming soon: a series of posts built around the song titles of Thomas Dolby (and yes, Tom Dolby, if you are reading this, ‘Airhead’ did immediately spring to mind as an ‘injoke’ song title for the main image)
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