I feel like I've been off my stride on the Decrease Worldsuck Project (sorry for those of you who wince at that name, but I'm sticking with it for now). I haven't recorded anything for an embarrassingly long time. Now I've found another woman's project which raised my embarrassment level even higher. I feel like a real slacker in comparison.

Her name is Betty Londergan (@blondergan on Twitter--why on earth doesn't she have more followers??) and she's started a blog called What Gives (which I've syndicated at Livejournal as whatgives365 and at Dreamwidth as whatgives365_feed where she blogs about the project she's doing this year: she's going to give away $100 a day for a year, choosing to promote projects that make the world a better place.

Yesterday, for example, she highlighted a project call Global Cycle Solutions (on Twitter as @GlobalCycleSoln. The concept behind Global Cycle Solutions is to take the 1 billion bicycles in the world and put them to work for something besides pedaling around. Started in Cambridge, Massachusetts by a group of MIT engineers and brainiacs, GCS’s blinding flash of brilliance was to design a universal adaptor that allows bikes to do anything from processing agricultural food to running home appliances to charging batteries. (I found this iniative to be interesting, too, and syndicated their blog as well: globalcycle at Livejournal and globalcyclesolutions_feed at Dreamwidth.

Because Betty Londergan, like me, is apparently doing research to help her find ideas that make the world a better place, she ran across the contest put on by the Unreasonable Institute (follow them on Twitter at @beunreasonable. Global Cycle Solutions is one of the finalists of their contest; Betty is sponsoring ten of the finalists herself. See the video below. Here's something you can do to decrease worldsuck today: take a look at some of the finalists' entries and find one to help sponsor.




( What I did today to make the world a better place )

Here's a Decrease Worldsuck idea I've found this week (through It Starts With Us) that I found intriguing. It was started by a woman named Caitlin, who came up with a mission to end, as she calls it, "Fat Talk."

Caitlin's right. "Fat talk" is epidemic in our culture, and although I've had a pretty good relationship with my body throughout my life, I'm occasionally guilty of this myself. It is certainly something I've worried about, in the context of trying to raise two beautiful daughters that I hope will have positive relationships with their own bodies. And the unrelenting pressure from the media is no help:



Caitlin has now launched a website, which she calls "Operation Beautiful" (syndicated at operationbeautiful_feed and opbeauty) The idea is really a simple one:

One of my biggest personal crusades is ending Fat Talk. If my little blog only does one productive thing, I hope it helps readers realize how truly toxic fat talk is — it hurts you emotionally, spiritually, and physically. I want to reach as many people as possible with my End the Fat Talk message. If you’ve never read my Fat Talk page, check it out here on Healthy Tipping Point.

Recently, I stumbled upon the Gives Me Hope website, and I was inspired to start my own random act of kindness crusade — Operation Beautiful.

Operation Beautiful is simple: all you need is a pen and a piece of paper.

I’ve begun leaving positive messages on the mirrors of public restrooms — at work, at the gym, at the grocery store. I scribble down whatever comes to mind — “You are beautiful!” or “You are amazing just the way you are!”

My goal is to leave as many Operation Beautiful notes as I can. Maybe some people read them and just smile, but I bet some people are truly touched by the effort of a random stranger.

If you want to join the mission, send me an e-mail at seebriderun@gmail.com with a photograph of your Operation Beautiful note or a description of your experience, and I’ll post it on my blog and on this page! And feel free to spread the word on your blog as well!

Here are some of the notes that people have emailed to Caitlin, set to the Operation Beautiful's theme song, "So Beautiful" by the group Superchick:

Jennifer McCann, who writes the Vegan Lunchbox (veganlunchbox) has started a new blog, This is Why You're Thin. I've set up a syndicated feed for it, whyyourethin.

The goal of this site will be to encourage exercise and the consumption of healthy plant-based foods through fun, intriguing, and beautiful images that will inspire us all. I’m looking for inspiring photos or video links of the things you do for health: pictures of fresh fruits and vegetables ... beautiful bean soups or hearty wholegrain bread ... people running, climbing, swimming, stretching ... smiling kids drinking smoothies and picking strawberries.

Edited to add: The entire reason for the name of the journal is that it is a response to a different journal, This is Why You're Fat.

Edited to add again: How to put this nicely. All right, I won't.

Look. I was just Syndicating. The. Fricking. Feed. And then informing you about it, as a courtesy. I have disabled further comments on this post. If anyone has any further sniffy comments they want to make about what Jennifer McCann chooses to title her new blog, take them up with Jennifer McCann. Not with me. I am definitely not in my Happy Place today and I cannot stomach any further righteous indignation today. And if you have issues with THAT, tough. Come back in forty-eight hours and hopefully by then I will have absorbed enough chocolate and coffee and Ibuprophen for the cramps and Obama will have fixed the economy. You might find a more sweet and tractable Peg then. Until then, BUZZ OFF.

Add the syndicated feed: whitehouseblog

I'd posted links to the previous videos that Matt did. This new one makes me smile even more; it just makes me hopeful and happy about the human race, and this beautiful world in which we live. The clip from Gurgaon, India, in particular, just slays me every time:




There was an article about this video in the Star Tribune recently, because the vocalist on this video (a Bengali immigrant by the name of Palbasha Siddique) goes to Fiona's high school!

Here is Nobel Prize-winning Rabindranath Tagore's English version of the lyrics to this song, titled "Praan" (you can buy it both at iTunes and at Amazon):

The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures.

It is the same life that shoots in joy through the dust of the earth in numberless blades of grass and breaks into tumultuous waves of leaves and flowers.

It is the same life that is rocked in the ocean-cradle of birth and of death, in ebb and in flow.

I feel my limbs are made glorious by the touch of this world of life. And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment.

Lyrics adapted from the poem "Stream of Life" Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore. He also has written the national anthem of India.

You can follow Matt's blog by friending whereismatt.

I've been pointed to by the blog Jane Austen's World (janitesonjames) to another interesting one by Chris Dornan, Peace and Wisdom (I've syndicated it as peaceandwisdom), which Jane Austen's World characterizes as Mr. Dornan's musings about Jane’s novels, politics, and Buddhism. Recently his thoughts have turned mostly to Jane. I was particularly intrigued by his discussion of the standard interpretations of Sense and Sensibility (Elinor=Sense, Marianne=Sensibility) and his suggestion of another reading:

. . . Angela's "'Sense' versus 'Sensibility'" critique is essentially a conservative one, that puts Elinor at the centre of the novel (rightly in my view) but sees the novel as a dialectic between sense and sensibility with sense winning the day. Christina's interpretation, what I would characterise as a liberal critique that is sympathetic to Austen, also sees this as a dialectic between Marianne’s romantic sensibility and Elinor’s prudential sense, with neither quality winning out (or both sisters winning through learning from each other).

Clearly I can’t compress my book into a blog article but I argue in it that Austen designed the book to be misread (other critics have said the same of Emma: see Emma’s Debt to Sense and Sensibility), that the reader has to remain sharp witted to navigate all the twists and turns in the book, just as Elinor does inside the narrative, and we have to follow her. And remember the novel is told from Elinor’s perspective, the first time a novel integrated the narration into the heroine’s perspective (i.e., free indirect speech) in a sustained way. Elinor is at the centre and embodies with Edward sense and sensibility, with the (early) Marianne and Willoughby representing the perverted sensibility and Lucy Steele and Robert Ferrars representing heartless prudence, perverted sense. Of course the only way for the head and heart to work is if they work together.

I've always been interested in this novel, of course, because of my interest in the heart of flesh/heart of stone theme. I'll be keeping a close eye on this blog in the future; it seems Mr. Dornan has some interesting things to say.

I have set up a syndicated feed to Jane Odiwe's blog at blogspot (janeodiwe), which will discuss all things Austen and the regency world. I learned about this blog through the blog Jane Austen's World (janitesonjames). Jane Odiwe's blog is worth following because of the lovely, delicate artwork she does of Jane and her family and all of Jane's characters. Her new book Lydia Bennet's Story, illustrated with her own artwork, is out now. (I have put in the link to the US Amazon site, but it is available in the UK, too.)

starsthatguide reminded me of Wizrocklopedia, which gives you all the info you could possibly need about Wizard rock bands: their new songs, CDs and tour schedule. I have syndicated it as a Livejournal feed: wzrdrocklopedia. Spread the word.

Edited to add: Apparently, there is another one already set up, wizrocklopedia. When I entered the feed link to see if it was already syndicated, LiveJournal for some reason didn't recognize it, which was why I set up wzrdrocklopedia. Dunno why: perhaps the site has changed their RSS URL since wizrocklopedia was set up?

Anyway, we now have two feeds pointing to the same website. Take your pick. The more the merrier.

I have just set up an RSS feed for the blog of Chris Farrell, the host of American Public Radio's program "Marketplace Money." (This show is has a podcast, by the way, to which you can subscribe on iTunes, here.) The by-line on the blog is "Helping you manage your money well." Friend mrktplacemoney to read it on your friends page.

I have set up an RSS feed for The Dollar Stretcher: stretcher_rss.