Thursday, February 26, 2009

Flowers for Algernon

With all the reading I do for work, I like to keep at least one book that I read for pleasure. So I keep at one least one book by my bed to read before I go to bed most nights.

The book I just finished reading (actually I did read this as an eight grader) is Flowers for Algernon. I bought the copy I have back in Duncanville, TX before we moved here to Little Rock.

I decided to reread it because I had heard a dramatic interp at a recent speech and debate tournament in Houston, TX and it piqued my interest in the book again.

I found it a great read. It is a story of a severely retarded boy who gets selected for a highly risky experiment where they do surgery on his brain and intend to make Charlie Gordon smart!

The surgery is successful! He becomes extremely intelligent but there is a down side too.

Charlie grows in his intelligence far quicker than he does in his emotional IQ.

I have heard much of EQ (or emotional intelligence) in the last few years. But now I have come to see how this book really opened the question far in advance of the recent inquiries!

It made me realize that being emotional mature is as important as have the brains.

What do you think?

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Think before you sign up!

Recently, a Facebook craze has hit the nation. Everyone loves staying in touch with their friends, and what better way to stay in touch than on a safe, user-friendly service like Facebook? If you thought that, you were wrong. FOX News had a new article today telling you what exactly you are signing up for when you sign up for a Facebook. Apparently, when you sign up, you agree to the Terms of Service. What most people do not know is that the Terms of Service state that the company is granted "an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or ... (ii) enable a user to Post." If you don't understand that, then this means that basically anything you post on your Facebook, the company has a right to use. Without your permission. Scary, huh? This shows us that we need to read EVERYTHING before signing up for something. We also need to make sure we don't post anything we would regret later on a social networking site. So many times, people post without thinking and end up regretting it. Our society has become so numb to Internet predators, pornography, cyber-bullying, etc. that we are putting our lives and the people we love in danger. We need to be careful and take steps to ensure the safety of the people we love.

--Katie

A New Way to Stay in Contact!

We are constantly looking for new ways to stay in contact.

Recently, I (Nick) went to Lunch and Learn here at FamilyLife about blogging. So I am starting this blog. Many times I have wanted to share some info with you and I have sent a few emails but I think this will be more effective.

If you want to keep getting these blog posts please sign up on an RSS Reader or better yet there is a link where the system will notify of a new post by email!