1. When you’re wearing top and bottom Crest Whitestrips that are applying bleaching goop to your teeth, and you’re sitting at your desk at home reading email, don’t sneeze. Trust me on this.
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2. I went to the premiere of Evelyn tonight. Sweet movie. Drippy sweet. Pretty, green scenery, and a lovely Irish accent on Pierce Brosnan, who looked fairly comfortable drinking Guinness instead of a martini.
The “preem” was at the Academy building, and the ratio of famous::regular people was quite high; my sister Staci was impressed, and darn it, I was, too. Also, they served corned beef sandwiches and little potatoes on trays. A full house. Nicely done.
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3. Susie and I have finished two great Web sites recently. One is an artist’s online portfolio: www.pmgardner.com/
The other is a complete update of the Daily Trojan site, my hobby, albatross and avocation all rolled into one. It’s at www.hopstudios.com/dtlink/
Comments on both are welcome; the art gallery is a little more interesting if you weren’t in college with me. If you, or someone you know, needs a Web site built or redone, let me know. We’re also quite good at getting folks into search engines: The artist’s site is already high on Google, search for “pmgardner” and you’ll see.
“I’m not bitter about what happened to me as a child, and my mother was instrumental in keeping me from being so. ... She taught me to be grateful for my life regardless of what that entailed, and that’s directly related to the image of Christ on the cross and the example of sacrifice that he gave us. What she taught me is that the deliverance God offers you from pain is not no pain—it’s that the pain is actually a gift. What’s the option? God doesn’t really give you another choice.”
After over a decade of user testing, it is clear that the way we search the web is similar to the way we would search our home for valuables as it was burning to the ground. Frantically.
“We must shift the focus of companies back to the customer and away from shareholder value ... The shift necessitates a fundamental change in our prevailing theory of the firm… The current theory holds that the singular goal of the corporation should be shareholder value maximization. Instead, companies should place customers at the center of the firm and focus on delighting them, while earning an acceptable return for shareholders.”
You can scroll right easily by holding down the SHIFT key and using your scroll wheel. (Firefox users trying this will end up jumping to old Web pages until a) Firefox releases a fix, b) they change their settings like so.)