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Jan 13 11

Destiny is a thing to be achieved.

by cory
"Destiny is not a matter of chance; but a matter of choice. It is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be acheived." — William Jennings Bryan, my great-great-grandfather.
Jan 11 11

Year in Cities, 2010

by cory
My yearly retrospective. These are cities I spent the night in during the year 2010. You can also see lists for 2009, 2008 and 2007. Asterisks indicate cities I spent non-consecutive nights in. You can also see this in map form, somewhat, at my Family 2010 World Map.
  1. January
    • Maho Bay, St John, USVI* (pictures)
    • Brooklyn, NY*
  2. February
    • Red Hook, St Thomas, USVI
    • Maho Bay, St John, USVI*
    • Bangkok, Thailand (pictures)
    • Chiang Mai, Thailand
    • Chiang Mai Highlands, Thailand (Trek)
    • Chiang Rai, Thailand
    • Luang Prabang, Laos
  3. March
    • Koh Samui, Thailand
    • Logan, UT*
  4. April
  5. May
    • Allentown, PA (Father-Uncle-Son Road Trip V. pictures.)
    • Strasburg, PA
    • Gettysburg, PA
    • Front Royal, VA
    • Charlottesville, VA
    • Blowing Rock, NC
    • Asheville, NC
    • Pigeon Forge, TN
  6. June
    • East Hampton, NY
    • Bovina, NY
  7. July
    • Jersey Shore, NJ
    • Maipú, Chile
    • Santiago, Chile
    • Reñaca, Chile
    • Great Barrington, MA*
  8. August
  9. September
    • Montauk, NY
    • Great Barrington, MA* (pictures.)
  10. October
    • Binghamton, NY (Nat'l Mini-golf championship. pictures
    • )
    • Seattle, WA (Visit Jenna. pictures)
    • Key West, FL
    • Manhattan, NY*
    • Fort Lauderdale, FL*
  11. November
    • Atlantic Ocean (Cruise. pictures)
    • Fort Lauderdale, FL*
    • Logan, UT* (Thanksgiving. pictures)
  12. December
Jun 4 10

Today is the 34th Birthday of Punk Rock

by cory
On June 4th, 1976, the Sex Pistols played their first gig at Manchester's Lesser Free Trade Hall. There's a book written about it called The Gig That Changed the World. You can read an interview with the author here. The reenactment from 24-Hour Party People:
Jun 3 10

Day 3 of the Monkey Mind

by cory
I increased my meditation time from 5 minutes on Monday to 7 on Tuesday and 10 last night, and so far I still haven't gotten bored. On Tuesday I picked up a meditation candle (just a normal candle, really) and have been staring at it to help focus my meditation. Last night an interesting thing started happening after about 5 minutes or so. If I held my head still and didn't blink, after a little bit of time the periphery of my vision would start to darken, and it was like being in a tunnel looking only at the candle. I could only hold onto it for a second or two. My guess is that this effect has more to do with suppressing my saccadic eye movement than anything mystical, but it's fun to see how long I can hold onto it. Excepting of course that merely noticing when I go into tunnel-vision is an interruption of my clear mind and the goal here is to let go of things, not hold onto them. Inspired by the article on distraction that I linked to yesterday, I've also picked up Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age, which was cited in it.
Jun 1 10

Thing a Week: Meditation

by cory
This week I'm going to try meditating every day. I read AJ Jacobs's article about unitasking and the focus-destroying properties of multi-tasking last week. It reminded me that I have been wanting to try meditation. Last night's meditation: 5 minutes. Notes: That went much faster than I thought it would (meaning I didn't get bored), but my mind still wandered like crazy after a couple minutes. Today I'll push it a little. I'll include some more thoughts here as the week goes by.