Communities

A few of the communities online
with which I have experimented:

TravBuddy

MyVisualDNA

Google Earth

YouTube



MySpace

Facebook

Technorati

MyBlogLog

BookCrossing

Pandora

Slide

Flickr

Photobucket

Frapper

Evite

TagWorld

Del.icio.us

Digg

lovemarks

Amazon.com

Slide show

Mailbag Gems: Women

For many years
my website(s) have studiously avoided dealing with
the subject of women,
for many reasons,
but today I received an email on the subject
which I felt compelled to answer
and save it here for posterity.

His question was stated simply enough:
" Mike, this has nothing to do with business....
how do you figure out WOMEN!!!???



Here's my reply:

women?

i could write a book...

if i take your question literally
("how do you figure out women?"),
my quick answer would be:
don't try to figure them out.
just enjoy them for what they are.
you don't try to figure out a delicious piece of pastry,
you just enjoy it.

women may appear to be human,
because they seem so much like men
(except for the obvious and very attractive differences)
but they are probably a completely different species
and this conclusion is based on their behavior
which is so bizarre that thousands of years
of analysis by very intelligent men
has produced no true understanding of them.

we know that they like to talk a lot, about themselves, mostly,
and about their feelings,
and of course we men (hetero types)
are not equipped to deal with that.

they are consumed with how they look,
so it is important to frequently reassure them
that they are very appealing to you
and to never, (this is very important),
never get caught looking at another woman,
and never bring up the subject of another woman.
in fact, it is best if you never bring up any subject,
just to be on the safe side.

however, there seems to be one subject
which you can bring up, safely,
and that is to ask the question "How was your day?"
and then just relax and let her go off for a while.

the smartest of men have found that
the best ways to keep a woman captive
is to turn off your mind and appear to be
actively listening to what they are saying
by filling any pause in the conversation with such things as
"Reallly, tell me more!" and "You are so right" and "Yes, dear".
you will earn extra points with eye contact
and an earnest expression.
never try to use logic, or argue with a woman.
you may win, in your mind, that is an illusion.

women are attracted to men who appear confident.
this means confident in every respect
including a complete lack of jealousy.
(this is hard to fake)
women also seem to be attracted to men
who appear to be not attracted to them.
(this seeming paradox is a real challenge)
but mostly, they are attracted to men
who appear to enjoy listening to them a lot.

we also know that they are attracted to shiny things
such as mirrors, gold, silver and diamonds especially.

never take seriously what they say,
not because they are deceitful (which they may be)
but because they seldom know what they say
(they just like talk, remember?)
and many times they will say things which are outrageous
just to see if you are paying attention.
this is tricky territory,
so reply with the very effective "Really? Tell me more!"

women are also very into fashionable clothing,
not just for themselves,
but they also love to choose clothes for their man.
let them do this, if you can bear it,
but you will probably want to have
other clothes you wear when you are not with her.

as i said, i could write a book.
but your question is so general that it would probably help
if you could be more specific.

but the truest answer would be, again,
don't try to understand women,
just enjoy them.

M.

------------------------

Further research on this topic:

The French phrase
"Cherchez la femme"

The literal translation from the French is "look for the woman". It is used when a man behaves unusually or gets into a quarrel or other difficulty and the reason for it is sought. The suggestion, "look for the woman", express the idea that behind the problem there is a woman. That isn't to say that the woman herself was necessarily the direct cause of the problem, for instance as in Shakespeare's Macbeth, but possibly that the man behaved stupidly or out of character in order to impress or gain favour.

TED: world's greatest thinkers and doers

Here is one community worth joining:

"TED"
Ideas worth spreading
by the world's greatest thinkers & doers.

Videos. Free. Online.
And a community of high level minds.
The only community I have felt compelled to join.

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds. Since then its scope has become ever broader.

The annual conference now brings together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).

This site makes the best talks and performances from TED available to the public, for free. More than 60 talks are now available, with more added each week. These videos are released under a Creative Commons license, so they can be freely shared and reposted.

Mission: Spreading ideas.

Video iPod

I have just greedily loaded my new video iPod
with 8,000 of my favorite photos,
my entire music collection,
and am now subscribing to podcasts
like they are going out of style.

This thing is awesome!

iTunes lets me play music on my PC
while simultaneously downloading
30+ stacked-up video podcasts.

Soon I will load it with my own videos
(pool, meditation, etc)
and text too
(affirmations, visualizations, etc).

Yikes!

I have had the ordinary iPod for years,
but this new video critter is the Future.