There are two things I'm finding intriguing right now. The first is an
article an (actual) friend posted on Facebook about its (Facebook's)
runaway success in India. I'll post the link later, but in essence,
the author (an Indian) posits that cultural traits lead people to
friend everybody, whether they actually know them or not. Personally,
I have a rule that I have to actually know the person, and even be
friends with them in real life, with a few exceptions, of course.
(What good is a rule without exceptions?)
This article made me think of Facebook practices in Mali, which are
much more akin to India's practices, and where I observed a much more
collectivist mentality than we have here in the States. There, I had
to politely "ignore" friend requests from friends-of-friends (and,
indeed, I recently "unfriended" someone who I truly could not remember
from middle school- I don't agree with her politics anyway). I just
think it's interesting what it says about American individualism
versus other countries' collectivist mentality. In Mali, whenever I
did succeed in getting paid my miserable salary-which was never enough
to cover my own expenses-I was immediately hit upon by friends for
"loans", thereby ensuring that we were all in the same collectivist
merde. It seems that it is fine to be miserable as long as we're all
in it together. It does give you a good topic upon which to bond.
The second random thought has to do with a weird dream I had last
night, possibly brought on by stomach troubles. I won't go into
details (what was I doing sneaking into the White House anyway?), but
what woke me up was that in my dream, someone threw up some nasty-
smelling, orangejuice-laden vomit. Even after waking, I couldn't get
the disgusting smell out of my head - which was the only place where
it was, of course. This got me thinking about memory, olfactory
perception, and how the brain works. I have to find some brain expert
to talk to about this.
Okay, that's it from here- my thumb is getting tired. One final
thought: love is like peeing in your pants; everyone else can see it,
but only you can feel it.
Peace out,
Peter
Peter L. Baldwin
http://peterbaldwin.blogspot.com
