The Times of Mashiach

Truly, we are living in the times of Maschiach. 

Someone contacted me with a friend request on Facebook, and his profile included that he is a:

Torah-Observant Gentile

Wow! 

It's truly like we say in the Aleinu prayer every day:

All Mankind shall invoke Your Name, to turn to You all the wicked of the earth.  They will recognize and know--all the inhabitants of the world---that every knee should bend to You...The L-rd will be King over the entire earth; on that day the L-rd will be One and His Name One.

We are on the way and I hope we all get to see and cross over the finish line soon. ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal) 

The Times of Mashiach

Peace Or War

I like this saying by Shimon Peres, you can choose:

Either peace and pay the price or war and take the risk.

It's very smart.

Peace isn't free...there is a price (maybe a large one) to pay for it. 

War is also not free...there is a risk of what you will win or lose. 

These are very serious life calculations with consequences that are far reaching. 

Peace or war and if you are wrong what will it cost and how will you achieve security? ;-)

(Credit photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Peace Or War

Wouldn't You Like To Be A Govie Too

Some people have a negative perception of government workers ("govies").  

They think that it's just a cushy job with a lot of free time and benefits. 

Sort of like the photo above with the lady streched out over her laptop, eyes half shut, and with the lightbulb above her head--thinking up great ideas for running the government and regulating the people. 

Ah, no--it's not like that at all. 

Okay, maybe a little for some people. 

Having been in both the private and public sectors about 40-60 of my career, I can tell you that there is plenty of unproductiveness (i.e. dead weight) wherever you go. 

But there is also a lot of hardworking (some super hardworking) and really smart people too. 

Yes, there are meetings (lots of them) and paperwork (piled high), but there is also a good amount of out-of-the-box thinking and trying to figure out how to do more with the same or less.  

There is also some really big thinking like how to win the next Big One (i.e. war), how to protect the country from deadly terrorism, disasters, weapons of mass destruction, and cyber attack, how to partner with others around the world to achieve big ambitious projects and peace, how to colonize outer space, protect the environment, and improve the economy, healthcare, education, and so much more. 

Not all the big thinking is good thinking--some of it is unrealistic, biased towards this or that constituency, counterproductive, or even corrupt. 

But many govies really do want to do a great job and save the world!

If you think there isn't plenty of hard work, passion, dedication--you're wrong.

If you think, everyone is doing the right thing for the right reasons--your delusional.

Like with people all over the world, there's a mix of good and some not so good, but overall, there is lots of opportunity to lead, problem solve, and do good and great things with real effect, nationally and globally. 

And if for that alone, being a govie is an amazing career move where you can have an influence on matters of tremendous importance and lasting impact. 

Wild perceptions and pictures can be deceiving--instead think about the hero that you can and want to be. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Wouldn't You Like To Be A Govie Too

What The Pope Knows That Our Leadership Doesn't

In response to the deluge of terrorist attacks across Europe, but also all around the world, culminating this week in the murder of an 85-year old Christian priest in France (his throat was slit in church by ISIS), the pope said the following:

The world is at war, because we have lost the peace."

But at the same time, our leader is self-congratulating himself, declaring his next in line for the Pennsylvania Avenue throne, and mocking the daily terror threats we face, calling ISIS the "JV [junior varsity] team" declaring them "not an existential threat, and insisting "no boots on the ground." 

From the attacks on 9/11 to Orlando and Fort Hood, from the attacks on Charlie Hebdo to Paris and Nice, from the multiple attacks on Germany this past week to those in Belgium in March, from the Madrid train bombing in 2004 to the London bombing in 2005, to the daily terrorist attacks throughout the Holy Land of Israel, and the non-stop violent killing of  millions around the Arab countries of the Middle East, North Africa, Asia and beyond, I ask:

Why is the Pope better informed than our leadership, and who will fight for us? ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

What The Pope Knows That Our Leadership Doesn't

Boarding 613

So this was pretty amazing with the mystical number 613.

Today, it showed up on the arrivals board for the trains, and I literally had to run down the train platform to capture this photo after my daughter saw it in the distance from the escalator. 

Under destination (DEST) and minutes (MIN) for wait, the first line says boarding (BRD)--although just a moment before it said arriving (ARR). 

Then the next two lines has the trains arriving in 6 minutes and in 13 minutes, respectively.

Also note that this same morning I saw 613 twice more (for a total of 3 times) on the train car/doors and in the phone number for a truck parked in front of the grocery. 

I am no prophet, but I believe that something important or perhaps cataclysmic is about to happen ("arriving") in the world. 

Interestingly enough, in 10 days is Passover--the redemption of the Jews from slavery in Egypt along with the giving of the 10 commandments (of the total 613) on Sinai. 

Now is a good time for faith, devotion, and prayer--that is my feeling for what it's worth. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Boarding 613

The Flaming Bus

I took this photo today in Washington, D.C.

This cool bus is painted with flames on the hood and has a guitar at the top. 

No, it's not the bus from The Partridge Family although it has similar colors!

On this bus, the guitar has the name "Sailing Conductors Jack Mantis" on it. 

When I looked this up online, I found that these are some "music loving dudes" who travel (sail and bus) the world and record musicians across dozen of countries and 5 continents. 

They have music, videos, and a 4-part TV series from their global talent search--although there is only limited material at their site (so not sure where all the recordings from the "hundreds of local musicians" is available for consumption).

Anyway, this is a fascinating experiment in discovering diversity, music and the arts, and culture along their travels. 

As to the specific music--beauty is in the eye of the beholder. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

The Flaming Bus

Ever Feel This Way?

I took this photo of an advertisement for the "I'm With Stupid" Minions movie released on February 2. 

Sadly, I think this sums up how I am feeling about current world affairs rapidly devolving into chaos, with little to nothing happening to bring it back from the brink:

- Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine forcibly take over the besieged city of Debaltseve in Ukraine, after the ceasefire that was agreed to last week.

- China builds four new fortress artificial islands in the South China Sea projecting it's military might in disputed waters.

- Iran threatens gas embargo on U.S., suicide missions on U.S. Navy, missile attack on Israel, and nuclear enrichment expansion while negotiating for a lifting of sanctions.

- Syrian fighting leaves over 250,000 dead and includes their "systematically" using chemical weapons. 

- ISIS burns another 45 people alive in Iraq, beheads 21 Coptic Christians abducted from Egypt, and commits mass "brutal and abnormal sex" on female captives.

- Boko Haram attack leaves another 2,000 dead in Nigeria (the world's 4th largest democracy) with "bodies scattered everywhere."

- Radical Islamists conduct terrors attacks in Europe in both France (Charlie Hebdo Magazine and a Jewish grocery store) and Copenhagen (a free speech event and a Synagogue).

- Dangerous terrorists apprehended and put away in the Guantanamo detention facility are then released with about 28% (or more) returning to their chosen terror professions. 

Daniel Henninger in the Wall Street Journal points to this sorry state of affairs and our retrenchment in world affairs, as a serious misalignment between the age-old guns and butter debate.

Maybe time for some smart people to get in on things. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Ever Feel This Way?

Bring Us Peace

Amazing song "ONE DAY" by hassid Matisyahu--a light unto nations.

Sung by Public School (PS) 22 Chorus in New York.

One day...no more fighting--only love, peace, and brotherhood.

There should not be a dry eye out there.

Mashiach is almost here! ;-)

Bring Us Peace

This Is Our World

This is some of the unbelievable crazy news just from today--check this out:

- Russia accuses U.S. that the rallies of masses of people seeking freedom and human rights in Hong Kong and Ukraine are really CIA plots.

- Ebola enters the U.S. ten days ago by a man who arrived from known, striken Liberia.

- "The Earth lost half of its wildlife in the past four decades."

- Oklahoma man, who recently tried to convert colleagues, beheads one of them at work. 

- Man who is armed felon (with "three felony convictions for assault and battery") gets within feet of and potentially endangers President on elevator within days of another man with a knife, who climbs fence, enters White House and skips about and into the East Room.

- Report that if just a "100-meter wide asteroid hit Washington, D.C....'it could wipe out everything within the Beltway.'"

So in case you didn't have enough to worry about ..this is our world and what we are doing to it. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

This Is Our World

Chocolate Putin and Lemon ISIS

Ok, so Chocolate Putin and Lemon ISIS are a true recipe for global disaster. 

GLOBAL THREATS: With Chocolate Putin, we have the old Cold War back again (or maybe it was never really gone) with nation states facing off and state-of-the-art weapons galore such as thermonuclear ICBMs onshore, offshore, and aloft. And with Lemon ISIS, we have extremists posing a new level of terrorist threats such that we have never seen before with beheadings, crucifixions, and mass killings, and the potential for (very) dirty bombs. 

PSYCHOLOGICAL INTIMIDATION: While Chocolate Putin still denies his troops are even in Ukraine or that they all along wanted to harbor Snowden, Lemon ISIS tells the whole world they seek to establish a caliphate across the Middle East. Either way the psychological impact is to confuse and scare.

OPPRESSION OF THE PEOPLE: Both Chocolate Putin and Lemon ISIS declare that the people (along with their territory) in their sights are really wanting it--Ukrainians, Georgians, the Baltic States and Poland want to be Russian and maybe really are, while ISIS declares that good Muslims really want to live under strict Sharia law. The victims are not victims, they are willing participants in their own takeover. 

RULING BY AUTOCRACY: Chocolate Putin and Lemon ISIS rule by dictatorship with a supreme leader or all powerful president, the people must follow or be put in the gulag or hung by a tree limb. Either way, you will obey, freedoms begone, and the collective will be better off for it. 

The list of ingredients and description for world chaos and terror can go on and on here...but the point is that we are facing enemies that are digging in to inflict serious metabolic harm on us. 

While some may like chocolate Putin or Lemon ISIS, the results of closing our eyes to the calorie count will be catastrophic to a peaceful world order. 

(Source Photo for Lemon ISIS is Andy Blumenthal and for Chocolate Putin is here with attribution to jlib)

Chocolate Putin and Lemon ISIS

Respect NOT Rape

BBC reports that already by age 20, 1 in 10 girls have been raped or secually assaulted. 

That equates to 120 MILLION girls globally. 

Many are then brutally murdered and shamed as we have been reading about, now with all too much frequency, in India for example, with young women being raped, killed, and then hung from trees etc. 

What is wrong with this world???

Women are our mothers, wives, and daughters--they are often amongst the most compassionate and caring of us.

This is how we treat them?

Unfortunately, rape and abuse is also a crime against many young boys. 

It is time to take a serious ethical pause and stop the violence against our children and against other adults. 

The screams and scars of those abused hang in the air as an indictment against those committing the crime as well as those that do nothing to speak out. 

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Respect NOT Rape

Vote to Have A Say

People vote to get representation in political office for what they believe or want. 

- Gun Rights
- Abortion Rights
- Civil Rights
- Social Entitlements
- International Engagement
- Strong Defense
- Low Taxes 
- Etc. Etc. Etc.

But now, cities like Los Angeles that are looking to boost voter turnout want to offer cash prizes. 

The cash prize "might include a prize as high as $50,000."

Nice (not!)--head to the polls like you do to buy a Powerball ticket. 

Votes, like love, is not something that should be bought.

For those fortunate enough to live in a free country, voting is a special right where everyone can have a say and influence the world around them. 

Instead of focusing on handing out rides or money to go and vote, maybe instead we should create awareness of what a great opportunity it is to live in a  democracy and be able to chart our own course rather than live like so many around the globe under the rule of dictators and tyrants.

Voting is a great privilege for those who care to stand up and make a difference by going to the polls, voting is not an ATM machine. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Vote to Have A Say

Big Bike, Little Bell

This photo that I took stuck in my mind for Independence Day tomorrow. 

We are a great nation of 50 states founded in freedom, ruled by democracy, and driven by human rights for everyone. 

Yet in many ways, we have been squandering our national strengths:

- Spending it forward (living as a nation in debt) and creating yet another bubble economy driven by low interest rates (hence another Dow record today of over 17000) with still the lowest workforce participation in over 36 years and 92 million Americans not working!

- Stretching our military muscle in over 10 years of hapless wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now we are war weary and in proverbial retreat across the Middle East, in Crimea and eastern Ukraine, and with Iran and North Korea).

- Partisan politics freezing our government with the Executive Branch saying they will go it alone on everything from immigration reform to fixing highways and Congress threatening to sue for various claims of abuse of power.

Like this Photo, this country is in danger of becoming a big bicycle with a lot of potential to move things forward, but with a very small bell barely audible with anything of significance to our citizens at home, let alone everyone else in the world. 

We have the ability to continue our path of greatness in building our country's economy, military, and social systems, as well as steering the world toward peace, prosperity, and freedom. However, to do this, we must be able to ring the bell of Independence loudly, with leadership, confidence, and a determination for genuine progress for a union greater than ever before. 

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Big Bike, Little Bell

10 Keys To Influencing And Selling Anything

Brilliant video by Kendra Eash for McSweeney's Internet Tendency.

It is made entirely with stock footage from Dissolve.

What is amazing is how with some great video, nice background music, and a soothing confidant voiceover--we can sell, or be sold on, just about anything.

The 10 Keys to influencing and selling anything, including B.S.:

1. Vague words that show progress (innovation, hope, motherhod, and apple pie--I'll have some of that)

2. Beautiful footage and sound (who wouldn't want to be there type?)

3. High-technology and science (we can solve the world's problems and make money, yippee)

4. Research and development (we're investing in the future and you should invest in us)

5. Global and U.S. (we're beyond borders, but still "made in...", headquartered, or otherwise a U.S. entity)

6. Environmentally conscious (clean water, breathable, air, lush forests, who can argue with that?)

7. High-speed (movers and shakers, we don't stand still, join us or be left behind)

8. Attractive people (this is for real human beings, human kind, we care about you!)

9. Diversity and equality (we love and help everyone--including you and your family)

10. Inspiring (we're thinking big and bringing positive change--buy from us, support our cause)

Throw/superimpose any company, product, country, person, or cause on this video--and poof, you've got an awesome brand--whether you deserve it or not!

This is how we're manipulated one brand at a time, hundreds of brands a day. ;-)

10 Keys To Influencing And Selling Anything

Fair Trade Principles Are Cool

So I was up in Harpers Ferry and discovered this cool boutique store called Tenfold. 

The store carries a collection of creative "fair trade," eco-friendly products from around the world. 

They had a cool variety of clothing and accessories--that was different and special. 

We all found something there to come back with and had to choose what we liked best. 

I ended up getting a couple of handmade ties from a company called Global Mamas in Ghana and the girls got some skirts (and necklaces) made by Unique Batik in Thailand. 

I liked the quality and design of the merchandise. 

But more than that, I was truly impressed by the principles these companies adhere to under fair trade:

- Alleviate poverty and social injustice
- Support open, fair, and respectful relationships between producers and customers
- Develop producers' skills, and foster access to markets, application of best practices, and independence, 
- Promote economic justice by improving living standards, health, education, and the distribution of power
- Pay promptly and fairly
- Support safe working conditions
- Protect children's rights
- Cultivate sustainable practices
- Respect cultural diversity

Note: Fair trade is not to be confused with free trade--the later being where government does not interfere with imports or exports by applying tariffs, subsidies, or quotas.

Truly, if we give people a chance to be productive under fair trade working conditions, they can make the world a little better one product at a time. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Fair Trade Principles Are Cool

Factory Floor Servitude

As a kid, I was all too familiar with factory settings--my dad worked in one. 

Dad is an incredibly persistent hard worker who went to the factory every day--tuna sandwich in tow--worked hard and was the voice of reason in advancing the business--and worked his way up to manage the place.  My dad is a modern-day success story!

He worked in everything figuring out how to design products, make them, sell them, and ensure the business stayed afloat. A lot of people depended on him in the factory to keep production humming, put bread on their tables, and most importantly to be treated fairly and like human beings. 

My dad never became arrogant as he advanced himself, he always believed that we only have what the Almighty above grants to us. 

What a contrast between the way my dad managed a factory and the decrepit working conditions that led to the factory collapse two weeks ago in Bangladesh that has now left at least 1,038 dead. 

The collapse has raised ethical questions again about the horrific working conditions in factories overseas--where low wages and hazardous conditions is the rule--low wages lead to growing outsourcing and hence, a $18 billion garment industry in Bangladesh that has tripled in size between 2005 and 2010 and is expected to triple again by 2020. 

The average monthly pay in 2009--$47!

By 2010, Bangladesh had 5,000 garment factories--2nd only to China.

Now most of the factories are gone from the U.S. moving overseas to the cheapest providers, with jobs in manufacturing decreasing almost in half from nearly 20 million in the U.S. in 1979 to less than 12 million in 2010.

Bloomberg BusinessWeek (9 May 2010) chronicles the ten years of stagnant wages and horrible working conditions there--verbal abuse, sexual abuse, physical punishment and humiliations for not meeting quotas (like having to forcibly stand on tables for hours and undress in front of workers), rare bathroom breaks to filthy and overflowing toilets, and much more. 

When the Savar building developed cracks on April 23, one man begged his wife not to go to work the next day, but when she called in and asked for the day off, she was told she would be docked a whole months salary if she didn't show up--she went to work and the building collapsed on April 24--leaving her buried under the rubble. Eventually, when the rescuers could not free her, they chopped off her legs!

Cheap labor means cheap goods--that's a draw for us getting more branded goods for less. In a large sense, our insatiable demand fuels the cruel, servile conditions overseas. 

This is also a broken market, where people sell their labor just to provide subsistence living for their families, while big corporations increase profits, investors smile all the way to the bank, and we get our boatloads of stuff cheap, cheap, cheap. 

There is nothing wrong with making money or saving money--it's an incentive-based system, but the only measure of success is not money. 

We need global standards of ethical conduct in the labor market, and this should be part of every organization's financial reporting, disclosure, and audit requirements.

People and organizations should not just be penalized for cooking the books or insider-trading, but for how they treat their people. 

Those organizations and leaders that balance making money with treating people decently have a leg up on those that don't--not that they will necessarily do better in the marketplace (maybe they won't), but that they make their money with their integrity intact and that's something money cannot buy. ;-)

(Source Photo: here with attribution to Ronn "Blue" Aldaman)

Factory Floor Servitude

Walking In All Shoes

Thinking about life and death and the concept of reincarnation. 

While I have heard the belief of some that reincarnation is the ultimate justice machine--if you treat others well, you come back well off, while if you treat them badly, you come back in their situation. 

So the classic example, would be if you have the opportunity to give charity, and do so, genoreously, then you are rewarded in a next life with riches, but if you are miserly, then you come back poor--to learn the lessons of charitable giving. 

However, I wonder if this concept goes even much further.

Does our journey ultimately takes us not just to occupy some positions if life, but rather to every role and status, illustrative of all peoples--so that we learn from the eyes of everyone. 

The world  is round and the number of perspectives around it are as varied as the people, races, cultures, and nations they come from. 

As the saying goes, "don't judge me until you walk a mile in my shoes," perhaps we are indeed given the opportunity to walk in a large representative sample of those. 

When the see the world not from where we sit today in life, but from where others are perched, we can get a whole new perspective on issues and ideas--we can learn true empathy, caring, respect, and justice.

Almost like having G-d's vantage point, we can learn to see the world from a multi-cultural perspective, where each person, tribe, and nation is infinitely valuable--where each holds the key to a perspective and lesson that we must all learn before our journey comes to a conclusion. 

Live life and learn well--there is much to see, hear, and experience, and no one has all the answers or is all righteous--like a large mosaic, we all have a piece. ;-)

(Source Photo: here with attribution to Fernando Stankuns)

Walking In All Shoes

When Aliens Come Calling

This is an out-of-this-world topic that I don't think I have written about before...ALIENS--no seriously! 

MSNBC ran an interview with Seth Shostak, the chairman of the International Academy of Astronautics' SETI Permanent Study Group (27 June 2012).

SETI is the well-known orgnaization that conducts the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence--they employ 150 scientists, educators and support staff, and their projects have been sponsored by NASA, Department of Energy, U.S. Geological Survey, and many technology companies like HP, Sun, and more. 

At SETI, they monitor radio transmissions and telescope observations for signals that "cannot be ascribed to noise."

According to Shostak, he believes that we will detect alien signals by between 2025 and 2030, although he acknowledges that searching for alien life in the cosmos in like looking for a needle in a haystack, and it "never occurs when you expect them."

However with advances in technology (specifically computer processing), we will get closer to be able to monitor "all-sky, all the time, all frequencies," rather than searching a specific star system, for a specific time, at specific frequencies.

The really interesting question posed though is what happens if we actually detect an alien signal?

Apparently, most of the planning, according to Shostak is for the initial protocols for alerting everyone and even then "it takes something on the order of five days" to assess whether it is real or not. 

The big concern is that "nobody is in charge" for handling such a global...no, intergalactic event. 

And, he says "I don't think there's any large-scale effort to prepare humanity."

Maybe, it's that we don't believe or want to believe that this eventuality will ever really occur.

Perhaps, it's too frightening to think of ourselves as the native Americans being invaded by colonials with superior technology and firepower.

Yet according to a National Geographic survey, more than a third (36%) of people surveyed think aliens exist. And how many more people are afraid to admit it?

Aliens could be a good thing--coming here benevolently to share with us or they could act alien and try to take from us. From our own Earthly experiences, it seems the latter is far more likely. 

We have a lot of fingers and weapons pointed at each other all time, I wonder whether we need to spend more time and effort thinking, planning, and preparing for something much more scary and threatening than each other.

(Source Photo: here with attribution to Chris at Oblong Pictures)

When Aliens Come Calling

War ---> Peace

I like this clever poster from the United Nations, published in March 2009 by their Department of Public Information, on "Translating War to Peace" with a dove carrying the letter "A" from the word war to the word peace.
If only peace was as simple as moving around a single letter.
Usually, it not the single letter that is painful, but when it becomes many letters and these letters form words of hate, bigotry, intolerance, and injustice that is indeed painful and where war does not translate to peace, but where war become unfortunately inevitable.
As individuals and a nation, I believe peace is what we all hope and pray for and that this comes from a spirit of brotherhood and unity around the world.
Although there are many prayers for peace, I am reminded of one specific beautiful prayer In Judaism, that we sing called "Oseh Shalem"
"May he who makes peace in high places, make peace for all of us and all Israel, and let us say Amen."
I love singing this and humming the tune for this prayer--it is like a deep calling that resonates.
I noticed online that the United Nations "cancelled as a sales item" this poster for peace (and it's also gone from Amazon), and it should make us all wonder where did that peace go and when will it return?
A genuine peace--more than a single letter and a secure and lasting peace of many letters.
(All Opinions my own)

War ---> Peace

Technology Anonymous

Alcoholics Anonymous is famous for their program to help people attain and maintain sobriety.

With the latest addiction being everything technology, there is now a movement toward "technology detox" or the AA equivalent, Technology Anonymous.

I remember reading months ago about people so addicted to the Internet and online video games that they literally had to be institutionalized to get them to eat, sleep, and return to some sort of normal life again.

Apparently, technology taken to the extreme can be no less an addiction than smoking, drinking, of fooling around.

And there is even a Facebook page for Internet and Technology Addiction Anonymous (ITAA).

I've recently even heard of challenges for people to turn off their technology for even 24 hours; apparently this is a tough thing even for just that one day--wonder if you can do it?

The Wall Street Journal (5 July 2011) reported on someone who "signed up for a special [vacation] package called "digital detox," [that] promised a 15% discount if you agree to leave your digital devices behind or surrender them at check in."

The message is clear that people "need a push to take a break from their screens."

Here are brief some statistics from the WSJ on technology addiction even while on vacation:

- 79% expect to remain connected for all or some of the time on their next vacation.

- 68% (up from 58% in 2010) say they will check email while on vacation--daily or more frequently--for work.

- 33% admitted to hiding from friends and family to check email on vacation.

- Also, 33% check email on vacation while engaged in fast-paced activities such as skiing, biking, and horseback riding.

For people routinely checking email as many as 50-100 times a day, going on vacation and leaving technology behind can be a real shock to our social computing systems. Should I even mention the possibility of not logging unto Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flikr, etc. I see people convulsing and going into withdrawal just at the thought.

So what is this technology addiction we are all on? There's no nicotine or alcohol or testosterone involved (except in some extreme video games, maybe).

Incredibly, for many technology is the first thing we check in the morning and last before we close our eyes at night.

It even lays on the night table right next to us--our spouse on one side and our smartphone on the other. Which do you cuddle with more?

It's scary--technology is an addiction that is not physical, but rather emotional.

It is the thrill of who is calling, emailing, texting, friending, or following us and what opportunities will it bring.

Like Vegas or a lottery ticket...technology holds for us the possibility of love, friendships, sexual encounters, new job opportunities, fame, fortune, travel, and so on.

There is no limit, because technology is global and unbridled and so is our ambition, desires, hopes, and even some greed.

(Source Photo: here)

Technology Anonymous