On July 6, 2018, I stumbled into Ashland & Hill on Main Street in Santa Monica, California by accident.
I was with my daughter Leah Smolker.
We had just finished eating dinner at a Korean-Japanese Ramen Fusion restaurant on Main Street. Leah wanted to go to a nearby pub (the Ale House) to get a beer.
As we were waking down Main Street towards the Ale House we saw Ashland & Hill. Leah said, “This looks like an interesting place. Let’s go in.”
We went in.
Leah ordered a beer.
The waitress bar-woman asked me if I would like a beer.
I said, “No, but I’ll have a pretzel.”
That was the beginning of me living in my own fantasy world.
I love pretzels.
I never saw a pretzel as big as the one she brought me. See photo below.
And, she (Lauren, the bar lady who brought me the pretzel) is/was cute, charming and hospitable.
Lauren emits good vibes.
Look at the t-shirt Lauren wears while serving customers of Ashland & Hill.
Look at her smile.
Look at her dimples.
Look at her facial expression.
Look at Lauren’s wide open attentive eyes.
See photos below.
Below is another picture of that pretzel and the glass of beer Lauren brought to Leah at the same time Lauren brought me the pretzel shown below
By the way, the beer Leah ordered was delicious.
I had a few sips of Leah’s beer, then ordered my own.
Copyright © 2018 by Gary Smolker, All Rights Reserved
Follow me on Instagram @garyspassion
My friend Ray and His Wife Dianna decided to cut up their wedding cake in 300 plus slices, shrink wrap the slices, nicely wrap the slices and put each wrapped slice in a nice/pretty bag and to give each bag to the guests at their wedding celebration instead of serving “wedding cake” after dinner at their wedding celebration.
After dinner Dianna explained there would be no cake served because everyone was probably full.
Dianna also explained why they (she and Ray) were having a wedding celebration with 300 friends and family members instead of going to Las Vegas.
Ray explained how and when they met — Ray told us the exact time and date.
Everyone who was sitting at the table I was sitting at (except my “date) was a relative of Dianna.
Nobody sitting at the table I was sitting at knew Ray (except me) or how Dianna met Ray or knew that Dianna and Ray were getting married until they received an announcement telling them to save the date July 1, 2017 four or five months before.
After dinner Ray and Dianna each gave a speech.
Ray explained that he met Dianna on a blind date on August 24, 2015 at 7:00 p.m.
Ray explained that a “Blind Date” is a date on which you often wished you were “blind.”
However, his blind date with Dianna was different. He and Dianna had chaperones on their “blind date.”
Three people who knew both of them (knew both Ray and Dianna), arranged their blind date and accompanied them (Ray and Dianna) on their first date, their “blind date.”
During her after dinner speech, Dianna told everyone present:
Dianna told Ray she wanted to have a wedding celebration.
Ray told Dianna: “People our age don’t need to have a wedding celebration. If you want to celebrate we can go to Las Vegas for the weekend.”
Dianna told Ray: “Its my/our wedding and I want a big party to celebrate our wedding, and to invite all our family and closest friends to our party/wedding celebration.”
Dianna explained that she wanted all their closest friends and family to get together at something other than a funeral.
Dianna called out her friends from the second grade, her high school college counselor and people who had worked with her at each of her jobs who were present at this wedding celebration and she called out people who had worked for her in her company who were present and asked each one of them to stand and raise their hand.
After four hours of partying, I loosened my tie and Ray changed his jacket.
The minimum requirements for friendship are:
Ray has always been my friend and I have always been Ray’s friend.
Ray and I have known each other since we were classmates in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley in the 1960s.
Femininity is essential.
The perfect wife is a woman who is already happy and is confident in her ability to remain happy.
The perfect wife is a woman who is affectionate and friendly, towards me especially.
The perfect wife is a woman who I laugh with all the time.
The perfect wife is a woman who is always making me think and teaching me something new.
The perfect wife is a woman who is inspirational.
The perfect wife is a woman who becomes my companion.
The perfect wife is a woman I want to share my life with.
It takes intelligence to look good.
Most people don’t know what it takes to look good.
The perfect wife knows what it takes to look good, knows how to look good and looks good to me all the time.
Copyright © 2017 by Gary Smolker, All Rights Reserved
Gary S. Smolker, Publisher, Social Commentator, Movie Reviewer, Book Reviewer Gary S. Smolker Idea Exchange Blog www.garysmolker.wordpress.com Gary Smolker, Fashion Blogger Dude's Guide to Women's Shoes www.dudesguidetowomensshoes.com Follow me on Instagram@garyspassion
Meet Christy Rusk, my Part-Time Muse and Part-Time Leader to Fun New Experiences.
Christy is a 26 year old working woman.
Among other things, Christy is a foodie and Master Chef.
The night before Valentine’s Day, I wrote Christy a note wishing Christy a fun Valendine.
Christy wrote back:
“My friend and I are going to In-N-Out tomorrow, because fancy dinners that night are a scam, and we are smarter than that.
” Besides I already bought myself orchids 2 weeks ago, and I keep a stash of dark chocolate in my desk at work. I’m set.”
TAKEAWAY:
Copyright © 2017 Gary Smolker, All Rights Reserved
__________________________________________________________________________________________
This is the second in a series of articles I intend to post on the Gary S. Smolker Idea Exchange Blog at http://www.garysmolker.wordpress.com on “LIVING THE ENGAGED LIFE.”
I have continuously made posts on my Instagram account @garyspassion on “LIVING THE ENGAGED LIFE,” and I intend to continue to do so.
Follow me on Instagram @garyspassion
On Valentine’s Day I took myself out to dinner at the IN-N-OUT Burger Restaurant in Sherman Oaks, California.
My dinner cost $6.96.
I had a hamburger, french fries and a chocolate shake.
It was a delicious dinner.
The restaurant was full of happy people, eating dinner.
Most of the customers were there with someone else, eating dinner together.
A young couple sat in the booth in front of me.
The young woman didn’t stop kissing her boyfriend the entire time I was there eating my hamburger and french fries and sipping on my chocolate shake.
TAKEAWAY: All most people need, myself included, is “love, a hamburger, french fries and a chocolate shake.”
Copyright © 2017 Gary Smolker, All Rights Reserved
This is the first of a serious of articles I intend to post on the Gary Smolker Idea Exchange Blog at http://www.garysmolker.wordpress.com on “LIVING THE ENGAGED LIFE.”
I have continuously made posts on my Instagram account @garyspassion on “LIVING THE ENGAGED LIFE,” and intend to continue to do so.
Follow me on Instagram @garyspassion
The goal is to laugh with someone you take serious.
Let’s deal with seriousness of Carly Ray Jepsen’s condition.
See http://www.dudesguidetowomensshoes.com whose mission is to protect the world from bad taste in women’s shoes and in doing so create the opportunity for everyone to live a full happy meaningful life full of joy purpose accomplishment and self esteem.
You will have the pride of having lived an engaged life well lived if you actively show good taste and encourage others to do so also.
Lead by example.
Gary Smolker, Fashion Blogger Dude's Guide to Women's Shoes www.dudesguidetowomensshoes.com Gary S. Smolker, Publisher, book reviewer, movie reviewer, social commentator Gary S. Smolker Idea Exchange Blog www.garysmolker.wordpress.com Instagram @garyspassion Copyright © 2017 by Gary S. Smolker, All Rights Reserved
November 26, 2016
This morning I read a beautiful note (email) my friend Jason Fane sent to my youngest daughter Leah Smolker last night.
Jason gave Leah recommendations on what to see in Italy.
See copy of Jason’s email below.
Leah,
Jason and Leah are both beautiful people.
They are both lovely people.
They are always their real selves.
Beautiful is not how you look on the outside.
Beautiful is what you are made of.
Beautiful people spend their time discovering what beauty is.
They the share the beauty they have discovered with other people.
A Beautiful Person is a person who soaks up the beauty of the world, makes that beauty his or hers and then shares that beauty with other people.
That is what Jason and Leah do.
Jason and Leah fill themselves up with beauty; they take it in; they make it theirs; then, they share it with other people.
They glow.
When you are with them they make you feel warm and safe and curious.
Travel is good. Fashion is good. Food is good. Ideas are good. I share what I know about those topic with other people.
I blog about those topics.
We are all pursuing happiness above all else.
But we are not going to find lasting happiness in travel, fashion, food or ideas.
We are going to find lasting happiness in love and intimacy more than anything else.
The trick to being happy is being the “real you”; being the real you on both the receiving and giving ends in a relationship with someone else.
Look at the happy and joyful the correspondence between Jason and Leah.
Jason and Leah are being 100% real with each other.
They are bonding with each other.
By the way, I know they never stop bonding with each other.
Compare the happiness they are sharing with each other by sharing the beauty of the world with each other and their true feelings with each other with the miserable lives you know many people are living.
Some married people are living miserably.
At a recent dinner party a married woman told me she is a nun: “None in the morning, none in the afternoon, none at night.”
At the same dinner, a “single wealthy older man” told me he believes women will do anything [including having sex with him] for financial security, or even for a “free meal.”
Many men and women have told me that is their view of reality, of the way of the real world.
They have reached a point in their lives where it is their reality to see sex as a transaction.
Some married men, some married women, some single men and some single women think of sex in terms of satisfying a physical need without any emotional content.
Those people are not beautiful.
They are incapable of having a tender loving emotional relationship with one another.
In “Love Warrior” Glennon Doyle Melton reports:
One hot morning in the summer after tenth grade, my best friend and I go to the local pet store to visit the animals. My friend is considering having sex with her boyfriend and she asks me to tell her what it’s like. I watch the kittens play in their cage and notice one pouncing on a nearby scratching pad. I point to that kitten and say, ‘Sex is like that. I’m the scratching past and Joe pounces on me when he gets the urge. My body’s a toy he likes to play with, but he’s not all that interested in me. It’s like, he’s touching me – but he’s not really touching me. Sex isn’t really personal. It’s just that I happen to be his girlfriend so my body is his to play with. It feels childish to me. Like cats pouncing on scratching posts. But I learned this trick: I just leave my body there to get over with and I slip out and think about other things. I plan outfits and stuff. Sex is something I have, really, it just happens to my body while I’m up here, waiting for it to be over. But, I don’t think Joe knows. Or cares.’
Believe it or not, many women experience sex they way Glennon describes sex in the above paragraph.
Furthermore, I have heard of married women who have not had sex with their husbands for ten years or more.
People are made for intimacy.
They find someone they are drawn to, someone they want to have a relationship with.
Their relationships will not work when if they are unable to bring their whole real self to each other.
Look at how Jason and Leah bring their whole real selves to each other in their email exchange about Italy.
You can only be in love with someone else when you are fully present.
Another person can only be in love with you when you and the other person are both fully present.
Love is a sacred place created when two people decide it’s safe to be their real selves, a place to be fully human and fully known.
Building trust and intimacy takes time.
Intimacy and trust between two people is a mountain.
You can’t start by leaping to the top.
If you do, you miss the climb; the climb is where you bond.
You’ve got to climb together one step at a time.
|
Below are some of the pictures posted on Leah’s blog post referred to above titled “Italy Armchair Travel” ….
Gozo in Malta
Rome is one of the most famous cities in the world:
Milan’s cathedral is one of the most famous in the world:
Syracuse, Noto and Ragusa are all charming Baroque cities in Sicily:
Panarea in Sicily is a small island near Stromboli that offers excellent views of the volcano:
The Four Seasons Hotel in Florence
Aman Hotel in Venice
Cava Grande, Sicily
If you want to have long lasting happiness, pair up with someone
You will know when you have found a person like that because people like that glow, they radiate beauty, they emote beauty, they share beauty.
When you are around Jason or Leah when they are talking about the beautiful things they have seen in the world or talking about the beautiful things they have seen done, or thought about, you feel warm and safe and literally purr in contentment.
Gary S. Smolker, publisher, movie reviewer, social commentator Gary S. Smolker Idea Exchange Blog www.garysmolker.wordpress.com Gary Smolker, fashion blogger Dude's Guide to Women's Shoes www.dudesguidetowomensshoes.com
People of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.
You can’t cheat reality.
Every attempts backfires in ways you don’t anticipate; the unanticipated consequence of backfire goes beyond far beyond your that if this doesn’t work that will happen.
Don’t try to cheat reality; it’s a failed proposition from the get go.
Respect reality.
Reality tries its damness to teach you to do the right thing.
What will happen to you if you try to cheap reality will be worse than being “bitch slapped.”
The author does not warrant any positive result will arise from use of anything stated in this guidance.
Most especially there is no guarantee of a happy result.
Don’t marry anyone under 40 years old.
EXCEPTION:
Being married involves sacrifice.
Raising children and maintaining a marriage is complicated.
Don’t marry anyone who has children if you don’t want to be constantly sacrificing for the benefit of someone else’s child.
If you marry someone who already has a child you will be subject to many “outside forces” (as a result of the presence of that child in your life) that will block and overpower you.
Don’t think getting involved doesn’t involve marriage.
You need to confront aging and death.
Understand that as you age you become less attractive to the opposite sex; as you age you become more like furniture than a sex partner.
OLDER PEOPLE:
Recollect that as you walked down a street during different phases of your life the members of the opposite sex paid less and less attention to you.
YOUNGER PEOPLE;
Note that as you become older when you walk down a street members of the opposite sex pays less and less attention to you.
Never believe that money isn’t important.
Money is like water, it flows.
BEWARE: The tiniest leak can sink the largest ship.
Don’t believe you can control access to your money.
BEWARE: Selfish has to do with values.
Middle-aged men have a perverse disinclination to accept that they are no longer sexually attractive.
The majority of men are in denial about their sexual attractiveness to women.
Women often become resentful when they become less sexually attractive.
Women rarely hook-up with men who are less wealthy then they.
Men often hook-up with women less wealthy than they.
If you have money it will flow to the other person’s indulgences.
You will not be in control.
To save yourself from a lot of grief, although it is impossible for most people to do so, proceed with caution and follow Guidance Number One and Guidance Number Two.
I believe in love, marriage, and having a family.
The things we love tell us what we are and who we are.
Man is not meant to be alone.
Men are meant to be with a woman.
Women are not meant to be alone.
Women are meant to be with a man.
METAPHOR: It is safe for a ship to be in a harbor. But, a ship is not built to stay in a harbor.
To not dare is to have a wonderful relationship with a member of the opposite sex is to have already lost.
Be with someone who you enjoy being with and who enjoys being with you.
The way you treat other people and the way you treat yourself is the measure of who you are.
Seek to get into and then get into a meaningful relationship with a member of the opposite sex.
Life has to be involving, it has to be fun, and it has to exercise your creative instincts.
In order to achieve anything you must be willing to be creative and you must be willing to fail.
Creativity takes courage.
Never be afraid to fail. That’s the first step to succeeding.
Life is all about who you become on the journey.
If you are willing to accept less than your best effort, you will never maximize your potential.
Being a father is the best thing that ever happened to me.
Being the father of my three daughters is a source of endless joy to me.
Below is a picture of my grown-up daughter Judi practicing ballet when she was a young girl.
Below is a picture of my daughter Terra dancing with me at her wedding reception.
Below is a picture of my daughter Terra during the religious ritual ceremony at her Bats Mitzvah.
Below is a picture of me cutting the loaf of bread we all shared at the reception.
Below is a picture of my sister and her two daughters dancing at the reception, a party which followed the religious ritual.
Below are pictures of some of our men friends dancing at Terra’s Bats Mitzvah party.
Below is a blown-up picture of Leah’s face and the full-length picture of my daughter Leah going somewhere, when Leah was five years old.
Since the picture below was taken, Leah has traveled to thirty countries.
The guideline information provided above is the result of a private survey of veterans of human relationship folly and the joys of being married and having children.
Copyright © 2016 Gary S. Smolker, All Rights Reserved
John Carroll reports in his January 14, 2016 article in “FierceBiotech” that the ratio of men to women at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco, in January 2016, was 9 to 1, men to women.
John Carroll scooped me.
See John Carroll’s article at http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/biotech-has-problem-women-or-it-other-way-around/2016-01-14.
I am in the process of writing an article on my experiences with Femme Fatale at the conference.
Below is a working draft of the article.
When you are done reading the partial first draft of the article I am working on (copy below) you ought to have a hankering for a churro, thanks to me.
Stay tuned: I ought to be done writing and to have posted my article on my experiences at the recent J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference (on my blog “The Gary S. Smolker Idea Exchange Blog” at http://www.garysmolker.wordpress.com) on or before January 26, 2016.
Femme Fatale and I both noticed a huge ratio of men to women at the Mintz Levin cocktail reception.
Femme Fatale’s immediate reaction was: There are so few women to compete with here!
It was astounding, to both of us, how few women were there.
The men and women who were at the Mintz Levin cocktail party reception gave us the impression that we were at the biotech industry’s equivalent of a Vanity Fair after party in the entertainment industry.
Vanity Fair has an annual party that takes place immediately after the Academy Awards.
——————————
Below is a partial first working draft of the article I am currently writing, which was scooped by John Carrol’s January 14, 2016 article in FierceBiotech.
If happiness, cheerfulness and delight could be put in a bottle and sold we would make a fortune.
Below are some pictures taken in the lounge of the Casa del Mar Hotel by the Sea in Santa Monica, California, on Thursday night, January 14, 2016, of two cheerful guys (Ed and Dan) from Pennsylvania with painter-poet-hypnotherapist Femme Fatale at an after party.
Femme Fatale and I met Dan and Ed at a cocktail party on Tuesday night, January 12, 2016, in San Francisco at a cocktail reception hosted by Mintz Levin Cohn Ferris Glovsky and Popeo, P.C., an international law firm, during J. P. Morgan’s 34th Annual Healthcare Conference and reconnected with them on Thursday night, January 14, 2016, at an after party they threw for the four of us in Santa Monica, California at the Casa del Mar Hotel by the Sea in Santa Monica, California.
The Casa del Mar Hotel by the Sea is a five star hotel.
Below is a picture of Ed and Femme Fatale in the lounge of Casa del Mar Hotel by the Sea, on Thursday night, January 14.
Dan and Ed have a cheerful temperament and convey likability big time.
Below is a picture of Dan and Femme Fatale on the same couch in the lounge at the Casa del Mar Hotel by the Sea in Santa Monica, on Thursday night, January 14, 2016.
If you ever find yourself in L.A. in desperate need for hot chocolate, I recommend you migrate over to “Churros Calientes” at 11521 Santa Monica Blvd. (telephone: 424-248-3890). There you will find great Hot Chocolate and Churros.
Sunday night, January 17, 2016 I treated my self to a Hot Chocolate Caliente.
Below is a photograph of my Hot Chocolate Caliente. I took that photo before drinking my Hot Chocolate.
My Hot Chocolate Caliente was so delicious that after drinking it, I then treated myself to an iced mocha.
Below is a photograph I took of the iced mocha I ordered, before indulging myself in the delight of consuming it.
The ladies sitting next to me at Churros Calientes enjoyed churros with ice cream.
They assured me their dish of churros with ice cream was delicious, as were their hot chocolate drinks.
Our server, Jacobo was wonderful.
Below is a photograph I took of Jacobo.
Yum — below is a partial list of hot chocolate drinks at Churros Calientes.
I love the cheerfulness of the philosophy expressed in the Italian saying si non e vero, e ben trovato (“even if it’s not true, it’s a good one”).
The purpose of this post is to tell you about a trip I took with Femme Fatale to San Francisco to attend a Mintz Levin reception/cocktail party in downtown San Francisco at Rickhouse on Tuesday, January 12, 2026 during J.P. Morgan’s 34th Annual Healthcare Conference and the after-party celebration we enjoyed with two Cheerful Guys we met there.
By the way, the people Femme Fatale and I met at the cocktail party were movers and shakers in biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries.
Henry Ford’s statement, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” best describes the type of people we met at that cocktail party.
That certainly sums up what Dan and Ed and their company are all about.
*** I am still writing this post.
Check out my blog in about two weeks to see my entire article about my 24 hour trip with Femme Fatale to San Francisco on January 12 and our after party with Dan and Ed and my commentary on chocolate.
I am on a quest to find the best hot chocolate drink, the best chocolate pastry, the best chocolate cake and the best chocolate in the world.
To be continued.
Copyright © 2016 Gary S. Smolker, All Rights Reserved
In 1913, Thomas Edison said in an article in the Dramatic Mirror, “Books will soon be obsolete in the schools. Scholars will soon be instructed through the eye. It is possible to touch every branch of human knowledge with the motion picture.”
Thomas Edison did not understand that the future happens slowly, the future comes slowl.
It takes a long time for change to happen.
Transformation is slow.
It is wonderful that you can take pictures with your cell phone today (such as the photographs above) and send those pictures instantaneously over the Internet to anyone who has a smart phone anywhere in the world.
I am thrilled that I was able to take the above pictures with my cell phone and to then send them to my three daughters over the Internet.
At the time: I was on the West Coast of California, one of my daughters was in the Middle East, another one of my daughters was on the East Coast and the other daughter was about 100 miles away from me in California.
However, I have not been 100% happy with my iPhone.
Yesterday (July 29, 2015), I found out that the reason I have not been able to talk on my hands-free phone system in my automobile as I am driving my car for the past week is that the blue tooth system in my car (a 2013 Nissan GT R) is not compatible with the latest update (8.3) on my iPhone and my mobile phone carrier’s (AT&T Mobility’s) software.
I moved into a new home in a new neighborhood on June 1, 2015.
I sent the above photos to my daughters because I wanted to tell them (visually) about my new abode.
When I sent the photos shown above to my three daughters:
I image that each of my three daughters had a different reaction (emotion and intellectual reaction) to each of the above photos because each one of them is a different person.
They think differently.
They have had different life experiences.
Therefore, I image they each saw something different than what their sister saw when they looked at each picture.
Similarly, I image that each person who looks at each of the above pictures will have a different reaction to each picture.
It has been said that there are two types of people: people who see shapes when they look at cloud formations and people who see only clouds.
I find the above story about the many links (technology systems that are linked to each other) that have to work together in order for me to be able to talk hands free in my car very instructive.
It is how each of the links works and interacts with the other links that counts.
Here is what I believe happened when each of my three daughters looked at each of the above pictures/images:
Put another way:
In Conclusion:
Visual images can make things happen by creating an emotional connection between you and what your are seeing, which in turn provokes you to take action.
Recent history proves that photographs can provoke an emotional response.
In the 1950s and the 1960s the still image – photographs – served as the lens through which people experienced the news.
For the civil rights movement, photos helped change the course of history.
When Americans outside the Deep South (the “Jim Crow” South) saw photographs of protesters being clubbed by the authorities and being attacked by vicious attack dogs at the direction of the authorities, the resulting outrage pushed presidents into action and spurred Congress into action.
That is the reason the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act came into being.
People reacted with ACTION because all people are all primed to experience unconsciously what they see.
All people have a visual action system as well as a visual recognition system.
Compelling visual images make us act, even more than rousting speeches.
Consider the public reaction to the following somber speech given by President Obama about the prevalence of the Zimmerman Mind-Set in America – a mind-set that views black boys and men as a problem:- after the not guilty verdict decision in the Trayvon Martin case. By the way, the decision in that case caused widespread rioting in the Black community in America.
“There are very few African American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. That includes me. and there are very few African American men who haven’t had the experience of getting on an elevator and a woman clutching her purse nervously and holding her breath until she had a change to get off. That happens often.”
In contrast, consider the famous Rodney King video showing four Los Angeles police officers using a Taser on a man (Rodney King) they had pulled over for drunk driving.
In the video, you see Rodney King being swatted by a police officer with a baton.
After Rodney King falls to the ground is set upon by other officers, who club him as he lies stationary on the ground.
When all the officers were acquitted of assault in a trial three years later, portions of the City of Los Angeles erupted in violence – the Watts Riots.
Further consider the different impact of making complaints vs. the impact of making a video:
Neurons are the basic building blocks of the brain.
Mirror neurons cause us to “experience” what we are seeing.
For example, if someone who agrees with what Donald Trump is saying or salutes Donald Trump for speaking out in plain English in a “manly fashion” watches Donald Trump say something that person will be able to imagine themselves saying it, similarly to the experience you will experience if you look at a person eating an apple – you will be able to taste a little bit of that apple in your own mouth.
The same thing happens when people watch other people having sexual intercourse – mirror neurons cause the people watching to experience the same pleasure.
That is why Donald Trump is currently leading the polls of Republican candidates for President.
That is why pornography – as a business – is the responsible for about thirty percent of the content on the Internet.
In the United States, pornography is about a $15 billion a year business.
White people in the United States, especially Republicans, are angry about many things.
They feel helpless. Donald Trump is the spokesman for many of them.
Donald Trump makes many people feel they are speaking out when he addresses things that piss them off.
The more other people criticize Donald Trump for being “a bad boy,” the more they like him and the more “free publicity” he gets.
Many people think Donald Trump is a moron. He is not a moron.
Donald Trump’s current “thumb in your eye bad boy campaign” to be the Republican candidate for president of the United States mirrors the early (1963) public relations campaigns and crusade to obtain publicity followed by the Rolling Stones before they were well known.
Neuroscientists have determined that it is not merely the suggestion of sex that arouses it people.
It is that a section of their brain that provides the intense pleasure associated with having sex is “tricked” into believing they are having sex in that moment.
Our mirror neurons fire [are activated] just as easily when we an action on a screen as when we see it in real life.
We most positively react [via the firing of our mirror neurons] to people we think are just like us and to people doing what we would like to be doing and to people who are acting the way we think people should act; we relate most positively to people we sense would understand and relate to us.
The person who appears to our brain (mirror neurons) to be most emphatic “wins” and the person we relate to the most will have/win our good will.
TAKE AWAY:
I recently moved from a nice house in Tarzana, California to a condominium in Van Nuys, California.
Van Nuys has the reputation of being “the armpit” of the San Fernando Valley.
I took the above photographs with my a smart phone, my iPhone, to show my three children that where I am now living is not a dismal place. It is actually a fun place.
After I took those photos I sent those photos to my children via email over the Internet..
All of the above photographs were taken by me on July 3 and July 4, 2015 .
The top photo is a photograph of a tree in my neighborhood taken by me with my iPhone on July 3, 2015.
The next photograph is a photograph of a street scene in my neighborhood taken by me with my iPhone on July 3, 2015.
The next photograph is a photograph of my reading chair in my living room in my new home, taken by me with my iPhone on July 4, 2015.
Next to that reading chair is a bookcase, one of the eight bookcases I have in my home.
I love to read.
There are a wide variety of books in that bookcase including collections of poems written by Lord Byron, Robert Browning, John Keats, W. B. Yeats, Walt Whitman, Heinrich Heine, Alexander Pope, William Wordsworth, Arthur Rimbaud, Octavio Paz and Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore and also a variety of books about love, one o which contains a copy letters of Abelard and Heloise. There are also books about power, seduction.
The next photograph is a photograph of my 2013 Nissan GT R the subterranean garage where I live.
I sent that photograph to my children because my eldest daughter was concerned that my “snazzy” car would be safe.
I took that picture to show her that my car is parked in a safe place.
The next photograph is a photograph of a note attached to a multicolored pair of socks which I placed in a bookcase in my study.
That note and the multicolored sock attached were given to me by a woman who was concerned that my life is not colorful enough because I only wear black and white socks.
I took that picture because I wanted to share with my children the warm pleasant and witty way that woman is/was trying to get me out of a black and white sock mold.
The books shown immediately under that note are books on how the food you eat affects your health and the following books about ethics: “A Maimonides Reader”, “Maimonides, The Guide to the Perplexed”. “Interpreting Maimonides”, “Peter Abelard Ethical Writings – Ethics and Dialogue between a Philosopher, a Jew, and a Christian.”
The hundreds of books in my home library are a microcosm of my interests and values.
I do not live an exclusively “black and white sock” existence.
One of my desires is to improve myself, to be a better men today then I was tomorrow.
Another one of my desires is “to make a difference.”
I love books so much that if someone told me, “I need to spend time reading more books, more time learning and creating myself.” I would suspect that person is and/or or will become a great success. Whether or not that person is a “success” I would feel an immediate bond with that person.
However, it might turn out that we are not compatible.
I strongly dislike being around embittered sullen people.
I try to stay away from people who never smile.
Being a sullen bitter complaining person is a “rule-out” — even if another person loves to read books, if that person is a bitter complaining sullen person I will not be happy being around that person and I try to stay away from that person.
I am selfish in that I try to stay away from bitter sullen people because they are drain my energy and their depression pulls me down.
I sometimes like people who don’t read books: It has been my experience that people with a “happy” outlook have well formed minds whether they read books or not.
I like being around people who exude positive energy.
Reading “reconfigures” people’s thinking but doesn’t make inherently unhappy people become happy or change “negative” people into “positive” people.
Reading a book merely indicates an openness to experience and intellectual curiosity.
Sometimes, but not all the time, people who read books are very thoughtful.
Once I see a person is reading a book printed on paper I feel an immediate kinship with that person. However, I do not know what kind of person that person is and will know I will like that person until I interact with that person over a period of time.
My experience has taught me that people get along best with people who share the same sense of life and the same desires that I do.
The next of the photographs above (the last photograph) is a photograph of a cookbook (JERUSALEM) containing recipes people from the four corners of the world brought with them when they came to live in Jerusalem.
I went to Costco to buy artichokes, stopped by the book section in my local Costco warehouse, saw that recipe book there and couldn’t resist purchasing it.
I think it would be great fun to prepare one of the dishes in that cookbook with some I just met.
By the way, my children know I don’t cook and also know I can’t resist buying more books.
Have you you changed what think/thought about when you first looked at the above pictures?
Are any of these pictures effective at telling you something about me, my character, my sensibilities, my interests, my tastes and/or my values?
Are any of those pictures worth a thousand words?
Sometimes facts matter less than images.
Consider the televised Kennedy – Nixon debates: Kennedy oozed charisma. Nixon looked awkward.
Many/most people believe Nixon lost the election to be the next present of the United States to Kennedy because of the way Nixon looked in those debates.
Historically, there have always been systemic changes in the structure of society following advances in communication technology.
According to New York Times columnist David Brooks: Researchers at the University of Oslo an elsewhere suggest that people read a printed page differently that they read off a screen.
See David Brooks’ op ed page column in the July 10, 2014 edition of the New York Times titled “Building Attention Span” for further details.
I refuse to read books off a screen.
I am enamored of the physicality of a book printed on paper, of reading a book printed on paper in solitude, of getting lost in the world created by the author of that book as I read it, and of interacting with the words and ideas and concepts and information provided in books printed on paper.
A book printed on paper is a PHYSICAL THING to me.
Books printed on paper, and newspapers and magazines printed on paper, are something I can physically hold in my hands.
That is very important to me.
Books stored on a smart phone or any other mobile device or on a computer are not a physical thing or a physical entity to me.
To me, they are just a collection of images.
I can’t imagine giving a book read on a screen steady focused sustained concentration.
For that reason I will not read a book stored on my iPhone or stored on my desktop computer or stored on my lap top computer.
But instead, for that reason, I will continue to purchase and read books printed on paper.
Some people my age use a Kindle or smart phone or lap top or iPad when they go on a long trip by airplane because of the weight of books printed on paper.
Some of the books printed on paper which I own and have in my home library weigh several pounds.
One of the books I own weighs more than 20 pounds.
One of my friends has pointed out that he prefers to read screen books because:
I understand “young” people read, tweet, text, email and do research on their smart phones and iPads.
Although screens displaying digital information (i.e. books, texts, tweets, emails, etc.) are a novelty and curiosity to me, they are appendages to my children and grandchildren.
Most younger people (i.e., my children and grandchildren) grow up playing video games, watching videos and movies and reading books on screens.
The decision faced by most modern parents is: when to place their young child in front of a screen and start feeding them media.
Books printed on paper give the reader an unique and superior ability to crystallize ideas and to deeply consider and understand the nuance and substance of what is being read.
For further discussion of the unique importance of books printed on paper to me, read my post “An Ode to Books”, posted on my blog, The Gary S. Smolker Idea Exchange Blog at http://www.garysmolker.wordpress.com, on June 27, 2015.
Life can be compared to an echo echoing in mountains and into empty sky.
Things change. so we must adapt to the times.
Everything in life is just for a while.
We must adapt to the times and prepare for changes or be crushed by changes.
Reading the page of a book will help you prepare for change and make you more aware of current realities.
Images combined with an appropriate text send a very powerful message.
Take for example the combination of images of the teeth in children in photos of the tradition faces of the first born of an Australian Aboriginal family, a typical Melanesian boy, a typical Indian of the Peruvian Andes with the modern faces of a second-born son to an Australian Aboriginal family, a coastal Peruvian Indian boy whose parents had straight teeth, and the photographs of an Amazon Indian born after its family adopted a modern diet and a Samoan boy born after introduction of processed foods to his parents’ diet found on pages 31 and 32 of the paperback version of “Vitamin K2 and the Calcium Paradox – How A Little Known Vitamin Could Save Your Life” by Dr. Kate Rheaume-Bleue, B.Sc., N.D.
Those pictures of children’s teeth and accompanying text powerfully make the point that what you eat (the modern diet vs the tradition diet) matters a lot.
Your concept of self is not constant.
Your level of awareness is not constant.
You should strive to be a better person today then you were yesterday.
Read a serious book, and study and think about what it says.
Share what you have “learned” with other people.
Discuss what it says with other people.
Two books I recommend you read if you are interested in looking further into the ideas discussed above ideas are:
It is everyone’s duty to share important information with other people.
Sharing what you know will create a cumulative effect.
Become part of the massive evolving cloud of ideas that constitutes our world culture; a cloud always in dialogue, changing shape as it pushes and pulls against itself.
It is a cloud in which every voice that contributes to it is like a small little breath of its own.
Be a full participant in the world.
A friend of mine told me the first photograph shown above is not a picture of a tree. According to my friend: it is a picture of a message.
What do you see when you look at the first photograph above?
Do you see a tree, a heart or a heart inside a heart or a heart inside a heart inside another heart, a message or something else?
Do you see one, two or three hearts?
Do you see a rainbow of colors in or around the heart(s)?
What do you sense when you look at that picture?
What does a heart symbolize to you?
What does a rainbow symbolize to you?
Who do you think painted the heart on the tree with the rainbow of colors and erected the twirling pin wheels in front of the tree?
What kind of person do you think owns that piece of property?
I see a heart within a heart and a picture painted in a rainbow of colors.
A heart symbolizes love to me.
When I see a heart, I think of Rumi’s poem:
Stop the flow of your words,
open the window of your heart and
let the spirit speak.
–Rumi
In ancient Egypt the hieroglyphic heart-shaped as a vase, was the storehouse of memory and truth, the center of the personality, of understanding, will and thought as well as creative imagination.
Egyptian physicians were the first to recognize the importance of the pulse, which they called the “voice of the heart.”
After the storm a rainbow appears; it has always been an emblem of promise.
A rainbow is both an act of nature signifying a storm has passed, a new beginning after a storm is over.
A rainbow also is a spiritual and inspirational symbol symbolizing hope for a wonderful future.
A rainbow is a sign of renewal, of the transmuting changes of the heart and the eros [deep love] of covenant between heaven and earth.
Poets have called rainbows “the dyes of heaven”, “a glittering robe of joy”, and a “celestial kaleidoscope.”
The “Book of Revelation” describes a rainbow, “like an emerald” surrounding the throne of God.
When I see a rainbow, I think of the words to the song “Over the Rainbow”: Somewhere over the rainbow blue birds fly, troubles melt away like lemon drops….”
It is “obvious” to me that a very creative and peace-loving romantic kid, probably an eight or nine-year old girl, painted the heart on the tree and put the pinwheels in front of that tree.
In my imagination the girl who painted the tree and placed the pinwheels in front of it and her parents who own that property are affectionate lovely charming people.
I assume the person who owns that property is an extremely loving and happy person because it is hard to be unhappy in an inspiring and beautiful place.
To maximize your opportunities for success today you must have (a) good listening and writing skills, (b) good reading and writing skills, and (c) good visual communication skills.
The inescapable fact is that man is fundamentally a social animal, yet in some ways isolated.
Language is in response to this.
We all yearn to be seen and understood by those around us.
We make decisions based on what we see and what we understand.
To maximize your opportunities for success today, you need to be able to critically review information, ideas, concepts, thoughts and communications.
See: “The Social Animal – A Story of How Success Happens” by David Brooks and “The Mating Mind – How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature” by Geoffrey F. Miller.
Communications are at the heart of most social and business enterprises.
Time is a vessel that you fill with what you want.
People are programmed differently by their past experiences.
This leads people to have different points of view.
I agree with the Dalai Lama: “People take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just because they are not on your road doesn’t mean they’ve gotten lost.” – The Dalai Lama
I also agree with Henry Miller’s statement: “The moment one gives close attention to anything, even a blade of grass, it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself.” – Henry Miller
I agree with the statement: “The more you stare up at the sky, the more stars you begin to see.” – GSS
I also agree with the statement: The most creative act you will ever undertake is the act of creating yourself.” – Deepak Chopra
Copyright © by Gary S. Smolker
 | Diana Kohler on Reality On The Ground –… |
 | boobibooblog on “UNCUT GEMS”… |
 | Passport Overused on VISUAL IDENTITY #3 – A W… |
| boobibooblog on VISUAL IDENTITY #3 – A W… |
| Boo Schaub on WORLD CHANGERS by Gary Smolker… |
Gary S. Smolker 