Toy Story - Children Around The World

Children are children, regardless of their country, culture, race, sex or situation, they still want to have fun and experience the joys of life without its complexities and responsibilities - at least this is how it should be!

Italian photographer Gabriele Galimberti has travelled the world to take photos of children and their most prized toys. The project is titled Toy Story and is a combination of absolute beauty and sadness. 

Tangawizi - Keekorok, Kenya by Gabriele Galimberti

Cun Zi Yi - Chongqing, China 

Arafa & Aisha - Bububu, Zanzibar by  Gabriele Galimberti 

Heineken Job Interview

I would love a job interview like this!

Happy Birthday Einstein - now eat some Pi

The famous German-born theoretical physicist, developer of the general theory of relativity, Mr Albert Einstein would be celebrating his 134th birthday today, had he not died in 1955.

Coincidentally, Einstein`s birthday falls on Pi day. What the hell is that, you are wondering...

Basically, it is the celebration of "The number π is a mathematical constant that is the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter, and is approximately equal to 3.14159."

No surprise that this concept is American! It is using their date format that the chosen day for celebrating Pi is 14 March - 3/14.

Across the States, especially at universities, they organize Pi and Einstein tributes, whereby in turn American fashion, they eat pie and dress up.

New Pope - Jorge Mario Bergoglio

White smoke (fumata bianca) has billowed out of the Sistine Chapel Chimney, signifying the agreement of the new Pope of the Roman Catholic Church.

The chosen one is Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 76, from Argentina and he is the first Latin American to become Pope - The Catholic Church, mixing it up since 2013.

hello there.

I`m not sure why he has to call himself by another name but he is going with Pope Francis  I.

Are you a psychopath?

I first came across The Hare Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-R), in Jon Ronson`s (rather comical book), The Psychopath Test.

Dr. Robert D. Hare is a researcher of criminal psychology and he put a list together, as a tool to diagnosis psychopathic behavior and tendencies.  It works on a symptom rating scale which allows for the comparison of a subject's degree of psychopathy to be measured against that of a prototypical psychopath.

Robert Hare`s general commentary on Ronson`s book  surmise: "In short, we think that Ronson’s book trivializes a serious personality disorder and its measurement, which is not helpful to those who have the disorder or to their unfortunate victims."

Whilst it is reiterated that this checklist should only be used by trained and experienced clinicians, you can`t but help look at those around or even at yourself and think..... maybe? 

The Hare Psychopathy Checklist (PLC-R) - this is this revised version.
1.) Glibness and superficial charm
2.) Grandiose (exaggeratedly high) sense of self worth
3.) Need for stimulation/ Prone to boredom
4.) Pathological lying
5.) Cunning and manipulative
6.) Lack of remorse or guilt
7.) Shallow affect (superficial emotional responsiveness)
8.) Callousness and lack of empathy
9.) Parasitic lifestyle
10.) Poor behavioral controls
11.) Sexual promiscuity
12.) Early behavior problems
13.) Lack of realistic long-term goals
14.) Impulsivity
15.) Irresponsibility
16.) Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
17.)  Many short-term marital relationships
18.) Juvenile delinquency
19.) Revocation of conditional release
20.) Criminal versatility

A psychopath is defined as "A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse." Therefore, it doesn`t mean that a psychopath will inevitably be a serial killer or anything of that sort.
Apparently psychopathic characteristics are prevalent in our society and tend to gravitate towards certain professions. These are the job fields most like to have psychopaths (this has never been proven though):
CEO, Lawyers, Media, Sales, Surgeons, Journalists, Police Officers, Clergyperson, Chef, Civil Servants. 


Best movies with psychopathic characters:
- Alfred Hitchcock`s, Psycho (1960) - Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins)
- Stanley Kubrick, A Clockwork Orange (1971) - Alex DeLarge ( Malcolm McDowell )
- Rob Reiner`s, Misery (1990) - Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates)
- Jonathan Demme`s, Silence of the Lambs (1991) - Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins)
- Oliver Stone`s, Natural Born Killers (1994) - Mickey Knox (Woody Harrelson) Mallory Knox (Juliette Lewis,)
-  Ben Stiller`s, The Cable Guy (1996) - The cable guy  (Jim Carrey)
- David Fincher`s, Fight Club (1999) - The Narrator/Tyler Durden (Edward Norton)
- Mary Harron`s, American Psycho (2000) - Patrick Bateman (Christopher Bale)
-  Christopher Nolan`s,  The Dark Knight (2008) - The Joker (Heath Ledger)

Sorry Morales, I wouldn`t call that a horror!

Spanish `horror` movies have seen quiet a hype around them in the past few years but I must say, I think they may have got the genre wrong. 

Julia's Eyes ( Los ojos de Julia) is apparently a `critically acclaimed Spanish horror`, it came out in 2011 and was directed by Guillem Morales. I watched it last night and whilst it is a good movie, thrilling and creepy it is definitely not a horror.

Many aspects are also rather reminiscent of 2007 movie, The Orphanage (El Orfanato) directed by J.A. Bayona and that is not just due to the fact that both movies have Belén Rueda (who is amazing) as the main character.

Although their story lines are different, both movies have this aspect of `search` involved, always look for something and usually it highlights a key and several key holes that are tried. The wife/husband relationships are also similar, fragmented by distrust/disbelief and accompanied with the husband threatening to leave.

Don`t get me wrong I enjoyed both movies, they are well structured and well filmed. They don`t have the gore but the psychological gruesomeness that has been lacking from movies lately.  Maybe it is just the influence of Guillermo del Toro as the producer that results in the small similarities.

As Morales said in an interview "I see myself as more of a thriller filmmaker than a horror filmmaker though," - thankfully there is no disillusion there.

There needs to be a variation of Mother`s Day cards.

Usually I try to get really arts and crafty when it comes to cards, especially for my parents, who still have all the homemade card creations from my childhood.

Alas, this year I gave in and went to buy one and found it to be quite a task. Firstly, they only have the words `MUM` - does everyone here use that? What about mom, mommy, mother? Secondly, there is no middle ground between really cheesy and `humorous`.

Before the `card hunt` I didn`t realize that there was a difference between Mother`s Day and Mothering Sunday or the fact that they had completely different origins.

Both are dedicated to celebrating mothers, motherhood and maternal bonds. But Mothering Sunday is a Christian holiday which celebrates the fourth Sunday during Lent and dates back to the 16th century. Whereas, the history of Mother`s Day varies from country to country, culture to culture. 

The origin of the commercial Mother`s Day that is celebrated today, is apparently the result of one woman... In 1908 Anna Jarvis held a memorial for her mother in West Virginia, USA. She thereafter pushed for Mother`s Day to be recognized as a holiday in the States and by 1914 she had succeeded..

It has been argued that no credit was paid to Julia Ward Howe, advocate of women`s suffrage, who in 1870 wrote her Mother's Day Proclamation, which called on woman of the world to united in peace.

However it begun, I think it is good to have a day that reminds people just how important your mom is. Because in the fast paced world that we live in, it is easy to omit our appreciation and love for all the things that have done and continue to do.

My adorable mom.

Gorgeous gran (Nini)