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C’est non sans émotion (lol) que je vous présente ma première réalisation de grande, avec un patron et tout et tout!

Il est en maille vieux rose, trouvée à la Maison des Tissus.

Petit zoom sur la custo :

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Deux petits boutons à recouvrir sur chaque manche, et une petite ceinture “ficelle” coordonnée.

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Pour les modifications, j’ai creusé la taille pour éviter l’effet sac de pommes de terre.C’est tout ce que j’y ai apporté hormis les petits détails (boutons et ceinture).

Et j’ai pris une taille en dessous pour le patron, comme Burda taille grand.

° Patron 7595 Burda °

Vêtements pour Femmes Une multitude de bonnes affaires à petits prix !!
Les dernières tendances vous sont proposées en mode femme, retrouvez de nombreuses nouveautés pour créer vos looks avec les accessoires derniers cris

Tee-Shirt / Top

Pantalon

Jupe

Pull et Sweat

Maillot de bain

Manteau & Imperméable

Bermuda / Short

Chemisier / Chemise

Gilet et Cardigan

Robe

Veste et Blouson

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Tee-Shirt

Pantalon

Manteau

Pull & Gilet

Chemise

Bermuda & Short

Costume

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Peignoir & Robe de chambre

Maillot de bain

Vêtement homme , Lingerie homme , Chaussures homme , Montre homme , Sac & Maroquinerie homme , Gants homme , Chapeau & Casquette homme , Lunettes homme , Ceinture & Bretelles homme , Echarpe & Foulard homme , Autres accessoires homme

En-Mode.Fr Boutique de la mode – Vêtements hommes.

In this post I contend that pull systems enable and promote working at a higher level of quality than is allowed by working according to a push system.

In traditional software development scenarios, project plans and timelines are imposed on development work. In addition, work is pre-assigned to specific developers. It is fact that any type of worker can only do so much work per hour, and there are so many hours in a day. When timelines (and a set number of human resources) are imposed on a creative, innovative process like software development, either the quality of the work decreases, or the amount of work decreases (if quality is kept constant).

If you give Michaelangelo 10 days to paint the Sistine Chapel, he will either paint only a corner of the ceiling to the desired quality (which is why you hired him in the first place), or he will paint the entire ceiling but it will look like rubbish.

This is a push system. The deadline is pushed onto the work. Work items are pushed onto specific developers.

However, if you don’t impose a deadline, and you don’t pre-allocate tasks to developers, the developer has the time available to him to ‘do a proper job’, i.e. complete the task to the level of quality required by the system. He is not under pressure to cut corners in either scope or quality. He is also not inclined to optimise to the incentive.

The challenge of these systems then becomes managing the uncertainties around such a project, like ‘when will it be complete’, ‘how much will it cost etc’. But in general, the quality of the finished product should be higher.

In my previous post, I described how pull systems work. I made the statement that work is only done in a stage in a pipeline when there is a request from the downstream stage. I.e. I only develop some code when QA has asked me for some artifacts to test. I also made the statement that if there is a request from a downstream stage, and no work needs to be done to fulfil that request, then the ‘conversation’ should ‘return’ immediately.

I contend that test-driven development (TDD) is a pull system. I make a request, and I then fulfill that request. I write a test as a specification of what I want to achieve, and I then write code to fulfill that request.

According to TDD best practice, I write code only when I have a failing test. This is indicative of a pull system. I write the code only when I need to. This need is represented by a failing test.

TDD ensures that you don’t waste time writing unneeded code. All code written must be justified by the ‘failing test’ rule. Otherwise it is considered superfluous, and does not contribute to satisfying the request from the downstream process.

If you write more code after all your tests have passed, you are not adding value and you are being wasteful.

Think of TDD according to this example: instead of producing an engine and then trying to fit it into a car (a set of requirements), rather start off with the car, and have the test ‘does my car go?’ You only need an engine to make a car go. If the car goes without an engine (highly unlikely), you don’t need the engine. Production of the engine can be justified (ie represent value) only when there is an explicit need for an engine. Code is only needed when you have a failing test.

You may refine your test to include economy and performance requirements etc: “My car needs a certain maximum speed. To achieve that, I need an engine which produces 100kW. Does my engine produce 100kW?” If your car needs an engine that produces a maximum of 100kW, it is wasteful to design an engine that produces 120kW. When designing the engine, you have explicit requirements  you need to satisfy. Producing more than what is required is wasteful, and is not ‘pull’. If your tests aren’t failing, don’t write more code.

Similarly, if you are designing a new car that needs an engine that produces 100kW and  you already have one sitting on the shelf, don’t design another one – if you add a test which passes without any new code, don’t write more code.

TDD simply provides a philosophy for specifying your requirements, and a mechanism for evaluating whether you have satisfied those requirements (i.e. does my engine satisfy all my requirements?). It provides a means for simulating requests that the code’s production clients will expect to be satisfied (e.g. drive-train and throttle interfaces). TDD makes those requirements explicit and measurable.

To conclude, TDD is a pull system. When practicing TDD correctly, code is only written when there is a failing test, signifying an explicit need for some work to take place. There should be direct traceability from each line of code to a TDD test, from each TDD test to a user story/MMF/BDD test etc, and so on up the line. The value stream then becomes explicit. Any code which can’t be traced back to a test (requirement) can then be considered waste and should be eliminated. (Obviously there will be some infrastructure code etc).

Some more notes on TDD as a pull system:

- A failing test is usually signified by ‘red’. This red serves as a visual trigger for action: we need to write some code. ‘Red’ is therefore a Kanban.

- The ideas discussed here don’t address the problem of how to arrive at TDD tests. In the car example, the tests are put forth as natural langauge: “Does my car go”?, “Does my engine make at least 100kW?” In reality, it is often difficult to translate user requirements into low-level unit tests required for TDD. Techniques like Doman Driven Design (DDD)’s ubiquitous language and Behaviour-Driven Design (BDD) can help towards this.

If we’re talking about engines, unless we can agree what ‘100kW’ means and how we measure it, we can never be sure that we’re actually satisfying our requirements, and we will fail only when we try put the engine in the car and drive away. At this point, it becomes very costly to try change the engine or the car.

- We are lucky that we can use these self-same tests for automated regression testing.

These are my thoughts on Lean systems from a pull perspective, and how Kanban Boards can be used to facilitate a pull instead of a push system in software development. I don’t go into the pros and cons of pull systems in software development.

Imaging you want to order a  new from Toyota. In a push system, Toyota would try anticipate customer demand, and would produce a certain number of cars per period. These cars would then sit in a lot somewhere until they’re sold. This is wasteful. In the ideal, what should happen is that your order gets passed down the line, through successive levels in the business until the order is fulfilled. It should look something like this: The sales person passes on the order to the manufacturing plant;  the order is directed to the appropriate manufacturing line (car model) etc etc until it gets to the person making the wheels, doors etc for the car (including the suppliers).

This can be illustrated by the following conversations:

Me: “Salesperson, I want a 1.6 liter Corolla!”
Saleperson: “Factory, we need a new Corolla for this customer!”
Factory foreman: “Corolla line, we need a car with these specs for this customer!”
Corolla Line Manager: “Engine supplier, we need a new 1.6 liter engine for this car!”
…
Engine Supplier: “Corolla Line Manager, here’s that engine you asked for!”
Corolla Line Manager: “Factory foreman, here’s that car  you asked for!”
Factory Foreman: “Salesperson, here’s that Corolla you asked for!”
Salesperson: “Customer, here’s your car!”

Each lower level in the process is only asked for something when there is a need. It is obvious that the conversation at a specific level cannot be ‘returned’ until it is satisfied. That is, a car cannot be produced without an engine. Note also the symmetrical nature of this series of  conversations, it starts and ends with the customer.

What does not happen is that there is a pile of engines, gearboxes, doors etc waiting around to be used when an order comes through. (Obviously there may be lead times associated with each part, but this can be handled with Kanban and order points). The process to create each item is triggered or initiated only when there is a firm requirement for that part to be made. Parts are created just-in-time (JIT), only created when they are needed (and delivered to where they are needed).

The same process should be followed in software development. The conversation might be something like this:

Business (our customer): “Deployment team, give me this feature I want!”
Deployment team: “Quality assurance team, give me this feature to deploy!”
QA team: “Development, give me this feature to test!”
Development: “Business analysts, specify this feature for me to develop!”
BAs: “Business, explain this feature to me so I can specify it!”
Business thinks about it then, Business: “BAs, it needs to do this and this and  that!”
BAs specify it then, BAs: “Development, here is your specification to develop off of!”
Development develops the feature then: “QA, here is the feature to test!”
QA test then, QA: “Deployment team, here is the artifact to deploy!”
Deployment deployes then, Deployment: “Business, here is your feature in the live system!”

Each team in the process only does work if there is a request from the downstream team. The downstream team is notified when the work item is ready for their attention. If there is no request from the downstream team, no work happens. If there is a request from a downstream team, and no work needs to be done to fulfil this request, then it is simply moved downstream, and started on its return conversation journey. (If this case seems cryptic, I will explain it more in a later post.)

The term ‘Kanban’ has become invested with the meaning of a ‘visual trigger for action’. A task board becomes a Kanban board only when task cards signify some action, otherwise it serves only the purpose of tracking where in the process a task is. The typical trigger for action is the return path in the conversation above, something like: “QA, here is that feature for you to test!”. This is manifest by a developer moving a task card into the ‘Done’ or ‘Waiting for QA’ column on the task board. This is a visual trigger for someone in the QA team to pull this task into their personal queue. This can further be improved by imposing work-in-progress limits for each resource at each stage in the process.

The following occurred to me while writing this post:

At the moment, I don’t know if the forward conversation should be represented on a Kanban board, and if so, how. Perhaps with a different coloured card. I think it might add value to track this forward conversation, since it could still serve as a trigger for action. As in the case with the car and engine, a QA engineer can test a feature until it has been developed by a developers. Similarly, a developer cannot begin development on a feature until it has been specified by a BA. Perhaps it is necessary to represent this on the Kanban board. I.e. a visual trigger to a BA that he needs to do some work.

This could be achieved by having a ‘reverse’ stream on a Kanban board, representing the forward conversation. Thus, when QA is asked to present a feature to give to the deployment team to deploy, QA should put a card in the ‘waiting for development’ column on the board. This card is then passed upstream in the process until the first stage in the process (business in our case) fulfils it, then starts passing it back downstream. This could be used to discover bottlenecks in the upstream direction. I.e. our developers are sitting idle because the BAs cannot develop specification fast enough.

This can be discovered on a ‘normal’ Kanban board by the ‘to do’ column for development remaining empty for some time. Perhaps then the absence of work items in the ‘to do’ column for any stage indicates a bottleneck in the stage before.

Mes chers compatriotes, bonsoir ! Je reviens d’une éprouvante virée shopping et je peux vous dire que même avec des ballerines aux pieds, je souffre ! Mais ça en valait la peine : j’ai acheté la robe que je porterais pendant les fêtes de fin d’année (déjà ?!) et elle est sublime. H&M, je t’aime ! Je tiens aussi à vous signaler que j’ai trouvé une raison valable (quoique…) qui explique ma folie de jeudi : je suis possédée par les Oumpa Loumpa. C’est même moi qui tenais le rôle de Willy Wonka avec mon sublime blazer en velours violet (que je ne porte pas aussi bien que Johnny…) Soit dit en passant, Johnny si un jour tu passes sur ce blog, sache que je te veux, quitte Vanessa, fais quelque chose enfin ! – Avis aux non-amateurs de Charlie et la Chocolaterie :  ne cherchez même pas à comprendre ! Bon revenons à nos histoires de Oumpa Lompa. Eh bah figurez-vous que ces sacrés petits bonhommes-là voulaient que je rende hommage à Michael (paix à son âme). Chose faite ! Et devinez qui l’a cousu ce magnifique gilet silver ?! MAMIE ! Vous l’aviez tous deviné je suppose ?! Bonne soirée

Veste Vintage – Jean Urban Outfitters – Pull H&M – Gilet de Mamie – Bracelet Camaïeu – Collier fait par moi-même ! – Sac Vintage

En-Mode.Fr Boutique de la mode – Vêtements enfants.
Les dernières collections enfant sont en ligne. Profitez en pour rhabiller votre enfant avec la derniere collection Automne / Hiver.
Toutes les marques chouchoutées par les plus petits sont référencées au meilleur prix.

Pantalon

Tee-Shirt

Pull & Sweat

Chemise

Manteau

Bermuda & Short

Combinaison

Gigoteuse

Maillot de bain

Pyjama et Robe de chambre

Robe & Jupe

Veste & Cardigan

The Life and Death of the Identity

If you have been reading my posts you may have guessed that a major driver for me has been awakening.  I have enthusiastically followed a path that has moved me to ever deepening levels of understanding about the true nature of being, consistently opening up and dropping into places within me that now hold no identity, where the personal is totally unimportant, and the impulse of pure, unrestricted creation is able to shine out.  As I have shed the structures that have held my identity, I have come across some interesting challenges in relating to others and in relating to all those things to which our culture in the West gives value.    

I have been looking at my experiences as my relationship to the ego and identity – prime structures of separation – have changed and how that relates to my movement through life back towards the pulse of Creation….. It starts for us all around the time of birth when we come into form, into Life, and create an I-dentity.

The ego-identity is part of the personality structure that develops throughout life.  As a young child we are loved, nurtured, fed, held….or not.  Out of these experiences we individuate into the people that we bring into our relationships both with ourselves and with others. We individuate from our parents but also from the pure impulse of Life, learning ways that hold us apart from the true nature of our beings as unfettered expressions of all creation. We move from a state of universal union in which the heart freely resonates with everything, without fear, to one that sees itself as a unique thing, separate, special, quantifiable, defended, and we develop a personality with defenses formed by fears related to perceived threats to our survival.  These defenses create protective armoring not only in our musculature – affecting how we hold our bodies – but in how we express our energy through our emotional and mental responses to specific situations. With the fleshing out of our defenses, the ego is fully formed and with it a sense of ‘I’ – the I-dentity is born.  And the bulk of this happens before our 7^th birthdays!! 

None of us, unless Avataric, are spared this process of separation from the Mystery that is the Divine Creator.  As we incarnate numerous veils of separation are created with the strength and resistance of Teflon, yet so thin as to be almost undetectable to microscopic ethereal examination.  They are part of the spiritual skeleton of our beings. The presence of these veils makes any evolutionary move back into the unified field of pure creation impossible.  You cannot awaken with them in place, and your unique life challenges and dramas will continue to repeat themselves for as long as you identify with the places of forgetting that they support.  Unless spiritual evolution is one of your drivers they are unlikely to go, and you are equally unlikely to be interested in what might be the deeper truth behind your identity.  But if it is, and when they do go, the ego can no longer hold onto its position as the leading character in the play that is your life, and so you lose your identity.

The persona that we identify with is reinforced throughout our lives, firstly by our parents who name us and generally instill in us certain values, beliefs, and prejudices that create the foundations of our realities.  Then the reflection of our friends, acquaintances, and life experiences are added to the pot, and all these elements are embraced by our egos.  Our identity, unique and separate, is then constantly reinforced by whoever we come into contact with.  It happens on many levels but the first one is likely to be on meeting someone, when the questions we ask help form an impression of ‘self’ and ‘other’ in our minds. These ‘I am’s….’ that we exchange with each other help us to relate and each question asked builds an instantaneous picture, giving a sense of identity, interests and lifestyle.  For example:

What do you do?                        ‘I am an art consultant/I am an energy therapist’

Where do you come from?         ‘I am English, and I live in New York’

You can change your identity superficially by leaving your job without having the security of another to go to, or selling your home without any plans to find another, as I did. Either will most likely send a tremor of anxiety through your community of family and friends, and you may find that they attempt to lure you back by sending out tendrils of fear unconsciously designed to scare you back into the fold.  You will be breaking the accepted mold, leaving behind the identity that defines you to them, and which they have helped you forge.  You will probably find that you need to make adjustments as you create new relationships that reflect the movements in the axis of your existence. 

Evolutionary levels of transformation and the human response to it, will occur when you move from merely swopping or adding identities to undermining core positions and beliefs, and the supports that hold them in place. When you do this the ego will be seriously threatened and the nature of the ego-identity has to adapt or die.  Surface changes, like the ones mentioned above, can be the forerunners of the seismic movements that are going on in the inner planes of your being as you start dissolving the structures of your existence, and so too your I-dentity.  A signature of significant change is the dropping away of things, habits, and people whose presence in your life no longer resonate with you or serve you.  In relationships, if you can’t bridge the divides that can form as you change – and the onus falls on you to do this – then you will find that gradually your worlds drift apart.

As you embrace a new direction and challenge the nature of reality your extremely resilient ego is dented, but it takes on the changes as if it was going to gain from the direction you are taking.  It embraces this change from an intellectual place and creates a new identity as you embark on your search for the truth.  My ego-identity took on the identity of a spiritual path AND the spiritual seeker alongside the existing identities and the defended personality structures it already ruled.  It was happy!  It was behind this new venture!  Everything was under control, and all was well in its new world.  My interest in returning to Source had become something that my I-dentity , my ego, embraced as being fruitful to its long term wellbeing as an individual, even though it was not.  It didn’t recognize that it had everything to lose – that for it the perception of gain was just another illusion. 

Personally speaking, my journey is not unique.  Like many, I created a fabulous and strong ego that allowed me to successfully navigate the challenges that I met on my life’s path.  The impulse to awaken to the true nature of my being was not apparent to me and it didn’t start to emerge until I was in my 30s and I started to feel some dissatisfaction with what I was creating in my life. Whether we know it consciously or not, there is generally a subliminal pull that leads us, by hook or by crook, forward towards a reunion with Self. Until that point the ego, and its many masks, rules.  In my case it was never asked to step aside and allow what was behind the mask of identity to come through, because there was no awareness that there was anything other to relate with.  My identity until that time, had shifted, morphed, been knocked a little, but remained clear.  Looking back, I can chart how I, as an adult, moved through life and how I got to where I am today.  My true nature remained quietly hidden, waiting until I got fed up with the play that I had created. It has gone something like this:

• I lived a materially successful and socially active life – I conformed with the accepted standards of my peers to a large degree.
• I started to get panic attacks when some of the most painful relational woundings of my childhood began to appear in my adult relationships.  My passion for my work into which I had put 100% of my being was seriously compromised and I turned to the healing arts for help, through therapy and hands-on healing.
• I connected, with the help of my healer, to parts of me that I never realized existed before or had forgotten – I experienced expanded states of being and became fascinated with quantum theories and realities.
• I started to read about, train in, and experience other levels of existence. My awareness and my energetic container expanded enormously.
• I found teachers who reflected to me the true nature of being and encouraged me as I stepped into the stream of the awakening path.  Their awake and aware consciousness helped me to evolve.
• I stopped planning, dropped structure, and went with the flow of Life.   I sold my apartment and put all my belongings with the exception of a suitcase of clothes into storage and I traveled to places around the world that I felt called to visit. 
• I lost my sense of the personal; my sense of being in any way special; my identity with a spiritual or any other path; my templates for existence, and my identity.

It wasn’t until the supports that maintained the drama of my existence began to crumble that the ego’s throttle-hold on my life weakened, and so did my sense of identity.  But it wasn’t until the core veils went that held me in separation from Self, that the nature of my journey shifted.  I had had transcendent experiences, tastes of bliss or emptiness that felt like they must be what enlightenment is all about, but until the structures of separation disappeared, I didn’t recognize that these were little more than expanded states, amazing experiences that have very little to do with true awakening.  My I-dentity remained intact until the intellectual understanding dropped from my head and traveled right through my heart into the core of existence.  Often, for this to happen, you are called to face your greatest fear – the one that holds your deepest life-long wounding – and this is what happened for me too.  Only by surrendering did the structures that I had thought were there to protect me reveal themselves to be keeping me from my heart’s desire for reunion with the Beloved, the Creator of All that Is, and with this awareness they dissolved.  When this happens there is no choice but to wake up from your dream to the reality that there is ‘no one’ there. 

Firstly, and most importantly, you wake up to the knowledge that there is no personal I-dentity with who you were.  When you actively hunt for it in the corridors and rooms of your existence there is no ‘I’.  I was then aware that I am nothing but an expression of the pulse of creation. This knowing was slim at the beginning, but as I started to live life from this place, embodying it as fully as I could, each aspect of identity that had built up over the course of my life started to crumble.  For me it was two years from a point where I recognized that the Identity had gone to a point where I had embodied this awareness to a place of real understanding.  Like me, you may feel echoes of your identity through the conditioned responses that still trigger you – and language demands that you refer to it all the time – but the seeker, the do-er, the sense of personal, they go, along with other aspects of your being.  For me, one amazing part of this was in finding commonality with beautiful or mundane lifeforms around me, and really seeing that with the ‘death’ of my ego-identity I was just another essence expressed in Life, no different from any other, and part of the whole.

This life is a journey, that’s for sure! The death of the identity is not The End.  It is one step deeper into The Mystery!

©2009 Sarah Lidsey

Notre coup de coeur de cet hiver l’addition ” petit pull manche courte + sous pull”. Et comme nous avons la chance d’habiter une région douce, on en profite en portant ce duo toute la saison!!! 

Et pour parfaire notre look, on oublie pas d’apporter une petite touche de violet, couleur phare de l’hiver 2009/2010.

Gilet gris -Esprit – 69,95 € ; Pull col-roulé violet- Esprit – 69,95 €

Pull violet – Esprit – 49,95 € ; Pull gris étoile – Esprit – 59,95 € ; Echarpe grise – Esprit – 29,95 €

Gilet noir – Edc – 69,95 € ; Pull violet – Edc – 29,95 €

Gilet gris – Esprit – 69, 95 € ; Tee-shirt – Esprit – 29,95 € ; Echarpe violette – Esprit – 25,95 €

Gilet gris – Esprit Collection – 69, 95 € ; Pull col-roulé noir -  Esprit – 49 95 € ; Echarpe aubergine – Esprit Collection – 35, 95 € Sac aubergine – Esprit Collection – 59,95 €

  Pour celles qui n’aime pas le violet, tous nos modèles existent en plusieur coloris!!

Hello les gens ! Aujourd’hui, je vous présente mes cuissardes – quoique, ce ne sont pas vraiment des cuissardes puisqu’elles montent jusqu’aux genoux – alors, je rectifie, je vous présente mes genouillardes ! Elles sont enchantées de vous rencontrer (oui, oui, je fais de la télépathie avec les chaussures, c’est très courant chez moi !) Ne vous moquez pas, ce n’est pas souvent que je raconte n’importe quoi ! Bisous les gens

PS : Vous avez remarqué, je ne dis plus “les filles” ?! Abattons la discrimination !

Short H&M – Pull Mim – Veste Camaïeu – “Genouillardes” Distri Center - Collier Camaïeu – Montre Swatch

Universidad Pompeu Fabra. Barcelona, 12 y 13 de noviembre de 2009. Acogida de un prestigioso certamen publicitario para universitarios: el Drac Novell Internacional.

Jueves, 12:50h. Cambio del paradigma: hacia dónde vamos. Conferenciante: Philipp Fürst, Director de Zenith Media en Cataluña. La consecución de notoriedad y persuasión está en revisión. Estamos inmersos en un cambio de paradigma. Se cuestionan las acciones “push”, parece imparable el modelo “pull” y se asoma el modelo participativo. Anunciantes, agencias y profesionales ante un nuevo modelo de comunicación. La situación vista por un planificador de medios.

De entre todos los ejemplos planteados durante el coloquio, me voy a centrar en uno: Coca Cola, Un encuentro sobre la felicidad. Pasados nueve meses, me doy cuenta de que mi interacción fue ínfima, ridícula; me convertí en una mera “espectadora” de lo que ocurría. Quizás con una mentalidad excesivamente above the line, me emocioné de forma aislada, sin involucrarme en la campaña.

Una noticia del diario El Mundo me refresca la memoria. Adaptarse o morir. En un momento de crisis, anunciantes y agencias deben desarrollar su astucia y picardía, su inteligencia y creatividad para motivar a unos consumidores tristes, decepcionados, impotentes, recelosos. Hace falta levantar el ánimo. Publicidad emocional. Y en esto es especialista un refresco que despierta una sonrisa en cualquier rincón del mundo, un refresco para los altos, para los bajos, para los flacos, para los gordos, una marca para todos que ha logrado cultivar alegría, bienestar y positivismo, dando sentido a la La Chispa de la Vida: Coca Cola.

En esta ocasión, el spot reúne a Josep Mascaró, mallorquín de 102 años, y Aitana Martínez, una bebé madrileña recién nacida. Pero también “se sugiere a los consumidores que participen. Ya no son sujetos pasivos, se les invita a ser activos. Interacción”. ¿Cómo? Coca Cola llega a un acuerdo de colaboración con los Hospitales Nisa “para que, bajo el consentimiento de los padres, se pueda poner una webcam con una pantalla en las cunas de los bebés, de tal manera que los internautas en tiempo real, puedan ver a los recién nacidos en sus primeras horas y enviarles un mensaje de optimismo”.

Actualmente, plantearse una campaña que incluya tanto a los medios convencionales como a los no convencionales ya no es una visión interesante, sino necesaria. Porque nos encontramos delante de un consumidor más experto, más informado y mucho más selectivo, exigente. ¿Prensa, radio y televisión? No son suficientes.

Me uno a la iniciativa. Es mejor tarde que nunca. Ahí va mi “multimensaje”:

“Haz realidad lo que más desees, elige con el corazón, lucha por tu bienestar, imagina un mundo mejor, confía en ti mismo, intimida las preocupaciones, saborea las oportunidades, arriésgate… y, sobretodo, vuelve a sonreír” (:

Decidido. También me registro en Happing, la comunidad de todos aquellos que nos atrevemos a ser felices, de todos aquellos que queremos “relajarnos, acomodarnos y disfrutar del buen rollito”. Hoy ya he sonreído, ¿y vosotr@s?

Hey,

Ce site, mon site, est avant tout mon aide mémoire pour garder trace de mes tergiversations cervicales,pour voir ce que cela rend sur une page web et pour le plaisir d’en posséder une, évidemment.

Je vois arrête tout de suite, je ne me prend pas au sérieux, même si mes mots sont snobs et prétentieux. Je m’expliquerai peut-être plus tard là dessus. J’aime écrire c’est tout ce qui compte, qui je suis, on s’en contre-balance.

Bienvenue dans le fond de la piscine.

I flew on a plane a little over a month after September 11.

I’ve ridden several roller coasters boasting themselves to be the tallest/fastest/only in the country/world/general vicinity.

I took a girl that I and many others claimed to be the hottest in the world out to dinner twice.

I’ve been two blocks from Harlem at 1:30 in the morning.

I’ve been to New Jersey.

Despite all of these things, nothing petrified me more than when the oral surgeon who hovered over my mouth for the better part of an hour said “Okay, open up.”

Back in early 2006, a toothache kept me awake all night, despite multiple doses of Tylenol taken by me in a desperate and possibly illegal attempt to remedy the discomfort. The episode prompted me to visit my dentist for the first time in nearly three years. Sure, the part-time jobs that filled my post-collegiate, post-being-kicked-off-my-dad’s-insurance-while-I-was-a-student life and their lack of a dental plan had gotten me used to a DDS-free existence, but my toothache, which is the only ailment that can hurt so much that it actually pisses you off, prompted me to take advantage of my current (full-time) job’s dental coverage and schedule an appointment.

Despite the usual poking and prodding of every sensitive area of my mouth with instruments that shouldn’t even be within a 50 mile radius of your damned HEAD, the appointment went well…until my dentist started dropping terms like “abscess” and “root canal” in regards to MY teeth. He suggested I get three of my four wisdom teeth removed. I later figured out why your four molars are dubbed “wisdom teeth”: it is wise to leave them in, no matter how severely they might decay.

He recommended me to a few oral surgeons in the area to have the procedure done. I’m sure he had the means to do this type of operation in his own office, but my guess is that, were he to do it, he knew that I would never trust him again to place anything in my mouth that wasn’t a steak.

So I ultimately visited one of the three recommended experts; I know now that my decision was the wrong one, for one of the plaques hanging in the waiting room had the typical engraved recognition of the guy’s work…and a fucking GAVEL attached alongside it. Of all the possible objects one thinks of attaching to a plaque that will hang in the waiting area of a DENTAL expert, the LAST thing should be a small HAMMER. It’d be like walking into a proctologist’s office and seeing a bronzed erect dick on the wall.

Anyway, I got X-rayed and was forced to sit in a room alone with the results:

Personally, I thought all of my teeth looked perfectly fine. Sure, I was basing this judgment on whether or not my teeth were all there, but I guess that wasn’t good enough for the dental community.

Soon, the dentist arrived: a tiny, wrinkled elder who might have performed surgery on Moses’ mouth. He looked more like the type of guy you see cruising down the Interstate in the left lane with his blinker on, going a whopping 16 MPH, his entire body frame pressed up against the steering column. And I was supposed to trust this man with sharp objects near my gums?

I had opted for the “local” anesthesia (meaning that I would be awake and Novacaine would be applied to my gums), which, in retrospect, was one of the dumbest decisions I ever made since insisting that we all eat at White Castle. This is not to say that I am an advocate for the “general” anesthesia (where you are put to sleep), either, for what you don’t know about this is the fact that you have to sign a form acknowledging that you understand that such a practice carries with it, among other things, the slight risk of CARDIAC ARREST and DEATH.

DEATH for a TOOTH? I’ll opt for Tom Hanks’ ice skate procedure that he did in “Castaway.”

A few nurses came in, bringing the grand total of people who would be extracting objects that had been in my mouth since infancy to THREE. Fucking THREE. My family’s mechanic can fix an entire damn CAR by HIMSELF. After they—why not?—took my blood pressure, it was time for the Novacaine.

Which was in a syringe.

Which had a needle attached to it.

Which was being poked into three of my GUMS.

I’ve been a fan of the MTV show “Jackass” since it premiered and loved its subsequent movies. One thing I failed to notice about the show until that day was the fact that not a single one of the “Jackass” cast members underwent oral surgery. They would ram shopping carts into each other, attach bottle rockets to their schlongs, shove toy cars up their butts, and intentionally give each other paper cuts…but they apparently (and wisely) drew the line at oral surgery.

“This might hurt a little” the doctor said as he advanced the needle towards my mouth. Several excruciatingly painful moments later, I realized he is also probably the type of person to remark that the Pacific Ocean is “just a little damp.” As we all waited for the drug to numb my face, I decided that coming here in the first place pretty much carried with it Class A Retard Status, so I decided to keep going with the stupidity. Before everyone present could start to small talk with me about sports or some such shit, I informed them all of my then-upcoming trip to Honolulu.

Dropping a bombshell like this in the middle of February in Pennsylvania is guaranteed to make just about anyone jealous. But doing so in an oral surgeon’s office probably intensified the jealousy to the point where they undoubtedly felt that the pain they would soon inflict on me would be well justified. Maybe I hoped that releasing this information would somehow cause them to say, “Oh, well, you don’t need to have these teeth removed, for the air in Hawai’i will automatically cure them.” No such luck, though.

My 3:15 appointment ended a little before 4:00, which might mean it took 45 minutes (possibly less) in actual time, but in Guy-Who’s-Stuck-in-the-Chair-Having-the-Procedure-Done Time, it felt more like several years. Before digging in my mouth for enamel treasure, the doctor put his hand on my shoulder and pressed lightly on it.

“See what I’m doing here? I’m just applying a little pressure. That’s all you’re going to feel: just a little bit of pressure.”

Yeah.

In all honesty, aside from some definite, noticeable “pressure,” the first tooth came out relatively easy. But the SECOND and THIRD teeth, who were now aware of what was going on once their upper left side neighbor was forcibly evicted, decided that there would be no better time to firmly embed themselves in my jaw as hard as they could. In other words, their removal was the largest pain I or anyone else has ever felt. I would have rather had a screwdriver stuck into my eyeball. I would have rather had a piece of the lead from mechanical pencils shoved up my penis hole. I would have rather listened to the collective works of Kenny G and Yanni SIMULTANEOUSLY.

It honestly felt like he was pushing the tooth further BACK in my mouth instead of pulling it out. I have no idea what tools he was using, for I kept my eyes closed the whole time. All I can tell you was that a fucking DRILL was started at one point to aid in the removal. I had my mouth twisted open every possible and impossible way, and the fact that the “spit sucker” had made my mouth drier than the Sahara Desert in June wasn’t exactly helping matters much. Twisting, pulling, pushing, and virtually every other action (except that “slight pressure”) that should never be undertaken in a mouth were performed on me by the three experts, which I swear had multiplied to about 50 by that point. I guarantee that, when you go to Hell, you do not eternally burn in bubbling cauldrons; you get wisdom teeth pulled. When you’re having that done to you, soaking in giant black pots over the hottest flames in creation is a much more pleasant alternative. It was somewhere in this conscious nightmare that I formed the first rational thought of the day: the lone wisdom tooth that remains in my mouth…the one whose removal the doctor said was “optional”…is staying right where it is, along with all of my other teeth. Cavemen never had to have their teeth eventually replaced with “dentures”, and they are still alive today (at least according to certain Geico commercials).

Still not entirely positive that it was still February or even the year 2006, I was eventually free to go. My molars had been officially replaced by a seemingly infinite taste of blood and two pieces of gauze on either side of my mouth. In fact, to rub it in, they gave me ADDITIONAL gauze in case I were to need it:

In fact, this was given to me before the operation commenced, but the ensuing pain caused me to twist and rip the poor innocent package to shreds. The package pictured above, which I have thankfully yet to open, was the second one bestowed upon me.

Now in possession of dry lips with no feeling to them, I also noticed that the gauze and leftover Novacaine had left me sounding like a Special Olympics athlete, which served me right, seeing as how the entire decision to get this done in the first place was retarded.

I also got a prescription for some sort of pain medication:

…which my sister, who works at a doctor’s office, later informed me was exceptionally “weak.” She suggested I take ibuprofen with each dose and, having already achieved my life’s highest stupidity levels that day, decided to listen to her, despite her being the same person who once thought that we wouldn’t be able to start our car because the power went out.

In addition to the $635 bill, I was presented with a list of rules to follow in the days after the surgery. Basically, I was not allowed to eat anything firmer than pudding and that everything that entered my mouth can be no other temperature aside from “lukewarm.” Interestingly, it tells me not to touch the affected areas with my tongue or fingers…but then states to brush my teeth no later than the next day! In other words, my tongue, which really doesn’t have an option to leave my mouth or rub up against its enamel neighbors, is not to even look at either side of my mouth, but a damn toothbrush is more than welcome. Yeah, I’m supposed to insert ANOTHER thin object into my mouth.

The rules also tell me to rinse my mouth out with SALT WATER the next day. Yeah, salt on three separate wounds. That will be fun.

Anyway, I came home, situated my ass in bed, and was generously waited on hand and foot by my family. Many cups of vanilla pudding were ingested, as were numerous pain pills and water.

And why?

Because of these culprits right here. Here are two of the three little bastards that made Presidents’ Day 2006 one of the worst days of my life thus far (the other one came out in “pieces” and thus couldn’t be salvaged):

Acheter Timberland pulls en ligne.

Today Emile worked with me on my arm motion under the water but prior to starting he relooked at my kicking motion. He reminded me to start the kicking motion from my Gluteal muscles and let my ankles relax. I had to keep my  knees straighter as they were flexing too much and kicking up water. The correct kick produced a gentle splash at the end of the feet and the trunk is  stable as the legs start moving from the hips.

The drills in the swim session today focussed on catching the water with my hand and then moving my arm to place the forearm in a vertical position. This automatically rotated my body. Emile then got me to push my hand backwards as I finished the stroke. This generated more forward propulsion in the water and enabled me to use my tricep muscle during the stroke. Emile explained using the tricep muscle created a more efficient stroke as it spread the  load between the Lats and chest muscles. I also had to rotate my body from my trunk which was coordinated with my arm motion.

Today I noticed how much rotation I needed to have in my trunk with each stroke. The position of the hand and how it moved under the water could assist in catching more water or slide through the water. At the moment it feels foreign to me but with more practice I could imagine my speed and efficiency improving. When I was catching the water with my stroke  I noticed how  I was accelerating as I swam.

My swim fitness is a weakness but Emile suggested my stroke was good enough that soon I could increase the lengths I was swimming and that would all change. It was a great swim session today and next week will be my last one until January next year. Lots of practice to do so better get on with it.

Je m’y suis finalement habituée ! Avant, je ne portais JAMAIS de talons, et puis je voyais tellement de filles en porter qu’à force, ma jalousie a pris le dessus. J’ai cédé… Si ELLES y arrivent, pourquoi pas MOI ! J’y suis parvenue, non pas sans mal (surtout après une journée entière perchée sur 7 cm). Alors pour tous ces efforts, les filles, je nous félicite ! CONGRATULATIONS girls !

A savoir : Même avec des talons compensés, on a très très mal aux pieds et aux mollets en fin de journée !

Jean Outfitters Nation – Marinière H&M – Blazer Xanaka – Foulard Monoprix – Chaussures Vintage // Outfitters Nation Jeans – H&M Marinara – Xanaka Blazer – Monoprix Scarf – Vintage Shoes

De pulls

I think this is the thing we all want most, the thing we all seek but somehow never find. I think its because we look for it the wrong things; we find it in being the best at things, or by having more friends, or with pleasure, or with partners, alcohol, drugs, sports, or things. Freedom lies only in the truth that we have been redeemed, that God has decided to pull us from the pit and to breathe life into us instead.

Don’t you understand? He had a choice! The God of the universe looked down at us, in all our brokenness and all our ugliness and deceit and he made a choice to give us another chance, and not only to give us another chance but to pay for the things we’ve done against him. My heart breaks for this message, for the humility it must have taken for him to do such a thing. It is unbelievable. How could he?

Father, we have no words to express. Sometimes we are shocked at who you are, at the things you do for us. We are humbled by your love, by your acceptance, by your grace, and we say thank you from the bottom of our hearts, with all that we can muster. We say yes to you, to your promises. Please keep us unified, Jesus. Please keep us unified. Empower us to be vessels of truth and compassion and teach us how to be free. Teach us how to be you.

Thank you so much for what you did. We can’t wait to know you fully.

Every word we speak, every action we do, every whatever will push people closer to God or pull them away from Him.

As fallen people, that’s a big burden. It honestly freaks me out to realize how many people I’ve probably pushed away from God with my words or actions or lack thereof.  It upsets me knowing that I have pulled people away from where the belong. I have displaced people.

I know I have done those things because I have felt the weight of the words/actions/lack thereof of those around me. And they have only either pushed me towards God or further away from Him. And honestly I feel the pull-away-from-God a lot more than the push-towards-God.

I hate the pulling-away feeling. And that’s what I’m feeling right now. Not because people are necessarily actively pulling me away. But because I’m not being pushed. And without contact, I feel a loss of relationship and a loss of God.

But God did call us to be His hands and feet. God did give us power to dishonor his name. God gave us a freedom and responsibility to Him. And hopefully we seek to honor that in all we do.

But even when we fudge up… God’s plan is still greater. We are inevitably going to pull people away through what we do/say. But God is still God and He can work things out. I know in my own life I have been pulled away. But fighting against that has created my faith and solidified it. Being pulled away from God has made my faith into my own.

And God is a God of forgiveness and redemption. Our pulling sins are washed away by His blood. He compensates for our wrongdoings and misleadings. I find it hard to accept that He compensates for the wrongdoings of others when they hurt us so badly. But He does. He heals us. He heals the people we hurt. And shows us that He is enough.

I think all of this has the potential to be like a ride on the swing. It’s very difficult to push a 5-year-old on a swing beginning with a push. It is so much easier to pull the swing back and let go. The child is going to go a lot higher and a lot faster….with the constant push. But even if someone else comes running up in the opposite direction and pushes the child “backwards” the child is just going to end up going forward faster and higher.

Maybe we’re just on God’s pendulum. And He’s waiting for us to realize that it’s not the high branch in front of us that we’re trying to reach… but it’s the swing set itself, the bar above us holding our swing, the person of God, that is what we need to realize and feel comforted by.

–as long as we don’t get pushed off of the swing–

I feel like if I run towards God I’ll push people and things out-of-the-way. God should be my first priority. But how do I still love others? How do i not push them out-of-the-way when they are in need? I’m not sure. But God knows.

It’s hard to know anything about this. But it’s easy to feel far away from God. Abandoned by God. Abandoned by others.

I dunno. God is so much bigger than we are.

Others have failed and will fail us. We’ve failed God. But God is eternal. God is true. God doesn’t fail. Us or anyone else.

He is bigger than our failures and our deepest pain. And He knows us inside-out and still loves us?? utter ridiculous-ness!

We push and pull and trip and fall. But God is good and He is a constant in our equation.

In all things, God works for the good of those who love Him. I want him to work for my good. But I also want him to work for the people who have been pushed away from Him and have not yet come to love Him.

unfortunately pro at pulling people away,

coop