The Undomestic Goddess

From the Author of "The confessions of a shopaholic" comes another funny and nice story...  

        Samantha Sweeting is whip-smart lawyer at London's most prestigious law firm called Carter Spink She works all day and all night. She doesn't want to waste every minute of the day because every minutes of her time is worth money and she's so determined to become a partner in the firm. Although Samantha earns 500 pounds per hour, she has no social life to speak of, is stressed out beyond belief, and her high-powered mother and brother can't even make the time to join her for her latest birthday celebration. All of this seems worth it, though, when she finds out that she has achieved her biggest goal-she has become a partner at Carter Spink.Unfortunately, the joy is a short-lived. Samantha finds some papers on her desk that she apparently forgot to file-and that little mistake loses the firm 50 million pounds. Unable to face her mistake, she rushes out of the office and gets on a train. When she gets of the train, she has a bad headache and approaches a big, beautiful house to ask for directions and water. The lady of the house mistakes her for an applicant for position of housekeeper, gives her a tour of the house, and describing her duties. Wanting only a place to crash for the night and to get her head in order, Samantha unwittingly takes the job. When she finds out that she no longer has a career at Carter Spink, she decides to stick it out at the big house for a while-but there's a problem, she doesn't know how to laundry, cook and clean. Fortunately, the muscular, hot gardener, Nathaniel, falls in love with her and invite her to his house, where his mother teaches her all she needs to know about cooking, cleaning and ironing. Samantha soon enjoys her country life and her romance with Nathaniel. She discovers that the slow life suit her just fine. However, she can't escape her past and in fact uncovers the fact that she didn't make a mistake but was in fact framed. She surfs the internet and finds out that the senior partner framed her for his own benefits. When she finally finds someone to listen, and the media figures it out, she is touted as "the best legal brain in country". But, she wants just to escape back to being the housekeeper, the simple life and her new love with Nathaniel.
//http://www.shvoong.com/books/novel-novella/1810091-undomestic-goddess/


Click here to get a free e-book of The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella.

LESSONS I LEARNED FROM STEVE JOBS COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS

"If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right."

           Among the points delivered by Steve Jobs on his commencement address, this quote hammered into my mind. It reminds me of the fragility of life, that it has an end. And when that ends comes, nothing in this world , not even all its combined wealth and riches, not even all of man’s wisdom and knowledge can stop it—and most of all no single person knows exactly when it comes. In that I realized that I really need to make most of my time. I believe that every day, life gives me a lot of opportunities, unfortunately, sometimes I’m too blind to see them, and if a see them, I think of better to come. This maybe the reason why I keep on doing the same thing all over again, and keep on waiting to amazing things that in a snap would change my life.
It’s no surprise that again after reading his speech as a commencement address for the graduates of Stanford University way back year 2005, I’ll be able to learn something great from him once more. Since I got a little bit of knowledge on his life, his sacrifices, hardships and success, I started to become one of his huge fans. Although I’m not an Apple user (which I hope I am), his every word greatly cause an impact to my life today.
What are those things I learned from his speech? Here, I have the list:

• About connecting the dots


“You have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.”


           I believe that as we make out decisions everyday we’re actually creating dots. Those dots maybe created out of our spite, or for a purpose, will somehow make good connections. This thing I learned from Steve…we have to trust in every decision we make that they will work out alright. You know, one of the difficult things that I’m going through oftentimes is actually making my own decisions, and most of all trusting in them. Whenever I decide, of course, I feel that I’m in charge of my decisions, and my life…I feel afraid to know that if it won’t turn well, I can’t find someone or something to blame on but myself. Thank for this lesson, this reminds me to have conviction on everything I do and posses. Just like what he did, at the very young age, he decided to drop out on the University his in, and stated to find what he really interest him. That time, he didn’t know where he was heading and had no idea of the consequences that might happen. Though it was pretty scary, he just trusted on his guts and believed that it would turn alright. That’s why he considered it as one of the best decisions he ever made.
Like Steve, maybe, I can’t see for now how the dots made are connected to my future, but soon I know I will be able to see the connections between them. As the saying goes” Everything happens for a reason.”

“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.”

• Find what you love. Don’t settle.

“And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle.”

     The statement above motivates me to keep finding what I truly love. Honestly, until now I haven’t found yet the thing I wanna do unto the rest of my life. Even entering in college doesn’t provide me assurance of my future nor to figure out what I truly love although it helped me find it.
What I hate about myself is the fact that what I want varies on the things that happened to me. For example, of I see a person happily sewing; I then want to be like him. That’s why it is difficult for me to figure out what or who I want to become. But I do believe that somehow, soon, I’ll be able to find what I love to do. “Keep looking. Don’t settle. You’ll know when you find it.” These are what I hold. If only I am as fortunate as Steve who discovered his interest at the very young age, I won’t make confusions to myself.

• Don’t be afraid to start over

“I had been rejected, but I was still in love.”

      What I like about Steve is his determination and passion to continue on moving. Even though a lot of prying eyes had been looking at him all the time, they did not become a hindrance for him to stop doing what he loves. Like what he advices, "Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice."
As we all know, at 30 he was being fired from the company he helped to start. He was devastated from that happening, but he slowly realized that his passion actually fueled him to start over.
He never got afraid to establish himself for a second time. And guess what, he considered the event to be the best thing that could ever happen in his life. “I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.”

• Have courage to follow your heart and intuition
 

     Being courageous is one of the things a man must possess in order to surpass all the challenges that life might offer. I believe that courage does not come from the strength but from the heart-- the root of all. Following your courageous heart, you will meet today’s challenges from a place that is real and authentic. This is the foundation for real personal accomplishment and professional success. This makes Steve Jobs one of the greatest entrepreneurs of the history.  
Without the courage to follow your heart’s desire and your intuition is same as living without a dream. It is all useless to discover what you love if at the very first place you can’t actually fight for it, right?

• Stay Hungry and foolish

“Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.”

 


        These are the last words delivered by Steve Jobs as he ended his speech. All he want to mean on these four worded statement was that we should never stop discovering, creating, and innovating whatever difficulties we can encounter in every second of out borrowed life. Like what he said, we need to make most of our time. Our life is just limited…and making the most of it, by doing what we love, can make though not contentment, but satisfaction. 

(All quotations came from Steve Jobs)

Company Logos and their Meanings

Ever wondered what company logos mean and whats the significance behind them? Wonder no more!

  How many of you have noticed a hidden symbol in the Federal Express logo. Yeah, About the 'arrow' that you can see between the E and the x in this logo. The arrow was introduced to underscore speed and precision, which are part of the positioning of the company.

 You might think the arrow does nothing here. But it says that amazon.com has everything from a to z and it also represents the smile brought to the customer's face. Wow, that is quite deep.

 The SUN Microsystems logo is a wonderful example of symmetry and order. It was a brilliant observation that the letters u and n while arranged adjacent to each other look a lot like the letter S in a perpendicular direction. Spectacular.




..ahh.. now i know.. =)
//for more...http://funzu.com/index.php/crazy-pics/company-logos-and-their-meanings-04012010.html

unusual and unbelievable images

Here is a list of some images that you may find unusual and unbelievable at first sight but they will sure appear to be legitimate after looking at them two or maybe three times.

http://www.speedywap.com/20772/rare-pictures-of-unusual-and-unbelievable-events/

Unbelievable Picture

Check out this photo and read the caption under the first one before going to the bottom one.

Look at the picture above and you can see where this guy broke through the guardrail, right side where the people are standing on the road (pointing). The pick-up was traveling from right to left when it crashed through the guardrail. It flipped end-over-end, across the culvert outlet, and landed right side up on the left side of the culvert, facing the opposite direction from which he was traveling.

Now look at the 2nd picture below...

If this guy didn't believe in God before, do you suppose he believes now ?

//http://funlok.com/index.php/just-like-that/unbelievable-picture.html

10 Biggest Misconceptions We Learn in School

1) Einstein got bad grades in school.
Generations of children have been heartened by the thought that this Nobel Prize winner did badly at school, but they’re sadly mistaken. In fact, he did very well at school, especially in science and maths (unsurprisingly).


2) Mice like cheese
Mice enjoy food rich in sugar as well as peanut butter and breakfast cereals. So a Snickers bar would go down much better than a lump of cheddar.

3) Napoleon was short.
He was actually around 5ft 7, completely average for the 18th/19th century.

4) Thomas Edison invented the light bulb.
Edison invented a lot of things – in fact he’s one of the most famous inventors of all time – but the light bulb wasn’t one of them. What he did was develop a light bulb at the same time as the British man, Joseph Swan, who came up with it originally.

5) Lemmings throw themselves over cliffs to commit suicide
The poor old things are sometimes so desperate for food that they do, according to the BBC «jump over high ground into water», but they aren’t committing group suicide.

6) Water flushes differently in different hemispheres
No it doesn’t. Sorry!

7) Humans evolved from apes
Darwin didn’t actually say this, but he’s been misreported ever since. What he did say was that we, and apes, and chimpanzees for that matter, had a common ancestor, once, a long, long time ago.

Vikings had horns/helmets with horns.
Vikings may have been buried with their helmets and with drinking horns. When they were dug up by the Victorians, they assumed that the helmets had horns.

9) Columbus believed the earth was flat
He may not have known how big the world was, but he wasn’t worrying about falling off the edge of it.

10) Different parts of the tongue detect different tastes
You do have different taste buds on your tongue and some are more sensitive than others. But they aren’t divided into perfect, easy-to-teach sections.


//http://smilepanic.com/10-biggest-misconceptions-we-learn-in-school

The Dumbest Inventions of the Twentieth Century

           The twentieth century was the century of inventions, and if we looked at the time line of historic developments and inventions, we’ll notice that our civilization achieved greater growth during that period in the field of science, technology, medicine, infrastructure, etc then in the whole course of human history. Technology, science, and inventions have progressed at an accelerated rate during the hundred years of the 20th century, more so than any other century.

We began the 20th century with the infancy of airplanes, automobiles, and radio, when those inventions dazzled us with their novelty and wonder. The expansion was from all points of the compass and besides all those great inventions some good, some bad that all had great impact on the whole human race, there were also a few not so successful ones.

Here is the list of the top ten dumbest and most useless inventions in the twentieth century. Have you ever thought about little umbrella over your cigarette that will make it easier to smoke in the rain? Or, what do you say about motorized surfboard? You name it, they’ve made it! I’m not all that surprised with the ideas, but I’m really surprised anyone actually built those crazy inventions.

We’ll start with baby cage, built in 1937 and distributed in London. This “adorable” and not at all Nazi-like cage was suspended over the windows over a busy street so the baby could enjoy the fresh air.

Since we’re already talking about babies, let’s mention another useless invention for babies. It is the beating breasts from 1963 invented by Japanese. Basically it is a pair of artificial breasts with a built-in heartbeats and it was supposed to help and putting babies to sleep.

This great invention, named Birdman Suit from 1955 is the work of Leo Valentin a true twentieth century double to antique Icarus and Daedalus. And just like his mythological friends, the inventor of this strange suit that was built to help us fly died when his invention failed him after jumping out of an airplane.

In 1966, someone came up with an idea that human race desperately needs an External Turkey Roaster. I wonder how come this one didn’t sustain? Maybe because of its bulkiness.

After a good meal, you might wanna relax a little bit and maybe loose some of the extra calories that you’ve gained after eating that delicious turkey, and that is when the Finnish Portable Sauna will shine with its full glow. This creative idea came to a realization in 1962 and for some peculiar reason it is exactly the same year when the production of this portable sauna was stopped. Strange isn’t it?
 

 

 

And if you prefer more open air activities, and especially water sports, but you don’t like getting dirty and sweaty the Motorized Surfboard is the thing for you! The surfing is really great sport and it is so exciting, but you need to be fit and extremely physically prompt to enjoy it, but this astonishing invention has a motor in it and that way you don’t need to do anything. You just stand on the board and enjoy the ride! And is you can see on the photo below, you can even wear your finest suit and heat.

The year of 1954 brought to the reality an invention that probably every smoker thought about while smoking outside in the rain – A Rainy Day Cigarette Holder! Just look at that elegant little umbrella over this man’s smoke. How could possibly resist it? I think the problem was that James Bond didn’t wanted to promote this invention and it failed only due to the lack of good advertisement!

This one is for the ladies. Just think how many times you’ve had your makeup and hair perfectly done and then decided to take a quick shower only to realize that that way you’ll completely ruin your makeup and headdress? With Shower Hood from 1970 you wouldn’t have to deal with this problem, because your head would remain perfectly dry and your hair and makeup safe.

The Venetian Blind Sunglasses from 1966 are both stylish and useful. I don’t know why this one didn’t sustain. Maybe it was simply too ahead of its time, but there is hope that these days someone like Lady Gaga will bring back this long and unjustly forsaken invention.

And at the end we have one of the most useful inventions ever! It is the yodel meter! Just think about it. Is there a person on earth that doesn’t want to measure someones pitch while yodeling? This invention is an absolute must-have at anytime. And the best thing about it is the fact that it is small enough to fit any purse and you can take it with you wherever you want – to a camping trip in mountains for example and then there exercise your yodeling. Just be careful not to start an avalanche wile doing so.

Written by: Sanela Todjeras
Source: Life Magazine

//http://artsyspot.com/the-dumbest-inventions/

Crazy and Funny Sports Photos Taken at The Right Moment 31 Crazy and Funny Sports Photos Taken at The Right Moment

Sport is not only good for your health but can also improve your sense of humor as it provides lots of material for fun blog like this one! I understand that a bit unfair to laugh at athletes while they are doing their job – after all we all look stupid sometimes! I bet you can’t resist laughing at these funny and crazy sports images taken at the right moment. I have to admit these are quite addictive.

//http://www.chilloutpoint.com/misc/31-crazy-and-funny-sports-photos-taken-at-the-right-moment.html

Most Creative Buildings of the World. Part 2

16. The Hole House, Texas, USA

17. Ryugyong Hotel, Pyongyang, North Korea

18. Container City, London, UK

19. Erwin Wurm: House Attack, Viena, Austria

20. Solar Furnace, Odeillo, France

21. Nakagin Capsule Tower, Tokyo, Japan

22. Beijing National Stadium, Beijing, China

23. CCTV Tower – China Central Television Headquarters, Beijing, China

24. Ripley’s Building, Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada

25. Ripley’s Believe It or Not!, Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada

26. Fuji television building, Tokyo, Japan

27. The Puerta de Europa towers, Madrid, Spain

28. Gas Natural headquarters, Barcelona, Spain

29. Wonderworks, Pigeon Forge, TN, USA

30. Habitat 67, Montreal, Canada

31. Manchester Civil Justice Centre, Manchester, UK

32. Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles, California, USA

33. Edificio Mirador, Madrid, Spain


//http://smilepanic.com/most-creative-buildings-of-the-world.-part-2#more-4760