[//edwin||reyes\\]

Don Imus over shadowed the events of last week… In Westchester County gangs were banging it out on the streets of Yonkers. Members of these gangs marched down the street to pay a visit to a 12 yo… they were going to beat the girl up… that is un-heard of. Another woman talked about how her kids couldn’t walk down the street because they weren’t in a gang. They had to take a taxi to get to the corner in order to take the school bus… that is gangster.

All these stories were covered by News 12 Westchester yesterday morning during a news conference covering Suburban Street Gangs… amongst them… the Latin Kings… the claimed to be a non profit organization or something like that… not to mention church goers, mentors, and hard workers. Si ta bien… yo te lo creo. News 12 has video of the conference…

That is the question my Dear Watson.

I’m just about ready to go on a strike. No Lounges, Clubs, or parties for the rest of the year. Mejor me voy a poner a viajar… Washington DC, Miami, Los Angles, Chicago, Boston and New Orleans for the States… Italy, China, Spain, and Brazil for over seas… yep… that sounds about right…

So I was talking to this gorgeous young lady last night… 5′4, light brown eyes, straight black hair, light skinned, no more then 120lbs… she says, “You probrably thought I was a depressed girl when you saw me…” I said, “No, as a matter of fact, I thought you were happy and full of joy…” Our conversation didn’t last more then 5 minutes before the young lady started to cry about her ex. Then she mentioned she had a 4 year old boy… My thoughts…

Let me get out of here…

But I stayed and talked to her for a bit… She was with her twin sister and a friend… Next thing you know her sister is crying… lol… jesu’santisimo… why did this have to happen to me… A poquito rato estoy hablando con la hermana, y viene el amigo me me empuja… para que fue eso… he was dragged out by the neck. My point…

I should’ve gotten the hell out of there earlier…

I love the way USA Today glorified the President of BMW on an article about the “Waiter Rule”

Whoever came up with the waiter observation “is bang spot on,” says BMW North America President Tom Purves, a native of Scotland, a citizen of the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, who lives in New York City with his Norwegian wife, Hilde, and works for a German company. That makes him qualified to speak on different cultures, and he says the waiter theory is true everywhere
-CEOs say how you treat a waiter can predict a lot about your charecter

Apparently the rule is also part of Swansons Unwritten Rules.

1: Learn to say, “I don’t know.” If used when appropriate, it will be used often.
2: It is easier to get into something than to get out of it.
3: If you are not criticized, you may not be doing much
4: Look for what is missing. Many know how to improve what’s there; few can see what isn’t there.
5: Presentation rule: When something appears on a slide presentation, assume the world knows about it and deal with it accordingly.
6. Work for a boss to whom you can tell it like it is. Remember, you can’t pick your family, but you can pick your boss.
7: Constantly review developments to make sure that the actual benefits are what they were supposed to be. Avoid Newton’s Law.
8: However menial and trivial your early assignments may appear, give them your best effort.
9: Persistence or tenacity is the disposition to persevere in spite of difficulties, discouragement or indifference. Don’t be known as a good starter but a poor finisher!
10: In doing your project, don’t wait for others; go after them and make sure it gets done.
11: Confirm the instructions you give others, and their commitments, in writing. Don’t assume it will get done.
12: Don’t be timid: Speak up, express yourself and promote your ideas.
13: Practice shows that those who speak the most knowingly and confidently often end up with the assignment to get the job done.
14: Strive for brevity and clarity in oral and written reports.
15: Be extremely careful in the accuracy of your statements.
16: Don’t overlook the fact that you are working for a boss. Keep him or her informed. Whatever the boss wants, within the bounds of integrity, takes top priority.
17: Promises, schedules and estimates are important instruments in a well-run business. You must make promises — don’t lean on the often-used phrase: “I can’t estimate it because it depends on many uncertain factors.”
18: Never direct a complaint to the top; a serious offense is to “cc” a person’s boss on a copy of a complaint before the person has a chance to respond to the complaint.
19: When interacting with people outside the company, remember that you are always representing the company. Be especially careful of your commitments.
20: Cultivate the habit of boiling matters down to the simplest terms: the proverbial “elevator speech” is the best way.
21: Don’t get excited in engineering emergencies: Keep your feet on the ground.
22: Cultivate the habit of making quick, clean-cut decisions.
23: When making decisions, the “pros” are much easier to deal with than the “cons.” Your boss wants to see both.
24: Don’t ever lose your sense of humor.
25: Have fun at what you do. It will be reflected in you work. No one likes a grump except another grump!
26: Treat the name of your company as if it were your own.
27: Beg for the bad news.
28: You remember 1/3 of what you read, 1/2 of what people tell you, but 100% of what you feel.
29: You can’t polish a sneaker.
30: When facing issues or problems that are becoming drawn-out, “short them to the ground.”
31: When faced with decisions, try to look at them as if you were one level up in the organization. Your perspective will change quickly.
32: A person who is nice to you but rude to the waiter, or to others, is not a nice person.
33: Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, an amateur built an ark that survived a flood while a large group of professionals built the Titanic!

Postscript: The qualities of leadership boil down to confidence, dedication, integrity and love.

Bueno… nice set of rules when applied to your work habbits. I can’t complain about my working habbits… but maybe my co-workers can… hehe…

Just like the movie Crash, this interesting show which relates to the daunting task of finding two strangers in NYC reminds me of how much life is a game… It’s called Game Theory…

It [game theory] is the science of strategy. It’s recognizing that the success of what you do depends on what other people do…

It all depends on you thinking about what that other person is thinking… To me it seems extremely time consuming but the truth of the matter is that if you don’t think about it or if you don’t have an open relationship with your other significant, you are forced to play a game even if you don’t want to. It’s all a mind game no matter what you say or do… the minute you meet someone your playing the game. The minute you plan an event, or simply consider doing something with someone else… your a player.

John Nash, the mathematician featured in the movie “A Beautiful Mind,” won the Nobel Prize for his work in game theory, proving there’s a way for everyone in a group to be happy with the outcome.

So… there’s a theoretical explanation for what I’ve been thinking about. Life is a game… I simply need to balance both sides of the equation in order to be happy on the inside, although on the outside I appear to be happy already… A little bit of physics, calculus, mind games and reality go a long way… aunque uno no lo crea…

While re-designing my website I took the time to read and search for music that I liked from the Dominican Republic. Asking for kareoke music from the era of Trujillo on Remolacha.net serveral Remolacheros came through with some music files. I was awed by the selection, the sound, and the number of songs that people sent. In particular Francisco Gonzalez and Victor Ramirez. The music is priceless… It repressents an era of an infamous leader that ruled with an iron fist. To me it represents much more then that… It’s music. I’m not into the politics of the music. It’s just music. Musicians that lived the times and hardships of this dictator and still managed to be heard.

Rafaelito Martinez, one of the few singers from that era that is still alive and well, sang with the musical group Los Hermanos Perez. Now at the age of 80 he keeps his voice tuned in and states that he has never used drugs, he has never had any drinking problems and does not smoke as frequently. His son José Martinez recently contacted me and will be forwarding tons of his wonderful music.

Once in power, Trujillo continued to clothe himself in the merengue, promoting it as a national (read political) symbol. Top merengue bands were renamed after him, propaganda songs were written and performed, and his brother Petán was allowed to run a major radio station that broadcast live merengue music. La Voz Dominicana as it was called, played a great role in consolidating national acceptance of merengue cibaeño. Petán’s penchant for live music meant that merengue bands seldom recorded, and even then only with his permission. Starved of recording opportunities and dissatisfied with the level of state control, many artists left for Puerto Rico and New York, spreading the merengue and beginning the Dominican diaspora.

Even the upper classes were not immune because they were compelled to play merengue cibaeño at all formal social occasions. Perhaps President Trujillo delighted in this: he was an avid merengue dancer although he was not originally of the Cibao region, and his early attempts to fraternise with the elite while he was of junior rank had been spurned.

Rafael Trujillo kept his grip on power for more than thirty years through his absolute control of the military, and by maintaining popular approval of rural Dominicans through the use of merengue. It did not prevent him from being assassinated as he made his way to his estate in 1961 [read the complete article]

In the words of President FDR,
“Not everything is made for profit…”

Watching Warm Springs on HBO was enlightening to say the least. The film is not only inspirational for paraplegics but people from all walks of life. It is truly a real life story of a man that brought real life issues to the face of American people. At the age 39, Franklin D. Roosevelt was stricken with infantile paralysis. Even with this un-imaginable occurence in his life, President FDR was the only President to be elected four times into office and the Man responsible for passing the social security tax…

President Roosevelt, named by Time Magazine “the foremost statesman and political leader” of the 20th Century. He founded the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation in 1927 long before he was known as the American President that we know today.

“And America succeeded absolutely. And with FDR’s death on the eve of total victory in the “Good War” in 1945, people no longer cared how the war had begun. Yet, our politics were poisoned by Roosevelt’s mendacity, as it would be by Truman’s undeclared war in Korea (“a police action”) and by Vietnam, when senators learned they had been deceived in the Tonkin Gulf incident. ”

Article from Patric J. Buchanan

Hoy vengo con mis manos llenas de sinceridad
Llena de verdades
Porque el hombre cuando es noble se arrepiente
Te quiero con las fuerzas que no tengo
Y por nada de este mundo yo te pierdo
Pero no voy a dejar todo por nada
El amor sincero
Por el pasajero
El amor que vale
Por el de la calle
Por andar de locos
Yo casi te pierdo
Pero me arrepiento
Voy a conquistarte

Por eso traigo Cuatro rosas en mis manos
Una por cada tristeza que te he causado
Perdona por ocultarte cosas que eran importantes
Perdona yo no quería entender que no podía olvidarte
Perdona haberte pedido que nos diéramos un tiempo
Perdona mi locura mas grande solo a ti te quiero

Solo a ti, solo a ti
Te verán de la mano de este hombre enamorado
Solo a ti, solo a ti
Quiero serte fiel hasta con el pensamiento
Solo a ti, solo a ti
Te debo el olvido de mi triste pasado
Solo a ti, solo a ti
Quiero llevarte a la iglesia y jurarte amor eterno
Solo a ti mi amor

Hoy siento que contigo soy nueva criatura
Soy un hombre nuevo
Vengo a saberlo cuando casi me olvidabas
Me arrepiento con las fuerzas que no tengo
Y por nada de este mundo yo te pierdo
Pero no voy a dejar todo por nada
El amor sincero
Por el pasajero
El amor que vale
Por el de la calle
Por andar de locos
Yo casi te pierdo
Pero me arrepiento
Voy a conquistarte

Por eso traigo Cuatro rosas en mis manos
Una por cada tristeza que te he causado
Perdona por ocultarte cosas que eran importantes
Perdona yo no quería entender que no puedo olvidarte
Perdona haberte pedido que nos diéramos un tiempo
Perdona mi locura mas grande solo a ti te quiero

Solo a ti, solo a ti
Te verán de la mano de este hombre enamorado
Solo a ti, solo a ti
Quiero serte fiel hasta con el pensamiento
Solo a ti, solo a ti
Te debo el olvido de mi triste pasado
Solo a ti, solo a ti
Quiero llevarte a la iglesia y jurarte amor eterno
Solo a ti mi amor

Canta: Jorge Caledon
via: El Vallenato.com

El Diablo! A man dies from sitting in front of his computer and starving to death… I am fortunate enough to say that I don’t follow any “Proffesional Forums” and if I did, that would be the end of the this “Hobby” for me… After all, I’m not getting paid to post!

A WEST NYACK, N.Y. MAN was found dead at his computer apparently the victim of trying to keep up with too many professional forums. Childress H. Wanamaker, 54, an account executive at a New York-based new media company, died of starvation according to the West Nyack coroner’s office. Wanamaker’s emaciated body was found by Loraine, his wife of 26 years, who told MediaPost she had been bringing her husband meals on plastic trays for weeks, but that he never took the time to eat them.

“He was glued to his computer 24/7,” she said tearfully. “He was so afraid he was going to miss an opportunity to contribute a comment or start a discussion, that he just stopped eating.” She added that Wanamaker’s last words were “OK Picard, stick that in your pipe and smoke it…”

Computer forensic specialists from SUNY at Cortland discovered that Wanamaker was subscribed to 48 different forums and networking communities including one apparently having to do with the elderly called “oldtimers” and another apparently limited to just 100 people. They also found that he posted a comment into one forum or another on an average of two per minute every hour of the day for the past seven weeks.

“He felt under terrible pressure to be part of the online community,” said his son, Lucian, who says he tried several times to get his father’s attention and lure him away from the computer. “The only time he even looked up was when I told him I had seen Dane Madsen trying to steal his car out of the driveway.”

continue reading the article

The Minuteman Project is a grassroots effort to bring Americans to the defense of their homeland, similar to the way the original Minutemen from Massachusetts (and other U. S. colonies) did in the late 1700s. Like them, we want to bring to this effort only what few personal possessions we can carry…plus our heart, mind and spirit.

This call for volunteers is not a call to arms, but a call to voices seeking a peaceful and respectable resolve to the chaotic neglect by members of our local, state and federal governments charged with applying U.S. immigration law.

It is a call to peacefully assemble at the Arizona-Mexico border to bring national awareness to the decades-long careless disregard of effective U.S. immigration law enforcement. It is a reminder to Americans that our nation was founded as a nation governed by the “rule of law”, not by the whims of mobs of ILLEGAL aliens who endlessly stream across U.S. borders.

Accordingly, the men and women volunteering for this mission are those who are willing to sacrifice their time, and the comforts of a cozy home, to muster for something much more important than acquiring more “toys” to play with while their nation is devoured and plundered by the menace of tens of millions of invading illegal aliens.

Future generations will inherit a tangle of rancorous, unassimilated, squabbling cultures with no common bond to hold them together, and a certain guarantee of the death of this nation as a harmonious “melting pot.”

Visit The Minute Man Project Website.

Although the borders are patrolled by the US, there is an increasing amount of illegal aliens crossing out border. Members of a Central America-based gang by the name of MS-13 were sent to Arizona to target Minuteman Project volunteers. Supportors of this defiance comes from ACLU lawyers that want to protect the rights of these foreign criminals that commit outrageaous crimes that could have been prevented. However these illegals are never checked for such backgrounds… “James Gilchrist, a Vietnam veteran who helped organize the vigil to protest the federal government’s failure to control illegal immigration, said he has been told that California and Texas leaders of Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, have issued orders to teach “a lesson” to the Minuteman volunteers.”

Yet another dilema with these illegal aliens is minimum wage. For obvious reasons they are the cheapest laborers. Someone else said it best although not in the same context… I’m not much of an analyst and becuase of that, what happens along the border stays along the border… I live in New Jersey not in East LA… As much as I feel for the rising number of victims related to the rising number of illegal aliens, for me, it’s just the same as if it were happening in Europe or in Africa. It’s none of my concern at this particular moment and I honestly have other things to worry about other then the Border along New Mexico, Arizona, Texas & California… I guess thats why this is such a great country… You can ignore a problem becuase you have other people that are willing to step up to the plate and represent the same values that you believe in. I don’t know… I just thought I’d write down my two cents here…

When Amy Fisher finished writing her memoir about shooting her lover’s wife, she told her agent not to send the manuscript to New York publishers. Instead, Fisher, who made headlines in 1992 as the 17-year-old ”Long Island Lolita,” turned to iUniverse in Lincoln, Neb. The company charges authors several hundred dollars to convert a manuscript into a book and make it available for sale online.

Fisher’s ”If I Knew Then,” which came out in September, is probably the first sure-fire success to start out under the imprint of a so-called self-publishing company. (Other self-published books, notably ”The Celestine Prophecy” and ”The Christmas Box,” became best sellers, but their success was a surprise to the publishing industry.)

Self-publishing companies like iUniverse have been growing rapidly in recent years, displacing old-style vanity presses and competing with the number of titles produced by traditional houses. AuthorHouse in Bloomington, Ind., which leads the pack with more than 23,000 titles, sold approximately one million volumes between 1997, when it started business, and 2002; in 2003 alone, it sold another million volumes, mostly through online retailers, according to the company. Amazon would have some catching up to do to get to those levels; on the other hand, since it has nearly 47 million customer accounts, the potential growth for its print-on-demand business is obviously enormous.

The difference between traditional vanity presses and modern print-on-demand publishing is essentially technology. Instead of expensive offset printing, which mainstream publishers use, print-on-demand relies on a glorified digital printer. The top three self-publishers — AuthorHouse, iUniverse and Xlibris, based in Philadelphia — all use the technology, and introduced a total of 11,906 new titles last year, according to R. R. Bowker’s Books in Print database. By contrast, one of the few remaining old-style vanity presses, the 56-year-old Vantage Press in New York, produces between 300 and 600 titles a year.

Meanwhile, for as little as $459, iUniverse will turn a manuscript into a paperback with a custom cover design, provide an International Standard Book Number — publishing’s equivalent of an ID number to place the book in a central bibliographic database — and make it available at Amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com and other online retailers. (Vantage charges anywhere from $8,000 to $50,000 for a limited quantity of copies, some owned by the author and the rest warehoused by Vantage.) [NY Times]

How much rent do you pay in NYC?

Salary: $30-40K
Rent: $750-$1000
First Floor Studio in Harlem: $400
First Floor Studio in Bedford Park, Bronx: $400
Fifth Floor 1 BR APT in the East Village: $750
Second Floor 1 BR APT in Inwood: $950

Salary: $50-$60K
Rent: $1,250-$1,500
First Floor 1 BR APT in Park Slope, Brooklyn: $1,325
Third Floor Studio in the Upper West Side: $1,495
Fourth Floor 2 Room Studio in Alphabet City: $1,300

Salary: $70-$80K
Rent:$1750-$2,000
Fifth Floor 1 BR APT in the Upper East Side: $1,995
11th Floor 1BR APT in Brooklyn Hieghts: $1,900
Fourth Floor 2 BR APT in Washington Heights: $1,750

Salary: $90-$100K
Rent:$2250-$2,500
(I don’t know about you but, I’m getting jealous right about now)
Third Floor 1 BR APT in Soho: $2,200
Fourth Floor 1 BR APT in the West Village: $2,400

Salary: $100-$120K
Rent:$2500-$3,000
Third Floor Loft in Williamsburg, Brooklyn: $2,800
Sixth Floor 1 BR in the East Village: $2,650
Tenth Floor 1 BR w/Balcony in Battery Park City: $2,725