Matthew’s Blog

I know I am going to shock a lot of people with this post.   I am so ashamed.  I hate cilantro, I know I should be just like everyone else and think it is the best flavor on the planet and that we should make ice cream and gum and smother all our recipes with the stuff.   But, alas, I can not ~ because I detest the stuff.  It is my least favorite herb.   I now know that I am not alone,  I just ran across this blog for we minority who hate cilantro.

http://ihatecilantro.blogspot.com/

I just stumbled across this great Recycling/Waste resource.  I’m in the process of cleaning out my house and I’ve run across many things that ought to be recyclable if I only knew where to take them.   http://earth911.com/ does!  Not only does it give you cool tips and ideas about things you never thought about recycling before (blue jeans as insulation?), it serves us one better by allowing you to type in your location and what it is you are trying to recycle.  It will then show you a list of places that will accept your material.

http://earth911.com/

I have no affiliation with this website.

After the umpteen time of seeing an “inspi(RED)” tee shirt I decided to go look into what it was all about.  At first I assumed it was a Best Buy thing considering it seemed that everyone I met that worked there was wearing one only to find out that that it was actually a Gap thing.  So I went off looking at The Gap to find the answer and was impressed not only by the project but the scope of it.  They have partnered with the world’s most iconic brands (Hallmark, Apple, Gap, Dell) to produce (RED) products.

From the (RED) website

(RED) was created by Bono and Bobby Shriver, Chairman of DATA to raise awareness and money for The Global Fund by teaming up with the world’s most iconic brands to produce (PRODUCT)RED branded products. A percentage of each (PRODUCT)RED product sold is given to The Global Fund. The money helps women and children affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa.

All funds generated by sales of (PRODUCT) RED products (aka (RED) money) will support Global Fund-financed programs that positively impact the lives of women and children affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa. (RED) money provides access to education, nutrition, counseling, medical services, and the two pills a day they need to help stay alive. This includes programs in countries such as Rwanda, which has a proven track record and ambitious targets. For example, in the past two years, Rwanda has increased the number of people receiving treatments for HIV/AIDS ten-fold.

Be inspi(RED), be uncenso(RED), be ado(RED), be chee(RED).

At long last, after nearly seven years of waiting, I have successfully secured the domain name conversationcircles.com - the more logical domain for a website dedicated to learning about conversation circles.  I even confused myself when verbally sharing the link with people.  Now I no longer have to worry.  Both links will take you there.

In honor of the new domain, I have updated the website, migrated it to a Wordpress architecture, and moved servers to obtain faster service.

Check it out and if you’ve never taken a look at my first video on conversation circles - watch it there!

http://www.conversationcircles.com
or
http://www.conversationcircle.com

Here is a great logical discussion of Global Climate Change and whether to act on it or not.

Last year I wrote about Paul Hawken and his presentation at the Bioneer Conference. I just found a video feed on QuantumShift.tv that gets to some of the heart of the speech, how all these movements (environmental, social justice, indigenous rights, bioneering . . .) all are really under the umbrella of one enormous cultural movement shift.

I just stumbled upon this unusual site called http://www.freerice.com/

The site provides an opportunity to help the hungry and covertly to expand your vocabulary.  For every word you correctly identify 10 grains of rice are donated.  Each time you get a word wrong it tells you the correct answer and lowers the difficulty.  As you get more write the difficulty goes up.

So for all those wordsmith social activists this is the site for you.