The Water Cooler

June 25th, 2010

This Week’s Topics…

  •  
    Sports
    Since Jean insists on defending soccer this week in this week's edition of SixSeeds, I…
  •  
    Sports
    Or, you might enjoy the "Are You Ready for Some Soccer" Simpsons excerpt.
  •  
    Parenting
    This is what's wrong with consumer research. Proctor & Gamble just launched a new website…
  •  
    Environment
    You might know that the Deepwater Horizon oil spill crippled a well located a mile below…
  •  
    Childhood
    Apparently, there’s a war on childhood “best friends.” According to the New York…
  •  
    Technology
    Economist David Henderson finds a catalog from Radio Shack from 1964 and compares the…
Sports

More Anti-Soccer Rants

item full image
by Nancy French
Since Jean insists on defending soccer this week in this week's edition of SixSeeds, I thought it might be fun to have an equally thought-out counter-argument from Homer Simpson.

Watch "The Simpsons Broadcast Soccer" here.

Sports

And even more!

item full image
by Nancy French
Or, you might enjoy the "Are You Ready for Some Soccer" Simpsons excerpt.

Watch it here.

Parenting

Man of the house

item full image
by Mark Basnage
This is what's wrong with consumer research. Proctor & Gamble just launched a new website for men in mind, with a distinctly domestic tinge. The URL is, of course, http://manofthehouse.com. It seems to cover everything from gadgets to careers, parenting to grooming... but none of them with much depth or authorial commitment. The New York Times quotes one pundit as saying "If you take a look at the economy, where you have had men who have lost their jobs and where they are now either sharing the role of parent or being Mr. Mom, then it makes an awful lot of sense to have that kind of resource available." Will men across America flock to the site? I suspect not.

Check it out, or not...

Environment

That's one deep ocean

item full image
by Mark Basnage
You might know that the Deepwater Horizon oil spill crippled a well located a mile below the ocean's surface. But what does that actually look like? Take a look at this amazing graphic-- and see what the conditions are down there, in a zone far beneath where the last sunlight reaches.

Check it out...

Childhood

Let's all be friends

item full image
by Nancy French
Apparently, there’s a war on childhood “best friends.” According to the New York Times, the idea of a child having one special friend is so 1970s. Instead, educators prefer to replace the messiness of a kid’s social interactions with the convenience of group friends:

“I think it is kids’ preference to pair up and have that one best friend. As adults — teachers and counselors — we try to encourage them not to do that,” said Christine Laycob, director of counseling at Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School in St. Louis. “We try to talk to kids and work with them to get them to have big groups of friends and not be so possessive about friends.”

“Parents sometimes say Johnny needs that one special friend,” she continued. “We say he doesn’t need a best friend.”

How do you feel about this, mom and dad?

Read more...

Technology

The Good Ole Days... Are Now!

item full image
by Nancy French
Economist David Henderson finds a catalog from Radio Shack from 1964 and compares the items that a person could buy then and now. Turns out, the “good ole days” are now!

“Choose any date earlier than 10 years ago and you get a feel for just how much our standard of living has increased. The items are generally what we regard as junk—and they’re expensive.”

So count your blessings. (Can’t count them all? Thankfully, your iPhone has a calculator on it... So go ahead!)

See what your hard-earned money could buy you back then!

last item last item
fade_effect
 
View all Water Cooler articles