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Recently I learned about the story of the murder of Catherine Genovese, who was killed even though 37 people were there to see and none called for help. Here is what happened:Catherine "Kitty" Genovese was the eldest of five children of Italian American parents, Vincent and Rachel, and graduated Brooklyn?s Prospect Heights High School in 1954. At time of her murder, she was 5?1? tall, weighed 105 lbs and was 28 years old. She was attractive and outgoing, and liked Latin American music and dancing and was interested in many subjects, especially history and politicsCatherine?s family lived in Brooklyn, New York where her father Vincent owned a fairly successful coat and apron supply company. After witnessing a shooting, they moved to New Canaan, Connecticut. Catherine remained in Brooklyn; her parents worried but accepted it. She had moved to Queens by 1963 and lived in a an apartment with her friend Mary Ann Zielonko on the second floor of a commercial building on Austin Street in Kew Gardens, a quiet, residential area. She worked as a bar manager in Ev?s Eleventh Hour Club which was five miles from her apartment. She drove there every night but didn?t return until late, even though walking in the dark made her nervous.At 3:15 AM on March 13, 1964, Catherine was returning home from work. She parked her red Fiat about 20 feet from her apartment, and while locking her door, she noticed a figure walking toward her. She began to run but the man started to follow her. He had a knife in his hand. Thinking she could reach the safety of the apartment quickly, she headed toward it, but the man was faster than she thought. She saw a police call box and changed direction to call for help, but the man caught her. He jumped on her back and stabbed her. She screamed ?Oh my God! He stabbed me! Please help me!? Apartment lights went on in nearby buildings. A man named Robert Mozer opened his window and yelled, ?Hey, let that girl alone!? The attacker left immediately, and the lights went out again.Catherine was now bleeding badly from her stab wounds. She reached the wall of the building and headed toward a door, trying to stay conscious, but the attacker returned within five minutes and stabbed her again. She cried out ?I?m dying!? and several people in the building heard. Lights went on and windows opened, and the attacker ran to a white Chevy Corvair parked nearby and drove away. At 3:25 AM, Catherine made it to the back of her apartment building and tried to enter, but the door was locked. She reached a hall which led to the 2nd floor of the building, but fell down onto the floor of the vestibule. By this time, the attacker had returned again and was looking around the area, wanting to finish what he had intended to do. He followed a trail of blood and found Catherine lying on the floor, defenseless. Then he cut off her bra and underwear and sexually assaulted her, took $49 from her wallet, and stabbed her again, killing her. He drove away. The entire incident took place in 32 minutes.At 3:50 AM, Karl Ross, a neighbor who lived on the second floor of the apartment building, called the police. They arrived within 3 minutes and found Catherine?s body. She had been stabbed 17 times, her clothes were cut and torn, and her wallet was lying open on the floor beside her. Detectives began investigating to find out what happened. They found there were 37 other witnesses, none of whom tried to help her. They believed that if someone had called when the attack started, Catherine might not have died. 30 detectives searched for the murderer, and after six days when a man was arrested for stealing a television, they found him.He was Winston Moseley and was 29 years old, just a year older than Catherine, and was 5?8? with a slight build and thin features. He lived in Queens, was married and with two children, and worked as a machine operator in Mt. Vernon.In addition to killing Catherine Genovese, Moseley claimed to have killed 15 year old Barbara Kralik on July 20 in Springfield Gardens of Queens, and also 24 year old Annie Mae Johnson in South Ozone Park on February 29. An 18 year old man named Alvin Mitchell had already been arrested for the killing of Barbara Kralik, but Moseley had details about the killing that supported the evidence that had been found concerning the murder. Even though there was no DNA testing at the time which could have proved it, the police were sure Moseley was telling the truth and had indeed killed Kralik. Moseley?s description of his killing of Annie Mae Johnson also seemed to contradict what was already believed. He said he shot her in the stomach, but the autopsy stated that her cause of death was puncture wounds. The body was taken from the cemetery so that a second autopsy could be done, and six bullets were found in Johnson?s body. Moseley also confessed to attacking many other people. He said he liked to roam the streets at night, searching for random victims. He had committed several burglaries and had raped and often robbed numerous women. He had had many failed attempts with rape though and even seemed to prefer that the victim be dead because there was ?no thrill with live women.?On June 8, 1964, the trial of Winston Moseley took place. Originally, he pled ?not guilty.? But he had already confessed to the killing and even described how it had been performed, so such a plea seemed crazy. At the last minute, his attorney, Sidney G. Sparrow, changed the plea to ?not guilty by reason of insanity? even though a state psychiatrist had said Moseley was sane. There were four residents of Kew Gardens who testified at the trial, giving details about the murder they had witnessed. But Moseley was the one who provided the most information. Sparrow himself called Moseley to the stand on June 11 to testify since he hoped the jury would believe that Moseley was insane. He asked Moseley about his previous crimes, and Moseley confessed that he had stabbed Barbara Kralik, whom he had wanted to rape but had been scared away, and shot Annie Mae Johnson. He said that he intended to kill Johnson and shot her several times to make sure she was dead. Then he raped her and set her body on fire in her living room.Moseley talked about how he had gone out on the night of Catherine Genovese?s murder determined to kill someone, for once the idea entered his head, he had been unable to get rid of it. He set out with a hunting knife taken from a previous burglary and stabbed Catherine. When the apartment lights came on, he moved his car so it couldn?t be seen, but mostly remained unconcerned since he had a feeling the people would just go back to sleep.The defense and prosecution summed up the case on June 11:Sparrow claimed that Moseley was schizophrenic and legally insane, living a ?Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde? life. During the day, he lived like a normal citizen, but at night he turned into a fiend addicted to murder. Sparrow asked, ?Was it sane for him to go on about what he was doing when 10, 20, 30 or 50 people were opening windows, opening and closing doors, yelling at him?? But the prosecuting attorney Frank Cacciatore said that Moseley was a monster nonetheless who should be punished for his horrible actions. The judge, J. Irwin Shapiro, explained the insanity plea. He said, ?Legal sanity means a person must be held criminally responsible for his conduct, unless he has such a defect of reason that he cannot distinguish between right and wrong.?The jury began deliberating at 4 PM at the Queens Supreme Court building. Less than seven hours later, at 10:30, they reached a verdict. They had found Moseley guilty of murder in the first degree. Only about 10 people were there when this was announced, since most people had thought the verdict would not be reached until Monday. Even the Genovese family was not there, for they wanted to protect the family from publicity.Moseley came back for sentencing on June 15, where many people had gathered to see what would happen. The prosecution was allowed to bring in anything else that seemed important to show other aspects of the defendant?s corrupt behavior. Four women said that Moseley had attacked them in addition the others he mentioned. One had been beaten, one raped, and all four robbed. Cacciatore said that life imprisonment wasn?t enough for Moseley since he would still be alive and possibly be able to ?stalk the streets again.? The jury considered the sentence and came to a decision shortly. They recommended the death penalty, and the spectators cheered upon hearing it. Judge Shapiro said, ?I don?t believe in capital punishment, but when I see this monster, I wouldn?t hesitate to pull the switch myself!?Moseley went to the Department of Corrections after he was convicted and eventually was sent to Attica prison. His death sentence was reduced to life imprisonment though, for in 1967, the New York State Court of Appeals found evidence of his mental condition that should have been in the trial. In 1968, Moseley was being transferred to a hospital in Buffalo when he stole a guard?s gun. He took five people hostage, and even raped a woman in front of her husband. The FBI located him and sent an agent after him, and for half an hour, he and Moseley pointed guns at each other point-blank while negotiating.Moseley finally surrendered and went back to Attica prison. He became philosophical, and after witnessing a riot in 1971 which killed 10 guards and 29 prisoners, he decided that he was going to make up for his past misconduct. He wrote a letter to The Times in which he expressed his thoughts about his killings and his imprisonment and stated that he was a new man determined to do constructive things. He even said that his murdering Catherine did ?serve society,? for it made people see how wrong the apathy of those who saw the murder but did not call for help was. The article was published.When he realized he would be eligible for parole, Moseley became more set on his goal to become a different man. He read books in the prison library and was even able to enroll in a college program where he received a B.A. in Sociology, becoming one of the first inmates in New York to earn a college degree.Between 1984 and 1995, he appeared before the state parole board six times, but was denied parole. In 1995, when Moseley was 60 years old, he appealed to a federal court for a new trial. He claimed that since his attorney Sparrow had once represented Catherine Genovese on a minor gambling charge, he had a conflict of interest and could not have adequately defended him in his trial. But on November 13, the judge denied this request, and Moseley was sent back to prison. Currently, he is at Great Meadows Correction Facility in upstate New York.The murder of Catherine Genovese was not big news when it first occurred, for many killings had happened. It got little attention until The Times published Martin Gansberg?s article ?37 Who Saw Murder Didn?t Call? on March 27, 1964, two weeks after the killing. It was believed that Catherine could have survived if one of the witnesses had called for help when she first shrieked. By mid-April of that year, the case became much more well-known, and people began to think about the apathy of society, which was sometimes called the ?Kitty Genovese Syndrome.? For the past forty years, her murder has been studied and analyzed, and has become a symbol of modern city life in which people are too afraid or too self-centered to help someone else.~~~I found this story fascinating and shocking. The idea that all those people were present during a murder, yet none called for help, is appalling. Many psychological experiments were conducted to further study the bystander effect, and it was found that, in the case of emergency, people are more likely to seek help if they are alone than if they are in a crowd. When many people are present, responsibility "disperses" and each person feels less like it's their duty to do something.Quite interesting.

One of the topics we learning about in psychology is called "priming." In the example you cited about the red car, priming would be a factor because you were just thinking about the red car, so you were more likely to make the connection between the car you were just thinking about and the fact that this person may own it. I think that that is where a lot of the "telepathy" we experience stems from.Also, we do have the ability to be "mind readers" in the sense that we can empathize with other humans. By looking at their facial expressions, posture, etc. and listening to how they are presenting themselves, our minds subconsciously reason about their emotional state and how they may perceive us or their situation. In this way, we get a sense of how they are thinking, even though we may not realize it. BBC's documentary "Brain Story" discusses this in more detail. It's really a fascinating show, if you ever get a chance to watch it.So I think that we are "mind readers" in this sense. As for the fortune teller sense of the meaning, well, I think some of the previous comments summed it up rather well

Enzymes act as catalysts in living organisms which allow important chemical reactions to occur at lower temperatures. They are not altered in the process and can be used in many reactions. Most of the chemical reactions that occur in living organisms are regulated by enzymes and would happen much slower without them. For example, without the digestive enzyme carboxypepdidase, it would take seven years to digest a hamburger.Ethyl carbamate is a compound found in fermented beverages that can cause cancer in various organisms. Its precursor is urea, an intermediate during fermentation by the arginase enzyme. The urea reacts with ethanol produced during fermentation to form ethyl carbamate. Storing wine at high temperatures increases the amount of ethyl carbamate.Enzymes play an important role in preventing the formation of ethyl carbamate. By disrupting the gene that encodes the arginase enzyme, the mutant can cause wine that contains no urea, and therefore, no ethyl carbamate. The use of the enzyme urease to lower urea levels has been considered, but the pH levels of wine are too low for the enzyme to work. The Japanese later found urease in the bacteria Lactobacillus fermentum which did lower urea levels in wine.An enzyme called chlamysin was found in scallops while researchers were looking for a use for scallop shells. This enzyme destroys dangerous bacteria associated with diseases in humans and fish. It may be important in several areas, such as medicine, fish farming, and food preserving.The enzyme appears in very small quantities in scallops. The gene that causes the production of chlamysin has been isolated, however, so other organisms such as bacteria or yeast can be altered to produce it. This is necessary for testing and successful industrial production. If it were to be administered as medicine, chlamysin could not be used in food that is to be eaten because it is a protein and would be destroyed by the digestive system before it could kill bacteria. Instead, it would need to be applied to the skin. Unlike other enzymes in organisms that live in cold water, chlamysin is not inactivated by temperatures of organisms from warmer areas.

Wow...that's a lot less ingredients than traditional scones! I just made a batch of the latter from scratch and while it wasn't a lot of work, it was time-consuming. But soooo worth it ;)I'll definitely have to give these a try...lemonade scones sound delicious!

I love quotes! And I have many favorites:"Three grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for." -Joseph Addison"Have a variety of interests ... These interests relax the mind and lessen tension on the nervous system. People with many interests live, not only longest, but happiest." -George Matthew Allen"The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak." -Hans Hofmann"Eliminate physical clutter. More importantly, eliminate spiritual clutter." -D.H. Mondfleur"Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated." -Confucius"Frugality is one of the most beautiful and joyful words in the English language, and yet one that we are culturally cut off from understanding and enjoying. The consumption society has made us feel that happiness lies in having things, and has failed to teach us the happiness of not having things." -Elise Boulding"To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter... to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring - these are some of the rewards of the simple life." -John Burroughs"The trouble with simple living is that, though it can be joyful, rich, and creative, it isn't simple." -Doris Janzen Longacre"The best things in life are nearest: Breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of right just before you. Then do not grasp at the stars, but do life's plain, common work as it comes, certain that daily duties and daily bread are the sweetest things in life." -Robert Louis Stevenson"If you can't stand solitude, maybe you bore others too." -Bob Gordon"Material blessings, when they pay beyond the category of need, are weirdly fruitful of headache." -Philip Wylie"Live simply that others might simply live." -Elizabeth Seaton"Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials." -Lin Yutang"To be nobody-but-yourself -- in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else -- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting." -e e cummings

Also, if you have trouble falling asleep, make yourself a "tea" using one tablespoon honey, one tabelspoon apple cider vinegar, and hot water. It's delicious, relaxing, and will help you fall asleep.

Brain Chemicals have a large effect on how we think and feel. Between two nerve cells, there is a space called a synapse. For a message to travel from or to the brain, nerve impulses must be sent from cell to cell. Chemicals called neurotransmitters are released to transmit these impulses across the synapses. In other words, the release of neurotransmitters is how the brain cells communicate with each other. There are many different types of neurotransmitters, and each one has a different purpose.Acetylcholine?First known neurotransmitter?Found in the brain and peripheral nervous system?Involved in learning and memory, therefore,?In Alzheimer?s disease, there is a shortage of acetylcholine?It also slows the heart, makes the bronchi and gut contract, stimulates glands to produce saliva and mucus?It is the only neurotransmitter in skeletal muscleDopamine?Dopamine does many different things.?In the interior of the brain, it controls movement ?In Parkinson?s disease, little dopamine reaches the interior of the brain, so the person is unable to control their movement?In the frontal lobe, dopamine regulates the flow of information coming into the brain.?In people with schizophrenia, dopamine does not reach the frontal lobe, so they cannot think clearly.?Drugs like cocaine, opiates, and alcohol help the brain release dopamineNorepinephrine?also called noradrenalin?involved in the regulation of mood?disturbances in its tracts can cause depression?higher levels cause aggression?higher levels along with dopamine and phenylethalimine produce a feeling of infatuation?because it is released in response to short-term stress, it causes the heart rate and blood pressure to increase.?it also increases the conversion of glycogen to glucose in the liver, increases the conversion of fats to fatty acids in fat tissue, and it relaxes bronchial smooth muscle to open up air passages to the lungs?it is also important for learning and forming memoriesOxytocin?touch causes the body to produce oxytocin which produces the desire to touch and be touched?people who don?t receive enough touch produce little oxytocin, and as a result certain connections in the brain disappear.?decreases mental processes and impairs memory which is why hugging helps recover after an argument?it also plays a large part in establishing maternal behavior. This is vital for successful reproduction since the mother must be attached to her offspring in order to take good care of it.?induces labor?associated with well-being in relationshipsPhenylethylamine (PEA)?causes feelings of happiness and relieves depression?it is thought that a PEA shortage may be the cause of common depression?increases attention and activity, promotes energy, elevates mood, and favors aggression?some people are especially sensitive to it, and when the level of PEA rises above the amount they can deal with, symptoms similar to those of an allergy can occur.Serotonin?like norepinephrine, it regulates mood, emotion, sleep, and appetite?Larger amounts of serotonin decrease one?s appetite while smaller amounts make one crave food, especially carbohydrates?Decreased serotonin contributes to depression?Aggressive and violent behavior in people is also linked with low levels of serotonin

I've found that certain foods, like sugar, make me crave more food, whether I'm hungry or not, whereas something healthier (usually high in fiber and protein) makes me feel satisfied and like I've "finished" eating. I also find that getting adequate minerals and vitamins gives me the energy I need to stay fit. For example, I was low on iron at one time, and I was amazed to find that by increasing my consumption of iron-rich foods, my energy rose from unbearably low back to normal. It's things like these, feeling hungry or tired, that can contribute to being more stressed out than you would have been otherwise. There's a great blog on how being healthy affects your life: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/ He gives all kinds of suggestions on how to eat well to maintain optimal health.

Lots of people cite chocolate as their favorite food, and even those who don't still love it! Here is some information you may not have known about chocolate:Making chocolate:Chocolate is made from cacao seeds. The seeds are harvested by hand and allowed to ferment. They are then roasted and the nibs are ground into a paste called chocolate liquor which is made up of cocoa butter and cocoa solids. Some chocolate liquor is pressed, separating the cocoa butter from the cocoa solids. Milk, sugar, and extra cocoa butter is mixed with unpressed chocolate liquor and is churned until it becomes a coarse, brown powder called ?crumb.? The chocolate is crushed until smooth. It is then cooled and warmed repeatedly, a process called tempering which gives chocolate its glossy shine and ensures that it will melt properly.A brief history:The Maya created a bitter and spicy drink called xocoatl from cacao seeds, which were also used as currency and burned as incense. They traded cacao with the Aztecs. In 1528, Hernando Cortes, who had come to conquer the Aztecs, took cacao to Spain. The Spanish added sugar to it since they thought it was too bitter, and they kept their creation to themselves for almost 100 years. Eventually the rest of Europe found out about it, and it became a symbol of wealth and power since only the rich could afford it. By the 1800?s, chocolate was mass produced and became available to more people.Contents of chocolate:Chocolate is a good source of potassium, phosphorous, zinc, copper, chromium, and manganese. 93% of the iron in chocolate is useable, making it one of the most iron-rich foods. It also has a low sodium level. It contains antioxidants which protect the body against cancers and slow the effects of aging. The fat content can raise levels of good cholesterol, and oleic acid, which makes up two thirds of the fat in chocolate, can lower breast cancer rates. Although chocolate contains sugar, its glycemic index is low so it releases sugar into the body slowly, allowing the cells to use it for energy instead of storing it as fat.Anyone have any interesting/delicious chocolate recipes to share?

I spent the past year at my college working on the development of a new content management system. It was really interesting because the journalism students were actually using it to produce their online magazine. We were trying to make our cms more media-friendly and secure since we wanted outsiders to be able to contribute to the magazine, but the college had firewall issues and such.It was very interesting work, and as such I've begun the development of my own personal content management system for my blog. Custom cms's are the way to go...you can get exactly the features you want, nothing more, nothing less.

That is very interesting! I had not heard of that disability.I learned about two genetic disorders that occur due to a problem during meiosis, which is the division of a diploid cell which produces four haploid cells. These cells are what become the sex cells (egg and sperm) that create a person. There are two parts: meiosis I and meiosis II. During each part, chromosomes separate and are pulled to opposite ends of the cell. If this happens correctly, it is called disjunction, but if they do not separate and are pulled together to one end of the cell, it is called nondisjunction.Down syndrome is characterized by features such as a broad face, narrow, up slanting eyes, and a large tongue. It leads to retardation and often disorders of the heart and gastrointestinal tract. It occurs when a person has an extra 21st chromosome; therefore, it is also called Trisomy 21. There is a critical region on this chromosome, and when it is present in three more copies, it results in the phenotype for Down syndrome. This usually happens due to nondisjunction during meiosis. More than 95% of these division errors are maternal, and most of them occur in older women and during meiosis I. Most of the paternal errors occur during meiosis II, and age has little effect.Edwards syndrome is another genetic disorder that arises when there is an extra copy of a chromosome. It occurs when there are three copies of chromosome 18 and is also called Trisomy 18. It is the second most common genetic disorder in humans after Down syndrome. Like Down syndrome, it causes mental retardation, but children with Edwards syndrome die early and rarely live more than one year. This syndrome is characterized by low set ears, deformed fingers, narrow nose, a receding jaw, and various heart defects. These defects include Ventricular Septal Defect in which there is a hole between the lower chambers of the heart which prevents the heart from pumping blood correctly, Atrial Septal Defect in which there is a hole between the two upper chambers of the heart which makes it difficult for the heart to pump sufficient oxygen-rich blood to the body?s tissues, and Patent Ductus Arteriosus in which closure of a duct fails to occur, resulting in abnormal direction of blood flow.

I read these interesting articles which compare browser speed: http://lifehacker.com/396048/speed-testing-the-latest-web-browsers http://lifehacker.com/396518/the-browser-stopwatch-speed-tests-page-load I will never switch back to IE now that I've been using firefox. It's irritating when you want to load a page and it says that you have to use IE. But, of course Firefox has a solution for this: the IE tab ad-on. You can open a tab in IE, right in Firefox. It's great if you're designing web applications and want to test them in both browsers, and it pretty much eliminates the need for IE.

There's a good collection of design info here: http://www.problogger.net/category/blog-design/ While the site is specific to blogging, many of the tips can be applied to more general websites as well. There's also information at about.com: http://webdesign.about.com/ I think one of the best ways to learn about web design and layouts is just to browse different sites and see what works and what doesn't. There are certain tried and true techniques of design that hold true no matter what, and by taking note of what's out there, you can determine what they are make them work for you. The most important thing you can consider in a web layout is usability; if people can't figure out how to navigate your site, they won't waste their time. Then you can work on the fun part...making it it pretty

If you need dynamically created webpages, PHP is the way to go, but as was previously mentioned, if you're just displaying things in a set way, HTML is enough. I usually use PHP anyway though to generate the page layouts; this way, if I choose to change the design of the site later on, I only have to edit one file which contains the function to generate the layout. It's MUCH easier than editing hundreds of files of HTML. Also, you may choose to add some more advanced functionality to your site later, and having it already coded in PHP will preven you from needing to rename all your files.If you know PHP, I think it's beneficial just to use it. It's much more powerful than HTML.

The most crucial step in website development is the research and planning you do before you code a page. It's vital that you take the time to determine the purpose and audience of your site before you set it up. Once it's up, things are much more difficult to change. There are many, many resources online where successful website owners go into detail about all the things you'll want to consider. Htmlgoodies.com has a chapter from a book about web site design that you can read for free, and problogger.net has many articles about things to think about (while the site is aimed at blog creation, many of the tips can be applied to any type of website).Once this is in place, you'll want to focus on how to organize the information you're providing. O'Reilly's book Information Architecture and the Worldwide Web is very, very comprehensive about this step. It's aimed at site providing massive amounts of information, so you won't need to focus on this as much if you're having a smaller site. But it's still important.The interface and design of your site is the next step. If your site is hard to navigate and use, users won't waste time trying to figure it out. They'll go somewhere else instead. So you need to make all your organized information easy to access through properly presented links, text, images, etc. Steve Krug's book Don't Make Me Think! is very, very good in this respect. He covers aspects of web usability and ways to test the usability of your site.The aesthetics is also something to consider. You want an attractive, professional looking site. I find that the best way to acheive this is to look at other site designs and take note of the types of things that look good and they types of things that don't. A popular test for whether something is a good idea is the "would amazon.com do it?" test. Loud music and 3948727634 flashy, bright red animated gifs, for example, would probably be a bad idea.Once your site is up, you need to think about mainintaining it and promoting it. How often will you (be able to/need to) update it? How can you reach your target audience with news of your site? By posting on forums and commenting on blogs, you can spread the word. Other sites may also want to trade links with you as your site becomes bigger and more well-known. Again, problogger.net has lots of information about these things.Creating a website is a large process and can be a lot of work, but if you are serious about it and enjoy your topic, it can be a fun experience. Just be sure to give it the time and thought that it deserves, and you will have a successful, well-presented website.

OpenOffice definitely has a major drawback in that it's much slower than Microsoft Office (I believe it was written in Java, where as MS is written in C), but if you don't want to pay for MS <or download a bootleg>, then it's definitely a good choice. It performs all the functions you'll most likely need, and can create MS compatible documents. Hopefully it will be able to render these formats much closer to how they appear in the actual MS software; I think that once it can do this, its popularity will increase dramatically. The main reason I don't use it is because I never know how my documents will look when I open them in Word, and also because I'm impatient and hate waiting for it to load.The open source movement is still relatively young in that there are many, many people who don't know about it or take advantage of it. As more people get involved, products will hopefully improve to the point where corporate ones, such as those produced by MS, will become almost obsolete.

I was on jobs.metafilter.com awhile ago and someone had posted a listing for participants in a survey. I bet if you checked something like craigslist they may even have similar things posted. Also, if you just google things like psychological study particpants you'll probably get some info on possible researchers who need participants. Unfortunately, you probably won't get paid much for easy, online tasks you could do at home...it's the uncomfortable stuff like sleep-deprivation that will give you the most money. But it's probably worth checking out anyway...you never know what you'll find.

I skipped fake classes like gym...in middle school my friends and I hated when we did track in gym because it was really competitive and we were really slow and didn't care, so we came up with an entire plan of how we could miss the week's worth of gym but not look suspicious.In college I actually cared about the classes I was taking and didn't skip them, except once or twice when I didn't get to sleep until like 5 AM and would have had to wake up an hour later for chem.

I thought of a chameleon eating a nectarine in the Dominican Republic

I asked my friend to give me the invite, so it wasn't an exciting surprise, but I was happy to finally have a Gmail account. At first I hated how you couldn't make any folders, but with the tagging and search capabilities I learned to deal. And there is just so much space! I love being able to keep everything I get.

There's a really good blog about making money from blogging called problogger.net. It has SO many articles and tips on ways to make money, extending from basic Google AdSense tips to things that will create long-term readers, such how to effectively use search engine optimization, how to generate good content, etc. You should definitely check it out!

Headphones. For when you want your music but your roommate doesn't.I've also found that a good pair of earplugs is nice. You never know when your floormates will decide to run down the halls screaming when you want to get some sleep.I've heard a Foreman grill is an awesome thing to have, but I haven't been able to try this out because my school doesn't allow them. If yours does, you might want to check it out.Because space is scare, one of those pillow/chair things is really nice to have on your bed. That way, you can study/watch TV from a "couch."

Try searching craigslist.com or jobs.metafilter.com. Sometimes things are posted there for these kind of jobs.

Another way to make money is through Google AdSense, where they put ads on your site and you get a couple cents for each click on the ads. I think they have one specifically for blogs.

I switched to linux to learn about computers/operating systems, but I found that I really liked the cutomizability of it. I use arch linux which is really lightweight; you only put on the things you need, nothing more, nothing less. I love this because I can have a faster, more stable system than Windows which is so BLOATED that I don't know what to do with it. I love having a choice of desktops with linux as well; it's tough going back to Windows and having to use everything the way it is and having little control.