Workplace Reform

   1. "Sleeping could be the best idea you ever had"
      < http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1297824,00.html >
   "For idlers, it may be the revelation they have been praying for: researchers
    called yesterday for beds to be installed in workplaces after a survey
    revealed that almost all of us come upon our best ideas when we are about to
    nod off"

   2. "Even low-level office noise can increase health risks and lower task
       motivation for workers, Cornell researchers find"
      < http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Jan01/noisy.offices.ssl.html >
   "Low-level noise in open-style offices seems to result in higher levels of
    stress and lower task motivation, according to a new study by a Cornell
    University environmental psychologist"

   3. "Cluttered desks make workers ill"
      < http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3571735.stm >
   "Researchers at NEC-Mitsubishi say the nation's office workers are being
    hit by 'Irritable Desk Syndrome'. They say long working hours, cluttered
    desks and poor posture are making many people ill"

   4. "Study links warm offices to fewer typing errors and higher productivity"
      < http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Oct04/temp.productivity.ssl.html >
   "Chilly workers not only make more errors but cooler temperatures could
    increase a worker's hourly labor cost by 10 percent, estimates Alan Hedge,
    professor of design and environmental analysis and director of Cornell's
    Human Factors and Ergonomics Laboratory"

   5. "Work illness hits half UK staff"
      < http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4221923.stm >
   "More than half of people believe they suffer ill health due to work, a
    study has found"

   6. "Workers want bosses to 'get lost'"
      < http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4166062.stm >
   "Most workers reckon that their bosses are excessively bureaucratic,
    apportion blame wrongly and are inconsistent in decision making, a report
    has found... 'Management has to help employees perform, which in many
    cases means getting out of the way'"

The Things People Say

   1. "The sleeping giant goes on the offensive: Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft
       is ready to take the offensive."
      < http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2006/04/03/
          8373041/index.htm >
   "My children--in many dimensions they're as poorly behaved as many other
    children, but at least on this dimension I've got my kids brainwashed:
    You don't use Google, and you don't use an iPod."

   2. "President Bush's remarks on Economic Competitiveness"
      < http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/18/
          AR2006041801057.html >
   "The iPod, interestingly enough, was built on years of government-funded
    research in microdrive storage and electrochemistry and signal compression"

   3. "Bush brings campaign across the Potomac"
      < http://www.wtopnews.com/?sid=243903&nid=25 >
   "Bush added that 'the really rich people figure out how to dodge taxes
    anyway'"

   4. "Rumsfeld prose makes sweet music"
      < http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200403/s1070092.htm >
   "Last year, newspaper columnist Hart Seely recorded Mr Rumsfeld's exchanges
    with reporters in Pieces of Intelligence: The Existential Poetry of Donald
    Rumsfeld.  One of those pieces, The Unknown, is Mr Rumsfeld's oft-repeated
    musing on the vagaries of intelligence, 'as we know, there are known knowns;
    there are things we know we know; we also know, there are known unknowns...'"
   Related:
    * "Pieces of Intelligence: The Existential Poetry of Donald Rumsfeld"
      < http://www.monkeyrivertown.com/brains.php?ART=438 >
    * The Donald Rumsfeld Library of Quotations
      < http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/news/bh/rumsfeld.shtml >

   5. "Jennifer Lopez wants to be American president"
      < http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200505/s1359116.htm >
   "After conquering Hollywood and the pop charts, superstar Jennifer Lopez says
    she is ready to wrestle George W Bush out of the White House"

   6. "Celine calls her Vegas audiences sleepy drunks"
      < http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_1328796.html >
   "Celine Dion has admitted that audiences at her Las Vegas show are often
    tired, drunk, sick and in some cases asleep"

   7. "Charlize wants to marry Ozzy"
      < http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_1130981.html >
   "Charlize Theron says she would love to marry Ozzy Osbourne"

   8. "'I haven't read a book in my life', says Posh"
      < http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/08/14/1123957937512.html >
   "Former Spice Girl singer Victoria Beckham, the wife of England soccer
    captain David, has confessed she has never read a book"

   9. "Vanstone denies mocking aviation security measures"
      < http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2005/s1513051.htm >
   "she allegedly complained about having to use plastic knives on planes, and
    used a bizarre example involving gouging someone's eye out with a pencil"

Interesting Research + A Stress Release Idea

   It's been so long I've almost forgotten how to write one of these things :)

   1. "'Sleeping on it' best for complex decisions"
      < http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8732 >
   "Complex decisions are best left to your unconscious mind to work out,
    according to a new study, and over-thinking a problem could lead to
    expensive mistakes. ... Thinking hard about a complex decision that
    rests on multiple factors appears to bamboozle the conscious mind so
    that people only consider a subset of information, which they weight
    inappropriately, resulting in an unsatisfactory choice. In contrast,
    the unconscious mind appears able to ponder over all the information
    and produce a decision that most people remain satisfied with"

   2. "Woman with perfect memory baffles scientists"
      < http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=1738881&page=1 >
   "Give her any date, she said, and she could recall the day of the week,
    usually what the weather was like on that day, personal details of her
    life at that time, and major news events that occurred on that date"

   3. "Cubicles: The great mistake"
      < http://money.cnn.com/2006/03/09/magazines/fortune/
          cubicle_howiwork_fortune/index.htm >
   "Even the designer of the cubicle thinks they were maybe a bad idea, as
    millions of 'Dilberts' would agree"

   4. "Bacteria use slime jets to get around"
      < http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8933 >
   "The propulsion system used by slime-squirting bacteria could teach
    rocket scientists and nano-engineers some new tricks"

   5. "No place like home: Ant navigation skills used in robot navigation"
      < http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-04/sfeb-npl033106.php >
   "Ants that return from foraging journeys can use landmarks to find their
    way home, but in addition they have an internal backup system that allows
    them to create straight shortcuts back to the nest even when the outbound
    part of the forage run was very winding"

   6. "Your taste in music is shaped by the crowd"
      < http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8702 >
   "People like a song more when they think other people like it too, a new
    study suggests. But the interactions between individual and group opinions
    are so complex that it is impossible to predict whether a good song will
    be a hit or a flop, according to researchers who asked people to rate the
    quality of music by unknown bands"

   7. "Anger boiling? Smash plates at Philippine eatery"
      < http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200603/s1604172.htm >
   "At the Isdaan restaurant in Gerona, about three hours north of Manila in
    the Philippines, Vescara and other patrons work out their stress for about
    40 cents Australian a go, by hurling plates at the 'wall of fury'
    emblazoned with words such as ex-wife, boss and lover"

   I hope you all have a happy and safe break over Easter.