适意生活和职业爬梯

我最近忙昏了，我们的系统下个月要正式运行了，忙得真是连网都上不了。

我这几天在等BM给我做年终评估。我知道不会坏，可没想到他们会给我这么大的一个提升，大的我都不想要。我这一年过得很舒服，工作虽多，可没有潜规则，完全是凭真才实学吃饭。我这个人别的没有，才华倒是满腹，至少在这个领域内，和我比肩的人实在不多。我终于找到了一个好老板---S是我们的CEO，到这个公司也就三年，从纽约最大的出版公司挖来的，目的是把我们公司提升为美国出版业的最大软件服务公司 。

我从第一天起就发现S天天和我们一起开会，我只觉得这个人长得好看，比过好莱坞任何一个男明星。我比较好色，所以每天开会时经常因为欣赏帅哥而走神，根本不知道这人是何方神仙，还以为是我们系统的客户，直到一个月后，才发现我实在色胆包天。

S不仅好看，更有一种精英气质，可以和奥巴马比肩。他很快就欣赏我，信任我。于是我的才华和个性不着边际的发挥出来。。。

有人为我们投资了5百万，将公司50多年的数据建立了一个data warehouse，这个warehouse将是公司所有系统的平台，是我们的钱源。我现在设计的项目是第一个用这个平台的项目，将为以后其他系统建立标准。又花了重金请了一个Architect Eric，主管data warehouse。 Eric是个犹太人，芝大数学系毕业。犹太人的聪明傲慢独断专行他占全了，全公司没有一个人能和他一起工作，遇到犹太节假日，他一丝不苟的全要歇遍，可他的技术实在过硬，至少我还没见过比他更牛的人。

CEO很发愁， 对此牛人又爱又恨又怕。说愿意出重金给他再请个助手兼backup，因为这个大数据仓库太太太重要了，这个人让他挑选，除了他别人无权管理，而且薪水由他决定，一切都好商量。问题是去那里找这样一个人？

Eric 自己找到了这个人：他对S 说，我只要她，别人不要。

于是，这块肥肉就掉进了我的嘴里。S比谁都高兴，我忠诚可靠，性情随和，和人人都处得来，实在是再合适不过的人选了。。。

问题是，我似乎失去了爬梯的热情，很满足我现在的职位。可Eric对S说，我现在的职位实在浪费了我的才华。。。

我真的这样有才华？连我自己都很怀疑。。。

Anne-Marie Slaughter

作为《大西洋月刊》专栏作家和前美国国务院政策规划负责人，安妮-玛丽·斯劳特今年在一篇文章中反驳了桑德伯格的观点，她为女性打抱不平：无论她们如何努力，女性都无法内外兼顾。她的前提条件是什么？女权主义者向年轻女性兜售了一个遥不可及的“谎言”，女性不可能同时兼顾成功的职业生涯和圆满的家庭生活。斯拉特写道，“今天不可能，以美国经济和社会目前的结构来说也不可能。”这篇报道收到了2,400条评论，让数百万的女性重新考虑她们的优先事宜。

Slaughter's article titled "Why Women Still Can't Have it All" appeared in the July/August 2012 issue of The Atlantic. In the first four days after publication, the piece attracted 725,000 unique readers, making it by far the most popular magazine article ever published in that magazine. In the same period, it received over 119,000 Facebook "Recommends," making it by far the most "liked" piece ever to appear in any version of the magazine. Within several days, it had been discussed in detail on the front page of the New York Times and in many other media outlets, attracting attention from around the world.

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I totally agreed!至今为止，还没有一个所谓的女权主义者现身说教让我认同她们，女性当代的艰难人生和女权主义的理论完全背道而驰。

Edward Hooer and his Morning Sun

Edward Hopper (American, 1882 - 1967)

1952. Oil on canvas, 28 1/8 x 40 1/8". 1954.031

Edward Hopper was one of the early American artists to paint the experience of human isolation in the modern city. Here, the woman—modeled after Hopper’s wife, Jo—faces the sun impassively and seemingly lost in thought. Her visible right eye appears sightless, emphasizing her isolation. The bare wall and the elevation of the room above the street also suggest the bleakness and solitude of impersonal urban life.

林肯，林肯太太和他们的后代

本来想去看Steven Spielberg的新电影<林肯>，Roger说等妞妞放了假，一起去。小人家正在期末大考， 每天哭唧唧的说没时间吃饭睡觉，有一天打电话，问我在干什么，我说我在做小笼包子，她马上大叫：“This is so mean, I only eat cookies now”, 我说：“这不能怨我阿，芝大录取了你，我连房子都给你买了，买在了我的边上，你不去，非要去纽约”。要是这会再说我们要去看电影， 人家又要受刺激了。

林肯和奥巴马是我最感兴趣的美国总统。这两个人是最纯粹的美国产品，是真正除了理想,  志向和才华，其它都没有的绝世天才。林肯之所以横空出世，基于他痛恨奴隶制，坚信美国必须在废除奴隶制下统一。因为这个理想。他利用一切可能的机会， 宣讲他的观点，而这，适合了当时美国北方先进的思想，他成了这种先进理想的代言人。奥巴马则是坚信美国的中产阶级的梦想已被落后保守的共和党政策破碎了，而他，要重新建立这个梦想。

林肯是通过和当时伊利诺州民主党的参议员Stephen A. Douglas的7次关于奴隶制的辩论建立了他的名声。有趣的是，他的太太曾经和Stephen A. Douglas谈情说爱，但她最后却选择了林肯。林肯似乎不很想娶她，结婚那天，在他们去登记的路上，林肯甚至说：“I am going hell”。

他们的婚姻绝对谈不上完美。林肯太太一直支持他的政策，尽管她出身于一个拥有很多奴隶的家庭。但是，就像所有一般夫妻一样，他们充满了矛盾和争吵。林肯和奥巴马一样，很是气管炎。但是，林肯的生活比奥巴马艰难多了。 他们一共有4个儿子， 其中的三个很小时就因各种疾病死了，只有老大活下来了。这样的夫妻一定经历过太多痛苦，痛苦一定摧残人的精神和健康。

为了对付种种痛苦，林肯太太喜欢买东西花钱。林肯总是被追账。林肯死后，她的这种习惯似乎变本加厉，经常怀揣大量的现钞，买很多毫无用途的东西。以致于她的大儿子认为她的精神有问题，把她送进了精神病疗养所。

他们的大儿子长得很像妈妈，后来成了律师，也在政府里担任过职务。他有三个孩子，而他们的后代却都没有孩子。至今，林肯已没有后代在这个世界上了。

Paula Fredriksen

 

Paula Fredriksen是个真正的美女教授。她是圣经历史权威，在牛津学习过，普林斯顿的博士。她著有以下的书：

这个圣诞节，我要好好读读美女教授的书。美丽聪明的女学者都是有意思的人。她原本是个天主教徒，后来相信了犹太教。学习了10几年的圣经后，我其实也从基督教转为犹太教了。宗教是精神体操，对人生有益处，也是需要每天操练的。

The taste of history

Anadama Bread

This soft, comfortingly sweet, cornmeal-and-molasses bread has a colorful history. For years, New Englanders have passed down two stories that attempt to explain the meaning of this bread’s unique name. Both revolve around a fishing village household. The first tells of a Gloucester, Massachusetts, fisherman, whose wife, Anna, prepared nothing for him to eat but a bowl of cornmeal and molasses. Desirous of something different to eat, one day he added yeast and flour to his daily gruel, in an attempt to create a tasteful bread. So frustrated was he in this endeavor that he grumbled, “Anna, damn her!”

A similar but more endearing story tells of a sea captain whose wife, Anna, was quite a good baker and renowned for her cornmeal and molasses bread. New England lore suggests that upon her death her gravestone read, “Anna was a lovely bride, but Anna, damn ’er, up and died.”

Chicken Noodle Soup

In colonial times, chickens were raised mainly for their eggs, which were prized for baking. Older chickens that no longer produced eggs were then used in stews and soups like this one. These chickens normally were fattier than younger hens, and colonial housewives used this to their advantage by rendering the fat to use as a flavorful alternative to butter or lard in other dishes. Adding egg noodles, a traditional German preparation, lent texture to the soup and served as a means of transforming the soup into a more hearty meal that could feed an entire family.

Baked, Stuffed Sturgeon

George Washington would have caught sturgeon from the nearby Potomac River near his estate, Mount Vernon. While it is an unsightly fish by today’s standards, it was a popular menu option for early Americans as it was readily available. It still makes a delicious entrée. This recipes is based on an original version written by Mary Randolph originally published in The Virginia Housewife.

Curried Tofu & Shrimp

Letter from Benjamin Franklin to John Bartram, a preeminent horticulturist in Philadelphia whose home on the banks of the Schuylkill River, Bartram’s Gardens, is America’s oldest living botanical garden.

London, January 11, 1770
“My ever dear Friend: I send Chinese Garavances. Cheese [is] made of them, in China, which so excited my curiosity. Some runnings of salt (I suppose runnet) is put into water, when the meal is in it, to turn to curds. These … are what the Tau-fu is made of.”
 

Stuffed Cabbage

 

This is one of the recipes copied out by Jefferson himself, originally entitled “A Cabbage Pudding.” Cooked whole and wrapped in a cloth, it does resemble the boiled puddings of the day. I have added illuminating details from Mary Randolph’s rendition, mixing some of the heart of the cabbage with the stuffing and serving it “whole with a little melted butter in the dish.” Since Jefferson only listed “sweet herbs,” I’ve chosen the herbs usually used with beef in the period. Originally, the beef was finely chopped by hand, not ground, but readers who are not as concerned for authenticity may substitute ground beef. At Monticello, they would most likely have used a tin-lined copper or iron pot – and may have cooked in on the stew stove. For home cooks today, a heavy-bottomed stewing pan or Dutch oven will answer. It’s a lovely recipe, and not as complicated as it looks.