CurrentMom

Happy Birthday, WWW!

Technology Thursday

Image via Wikipedia

March 13, 2009 was the 20th birthday of the World Wide Web. Before the Web there were services such as ftp and gopher that allowed access to files stored on servers around the world. Washington University in St. Louis had a massive image/clipart archive named wuarchive. There was no hotmail, no Amazon, no www.anything-at-all. I remember when I saw my first few URLs out in the wild, in a magazine, I think--no longer the province of geeks and computer nerds--and I thought then, and still think now, "this seemingly small thing, a URL on a page, signifies something truly huge."

The Web and the easy on-ramps to the Internet it provides (the Internet's been around a lot longer than the Web; the two should not be confused) is so ever-present now that it's hard to imagine living without it.

Jennifer Aniston, Sarah Jessica Parker and Relationships

Therapy Tuesday

Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer in Hollywood life, Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) and Mr. Big (Chris North) in Sex and the City, and then, the rest of us. All relationships are not created equal and each of us has our "ideal" relationship role model. To some it's Jennifer Aniston to others it's Carrie Bradshaw; to some it's their mothers and to others it's friends.

I am a huge fan of Sex and the City! I was a religious follower and still watch reruns often. Although Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall (Samantha Jones), Kristin Davis (Charlotte York) and Cynthia Nixon (Miranda Hobbes) are best friends, they each have their own unique relationship styles. It didn't matter as much who they were dating, but that each relationship eventually took on a similar feel to the previous one.

What Kind of Nutritional Gatekeeper Are You?

Meal Monday

According to a recent article in the New York Times, home cooking is “in” again, mostly because of the troubled economy. Cash-strapped consumers are cooking from scratch more and avoiding expensive convenience foods.

You would think that this would lead to healthier eating, wouldn’t you? Not necessarily, say researchers. The healthfulness of family eating hinges on the attitudes and behavior of the “Nutritional Gatekeeper,” otherwise known as the person who buys and prepares food for the family.

Researchers have found that the nutritional gatekeeper influences more than 70 percent of what the family eats. This impact goes beyond meals at home and affects food eaten outside the home, such as snacks and restaurant meals. Interesting, right?

Casey Anthony: Why Didn't She Choose Adoption?

Family Friday

Casey Anthony may be one of the most hated women in the US, or at least it appears that way according to recent media coverage.  Rarely have I indulged in late-night channel-flipping lately without encountering Nancy Grace snarling into the camera about "Tot Mom" Casey Anthony, the 22-year-old Florida woman accused of murdering her 2-year-old daughter.  (What an odd moniker - since I have a 2-year-old, aren't I also a "Tot Mom?")

I haven't followed the case closely enough to form an opinion about Casey Anthony's guilt or innocence.  But what has struck me most about the whole mess is this:

Casey Anthony is 22 years old. 

Federalizing Cybersecurity

Image by Lyn Millett via Flickr

Technology Thursday

A few days ago I heard on the radio about a computer worm called Conficker. Apparently computer security experts said that it was likely that Conficker had infected hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of PCs and was scheduled to do something nasty on April 1. Fortunately, the day passed with little drama and no major damage was seen. Nevertheless, keeping our personal computers secure and free from viruses is a daunting task and frankly most of us don't manage to do it. Even after I heard about the Conficker virus, while I thought about making sure all the software on my PC was up-to-date, I didn't manage to do so. Who has the time?

But given the nature of viruses and worms these days, each individual's actions with respect to computer security can have repercussions beyond their own data and PCs.