Another thought from The Tao of Pooh and The Te of Piglet by Benjamin Hoff (ISBN 0-416-19526-1):

“[Although] we live in what is commonly described as a Materialistic Society … ours is in reality an Abstract Value society – one in which things are not appreciated for what they are so much as for what they represent.”

So why is Abstract Value so attractive? I reckon it is because Abstract …

“If you put a spoonful of wine in a barrel of sewage, you get sewage. If you put a spoonful of sewage in a barrel full of wine, you get sewage.” Schopenhauer’s Law of Entropy

The nasty few wrecks it for everyone else. Or:

A few demeaning creeps can overwhelm the warm feelings generated by hordes of civilized people.

Basically, it doesn’t matter if most people involved with an organization …

From The Tao of Pooh and The Te of Piglet by Benjamin Hoff (ISBN 0-416-19526-1), this story illustrating the Taoist principle of Effortless Action or Wu Wei:

The Old Master and the Horse

A horse was tied outside a shop in a narrow Chinese village street. Whenever anyone would try to walk by, the horse would kick him. Before long, a small crowd of villages had gathered near the shop, …

The woman in front of me at the supermarket checkout today had a box of Tim Tam Cornetto ice creams. Across the box was the tagline “no boring bits”.

Since when was dessert or ice cream “boring”?

Is this like businesses everywhere loudly declaring they are “dedicated to customer service and quality”?

Ice cream… mmmmm…

“Wealth and its origin will never join up.” Jeremy Boutsakis

The gym I go to, Fitness First, has their own slick in-gym music TV channel with commercials. OK, so we cannot escape advertising. Not such a big deal right? But what if I told you that some of the commercials Fitness First runs in the gym, while you are working out, are for liposuction and cosmetic surgery?

I am seriously offended.

So what’s next? Pizza and fried chicken ads? I …

I have never really understood the reason behind liquid stock. You know, the type you buy in 1 litre bricks from the supermarket.

Stock cubes are much easy to carry around, take up less room, and results in less waste (less packaging). Assuming both products essentially come from the same production line and contains more or less the same ingredients, why are we wasting all that …

If you haven’t noticed, there’s currently a spate of spam or PC intrusion attempts using emails disguised as ecard notifications. You know, the ones that say “you have received an ecard” with a link to click on. Which presumably then causes trojan horses and all sorts of other nasties to be installed on your PC.

This is so sad. Ecards were a great way to keep in touch with …

Smart Company posted this:

Can’t afford to give your staff a pay rise? Boost their egos instead with a significant sounding title. … it could well result in them getting a better job with more pay somewhere else!

Good grief. How much more dishonest and superficial can you get?!!! I can’t believe they seem to be endorsing this behaviour. So much for being “Smart” if they were…

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Send questions to ask@eicolab.com.au. Yes, questions should really fall within the topics covered in this blog. And conversations will …