Yesterday, I listenined to NPR : O'Harrow's 'No Place to Hide' from Surveillance:

Robert O'Harrow, Jr. is a reporter for The Washington Post and an associate of the Center for Investigative Reporting. His new book is about how the government is creating a national intelligence infrastructure with the help of private companies as part of homeland security. Huge data-mining operations are contracted by the government to gather information on our daily lives. Information technology has enabled retailers, marketers, and financial institutions to gather and store data about us. O'Harrow's new book about this security-industrial complex is No Place to Hide: Behind the Scenes of Our Emerging Surveillance Society.

In response to the scary stuff I heard, I'd like to learn more about David Brin and his book The Transparent Society: Will Technology Force Us to Choose Between Privacy and Freedom?. He wrote Salon.com Technology | Three cheers for the Surveillance Society!. See also Wired 4.12: The Transparent Society.

In spite of the many, many, many things happening in my life, I feel that I've still managed to be productive and mostly focused. That's not to say that I don't feel a teensy bit off-balance. OK, sometimes way off balance.

Last year, I found the Getting Things Done system very helpful in getting me on track. I will focus some hours on getting my GTD system back on track. Since I'm often using how much of sustance I can write publicly as a measure of productivity, I'm loathe to work too much on activities whose outcomes are invisible or should be made invisible to the public. That's so funny, since so many good things in life are private. At any rate, I might not be producing much stuff here today. Trust me, though: I'll be busy and productive.

My co-worker Jim Harris was very thoughtful and generous to lend me his copy of Czeslaw Milosz's New and Collected Poems: 1931-2001. I'm now ready to return it because Laura bought me my very own copy of the collected poems as well as Second Space, the first collection of poetry since New and Collected Poems: 1931-2001.

Before I return the book, I made sure that I took down the poems I had bookmarked:

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  "A Poor Christian Looks at the Ghetto" p. 63



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  "Ars Poetica?" p. 240



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  "Oeconomia Divina" p. 263



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  "Temptation" p. 342



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  "Capri" p. 585



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  "Report", p. 589



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  "My Secrets" p. 792



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  "If" p. 703



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  "An Alcoholic Enters the Gates of Heaven" p. 734



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  "Prayer" p. 742

Thanks, Jim!

While browsing at Eastwind Books of Berkeley at lunch, I came across Good Life Luck: The Essential Guide to Chinese American Celebrations and Culture (See also goodlucklife.com, the accompanying website.) I'm very excited about reading it since many, many of the Chinese customs I've experienced as a child (and even as an adult) have been mystifying to me. Perhaps the book will clarify these matters.

Happy New Year!

Originally uploaded by Raymond Yee.

Banners painted by the kids in our house.