Derek Scruggs

Note: not safe for work. According to Frappr, swingers are more likely to live in the Bible Belt. There are more in Salt Lake City than Los Angeles!

This particular Frappr is just for one group. But here are two more that are heavily Bible Belt: Southern Swingers (of course) and Cycle Swingers.

(Not that I hang out in these forums. Seriously, I just did everyone’s favorite search on Frappr to see what came up.)

(Heh. I said came.)

If Web 2.0 is about social media, what could be more social that this? And it ties in with the whole phenomenon of sex driving the evolution of consumer technology. Lesson over.

According to the Washington Post, Random House plans to offer refunds to some buyers of A Million Little Pieces. The too-shocking-to-be-believed memoir turns out to be mostly fake. Too bad. I was planning to read it. And I still might but will just treat it as fiction.

Lifehacker turned me on to an old but still interesting Metafilter thread about inspirational moments in your lives. Though many of them are uplifting, inspiring and even funny (“Heard Ramones. Everything changed.”), others are downright chilling:

From the age of 2 to 5-1/2, my parents kept me locked alone in a cage. To this day, decades later, I find it impossible to form meaningful social relationships. Frankly, I’m surprised I’m not a serial killer.

Yeesh.

I originally sent the note below to a friend who has back pain, but then I remembered that I’ve repeated this story over and over to people in the past, so maybe some of you could benefit.

I’ve had lower back problems for several years. Also some upper back pain, which chiropractic seems to help (and nothing serious for the last few years). My lower pack pain reached a peak on our honeymoon about two years ago [February 2004]. It was really hard to get up after laying down for just 20 minutes. Chiropractic helped a bit, but I was starting to feel like an old man. I tried chiropractic, network chiropractic (don’t get me started – very woo woo Boulder stuff)physical therapy and acupuncture. None of them made much of a difference in my lower back pain. I also looked into a tested a popular physical therapy method called the Egoscue Method, but it requires 45-60 minutes of exercises every day! Screw that!

During this period I had an X-ray done. It turns out my very bottom disc is compressed to about 60% of it’s normal size. It’s a fairly common condition, but there’s no cure. Bummer.

Eventually, after hearing it advertised on the radio, I tried America’s Back. They use a simple machine-assisted exercise program to target critical back and abdominal muscles to give you better support. Amazingly, the whole workout is only about 10 minutes long, twice a week (once a week after six months).

Within six weeks there was a noticeable diminishment in pain. Now, about eight months in, there is almost no pain at all. I feel terrific. I tried America’s Back in desperation because nothing else worked. I was starting to think I would need surgery. Not anymore. This method fixed it. I still have some minor lower back pain – no surprise given the compressed disc – but it’s not serious at all. I still play soccer, ski, and exercise every day without any problems.

One interesting thing about America’s Back is the business model. It’s a monthly subscription type service. You pay forty-something per month for the first six months (when you use it twice a week), then $20 per month thereafter. Also, they’re located at Wal-Mart, of all places.

Unfortunately I don’t think the business is doing that well. They closed the branch closest to me, so I have to drive about 25 minutes to get to it now. Fortunately it’s only once a week. I hope they stay in business. It’s a great model and the service works exactly as advertised.

A while back I actually met with the former CEO of America’s Back about options for expanding the business. He apparently was forced out by the board, but he’s got other plans that I think will pay off in the long run. (They won’t compete with America’s Back, though.) Maybe one of the thousands of venture capitalists and angel investors who read this blog can help out.  Contact me if you’re interested.

For some reason this post on Andrew Sullivan’s Daily Dish struck a chord with me. I started to send him an email, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought it’s something I should talk about here.

Before I delve into that, I need to put a couple of things on the table.

First, let me be crystal clear. I’m an atheist. Not an agnostic, not a believer that God is revealed to us in nature or in the cosmos or other vague stuff. I thought long and hard about belief when I was younger, and the older I get, the more certain I am that there is no god.

Second, this does not mean I hate Christians (or Jews or Buddhists, Zoroastrians etc) or think they’re stupid. My wife is a Christian. She was raised in an aggressively secular society (China) and only found her spiritual calling when she came to the US. Conversely, I grew up surrounded by Southern Baptists in Georgia, and was even baptised my self. Go figure.

So back to the business at hand. Here’s the quote that stood out:

“…Christianity is about the conquest of death, not its enlightened acceptance, and that in the absence of a resurrection, no pious words can make either the miners’ deaths or our own anything but a horror.”

This was in response to the question, how does one explain the deaths of 12 miners in the grand scheme of things, and to what degree are the owners of the mining company culpable? Far too often, in my opinion, religious people offer up bromides such as “the Lord works in mysterious ways” to explain away tragedy.

Such pieties are especially useful if fingers are pointing at you. The real value of pious Christian bromides is to the owners of the company that has such a rotten safety record. If you believe in an afterlife, all suffering -  whether by miners, tsunami victims or innocent Iraqis hit by stray missiles or fanatic suicide bombers – is relatively small compared to the infinite ecstasy that awaits us on the other side. And thus even the monstrosities of Hitler, Stalin and Mao are diminished relative to the greatness of God.

But if you believe if there is no afterlife, every ignored opportunity to relieve suffering – giving a dollar to the homeless guy at the interstate exit, sending relief aid to tsunami survivors, refraining from dropping bombs on Iraq – is itself a sin against your fellow man. You cannot dismiss these things with piety (”the Lord works in mysterious ways”) or gruff humor (”kill them all and let God sort them out”). You, in some small way, are responsible for continued suffering. And death is not conquered or transcended. Death is final, not a mere stepping stone to ultimate happiness. The dead are dead, and they will never, ever again experience the joy of a beautiful sunset, a home-cooked meal or the birth of a child.

Who can live with such guilt? It’s much easier to believe in God and Heaven, or at least karma.

One final clarification: this is not an attempt to assert moral authority on my part. I’m as guilty as everyone else when it comes to not doing my part to relieve suffering, or being relatively callous in the face of evil and tragedy. It’s not like I volunteered to go fight terrorists, or to help stop genocide in the Sudan, or even to work in a soup kitchen. I’m just pointing out that I believe religious belief has a dark side that is never mentioned in the culture wars.

(And BTW though the post that inspired this little essay wasn’t written by Sullivan, it’s consistent with the kinds of views he holds. He’s a great example of a thoughtful conservative who isn’t just a mindless bullhorn for the Republican party. I wish there were more voices like him in the blogosphere. Likewise for the Democratic side of the aisle.)

One of the few newsletters I read almost every week is Meryl Runion’s PowerPhrase a Week. This week she has a great take on New Year’s resolutions.

What if you wrote your New Year Resolutions in performance review phrases? For example:

• So diplomatic she can tell people when they’re wrong and they are grateful for the information.
• When deciding between the easy thing and the right thing, she chooses the right thing.
• Such a persuasive leader she could herd cats.
• Expects the best and prepares for the worst. Usually gets the best.
• Her writing is so compelling a procedures manual she authored would be a page-turner.

Performancing for Firefox is pretty slick. It’s so cool I’m using it to write this post.

Performancing for Firefox is a full featured blog editor that sits right within Firefox. Just hit F8 or click the little pencil icon at the bottom right to bring up the blog editor and easily post to your WordPress, MovableType or Blogger blogs.

Dave Taylor as an excellent interview with the Donna Tocci, the PR manager from Kryptonite, about the infamous Bic pen vulnerability and the role of blogs in spreading the bad news.

Perhaps the best part about it is the fact that the first comment challenged one aspect of the story and Donna jumped in to refute the claim.

If the difference between blogging and journalism is that bloggers just talk while journalists actually develop sources, Dave just demonstrated that there is a middle ground that captures the best of both worlds.

I just received the email below from my friend Nicole (who also happens to be a client). I hope you’ll help us reach the goal of 10,000 visitors to their site in the next three weeks.

Hi friends,

After years in hiding, I’m back in action and wanted to let you know what I’ve been up to. I’ve been designing a psychological board game called Shift that is finally, finally, on the market.

Four years later with the assistance of a graphic artist, a stand up comedian, Buddha, Gandhi, Marianne Williamson, Byron Katie and a multitude of others, we have a fun board game called Shift that shows people why they act the way they do. Shift’s main message is that what we feel internally shows up for us externally and that one small shift in thought can shift your whole life.

Just this week we were featured in the Rocky Mountain News [scroll down], The Denver Business Journal [registration required] and the Boulder Daily Camera. We are selling in about fifteen locations in the Boulder/Denver area including Borders and have the front window display at The Boulder Bookstore. We even have Shift game nights the 2nd Tuesday of the month at the Boulder Co-op and The Unity Church here has incorporated Shift game nights into their Course in Miracles study groups. Life coaches, HR professionals and corporate trainers have expressed interest in bringing the game into the workplace and psychologists and therapists are interested in using Shift for group therapy or one on one. What else? We’re made in the USA on 100% recycled product, we have an affiliate program where we support groups by giving 15% of the purchase price back to them (know any great groups we can support?), The Shift Foundation gives back 1% of our profits to organizations who empower others to make shifts and in February we will make our public debut at The Toy Fair in New York- I can’t wait!

Now, this is where I’m looking for a “little help from my friends.” I know you understand the power of the internet probably better than most. As we gain momentum toward the New Year and as most of us think about making changes in our lives, we want to get the word out about Shift. The idea is, this year change your thoughts, not your diet. Although it’d be great to have you all buy a game, the purpose of this email is to ask you to pass the word on to people you think might be interested.

Here’s our goal. I want us to have 10,000 unique visitors check out www.ShiftTheGame.com before the New Year. Let’s make it happen.

So, go check out the flash demo online, read our blogs or just learn more about Shift and why people are playing at www.ShiftTheGame.com and, if you feel so inclined, by all means, pass the word on. I’ve spent a long time on this because I’m pretty clear that it’s my life’s purpose. Our mission is to reach as many people as possible and remind them that they are loved. Please assist us in that mission.

Other than that, I’m very thankful. Things are very good and I hope all is well with you and that you have an absolutely wonderful holiday.

Thank you,

 Nicole

Nicole Casanova
CEO
Shift, LLC.
p. 303.530.0787
f.  443.659.2467
nicole@shiftthegame.com
www.ShiftTheGame.com

…is here: