Here's My Prescription

Everyday of our life, we need somethings to keep us going. Actually, a lot of things, but to reduce it to its barest minimum, we need Food, Shelter and Clothing. But that is just on the physical side - the body. If you believe, as I and a great many others do, that we are not only body but mind and spirit as well, then certainly that basic need increases. I do not want to venture into the spirit side - that is something that is personal and individual, based on our own beliefs - but I can share with you my prescriptions for the mind.

In summary, my prescribed Daily Dose for the Mind consists of the following:

1. A Bit of Knowledge - something new that we learn each day.
2. A Joke - something to that gives us smiles, (better yet, laughter) and amusement.
3. An Inspiring Story.

So, without much ado, here is my initial prescription for today:

First Dose: A Bit of Knowledge

Source: “The Origins of Hyperlink” - from a book by Biz Stone, “Who Let the Blogs Out” published in 2004.

This may already be known to most of you, veteran bloggers out there, but for a newbie like me, this is a new bit of information - so I am counting this as part of the First Dose. And in summary, here it is:

Biz Stone is described in the Foreword written by Wil Wheaton as: “Biz Stone is to blogging what Marconi is to radio . . . one of the very first people to bring blogging to the masses”

In Chapter 1, Biz Stone describes a castle built long ago by a particularly important sect of Buddhist monks. This castle had a very private room called the “Room of Knowledge,” where an elaborate web of strings crisscross throughout the space in a random pattern which “looked like a ridiculously complex and giant game of cat’s cradle.” The strings would link books to other manuscripts, drawings, and occasional small statue or wood carving. “There was more than sixty thousand feet of string in the room and more giant rolls of it out in the shed waiting to be used.” The monks, who were the only ones with access to this room were were actually developing the physical manifestations of hyperlinks - the “lifeblood of the web, and, by extension, the blogs...” Let me not steal the thunder from the story - you can read it for yourself.
Biz Stone traces the origins of the hyperlink from Vannevar Bush, visionary scientist who in the 1930s wrote about a machine he called Memex in an essay titled “As We May Think,” Douglas Engelbart who in 1940s picked up Bush’s concept and subsequently created the “Online System,” the legendary prototype of the “hypertext,” Ted Nelson who in the 1960s coined the term “hypertext” and ultimately Tim Berners-Lee who in the 1980s-1990s spearheaded a project called “WorldWideWeb,” which eventually led to the birth of what we now know as the internet.

That is as far as I will go with the “Knowledge Dose” - you can do your own research and reading on the rest of the story.


The Second Dose: A Joke

Source: Eleanor Doan’s “The Speaker’s Sourcebook of 4,000 Illustrations, Quotations, Anecdotes ...”published in 1960.

Definition of a “Bachelor”

“A bachelor is a man who has cheated some woman out of a divorce.”

“A bachelor never gets over the idea that he is a thing of beauty and a boy forever.”


The Third Dose: An Inspiring Story

Source: From “Fragile Moments” edited by Phyllis Hobe in 1980, a short story by Arve Hatcher.

Recently after a heavy blizzard my car was stuck in a snowpile, and my efforts to get it moving only dug its wheels in deeper and deeper. Down the street came a muscular teen-ager carrying a shovel. When he saw my problem he promptly got to work and set the car free.
“Many thanks,” I said gratefully as I reached to hand him some folded bills.
“No way,” he said with a smile. “I belong to the DUO Club.”
“Never heard of it,” I replied.
“Sure you have,” he grinned. “it’s the do-unto-others-as-you-would-have-them-do-unto-you club.” And with a wave of his hand and another big smile, he was on his way.