Just found an old email that a friend sent to me. I remember thinking it was amusing then, so here it is:



Start with a cage containing five monkeys. Inside the cage, hang a banana on a string and place a set of stairs under it. Before long, a monkey will go to the stairs and start to climb towards the banana. As soon as he touches the stairs, spray all of the other monkeys with cold water.

After a while, another monkey makes an attempt with the same result all the other monkeys are sprayed with cold water. Pretty soon, when another monkey tries to climb the stairs, the other monkeys will try to prevent it.



Now, put away the cold water. Remove one monkey from the cage and replace it with a new one. The new monkey sees the banana and wants to climb the stairs. To his surprise and horror, all of the other monkeys attack him. After another attempt and attack, he knows that if he tries to climb the stairs, he will be assaulted.



Next, remove another of the original five monkeys and replace it with a new one. The newcomer goes to the stairs and is attacked. The previous newcomer takes part in the punishment with enthusiasm! Likewise, replace a third original monkey with a new one, then a fourth, then the fifth. Every time the newest monkey takes to the stairs, he is attacked.



Most of the monkeys that are beating him have no idea why they were not permitted to climb the stairs or why they are participating in the beating of the newest monkey.



After replacing all the original monkeys, none of the remaining monkeys have ever been sprayed with cold water. Nevertheless, no monkey ever again approaches the stairs to try for the banana. Why not? Because as far as they know that's the way it's always been done around here.



And that, my friends, is how a company policy begins.

I voted in yesterday's Washington State Primaries. For the most part, the democratic candidates I chose won by a landslide (BTW, what was Warren Hanson thinking? Warren has run for political office many times before as a Republican and tried to run as an independent candidate, however the two major parties here in the Washington legislature made it too difficult by law, therefore he is running for the first time as a Democrat. -- lame)



Interesting statistics on voters in King County:



% of Precincts Reported - 97%

Ballots Counted - 199,404

Democrats - 132,105

Republicatns - 55,228

Liberatarian - 2,332

Registered Voters - 1,006,839

Turnout to Date - 20%

Hmm. Alex, who hosts my website, just started working at findory, which looks a lot like Google News to me. Apparently, they use some personalization technology (which Google does not do) to deliver the news that's more relevant to you. Hmm..will have to play around with it more. Of even more interest to me is their Findory Blogory---now this is interesting. Similar in nature to their news section but all the links are to relevant personal weblogs. Check it out.

I met up with an interior designer today to go over color schema and furniture placement in my place today...wow, it's overwhelming to just sit and think about colors for 4 hours straight. Near the end, I was like "yeah yeah, just pick a color and tell me what it is". Quite an interesting process this was--we spent the first hour or so walking through all the rooms and talking about them so she could get a sense of my space and functionality. By the time she left, we had little blue painter's tape on a few walls with the names of some Benjamin Moore paint colors written on them. Some of the colors picked out for me: Beaujolais Red, Gloucester Sage, Hampshire Gray and Dash of Pepper. Apparently, the designer has me picked out as a "dramatic, moody" type and I need colors to match that sort of persona...so nothing boring or conservative. Most of the colors are of a darker palette...I can't wait to see how they look in here! Next: getting a bid from a painter. Hmm..wonder what this is going to cost me.



Just came back from my second Xgym workout: not bad. In fact, I have to admit it felt a lot easier to do, even though there was a bit more weight added. I had a different trainer and I think his "splinters" were far easier and shorter to do.



Party'd up in Vancouver for Labor Day weekend with Kabir and a bunch of his high school buddies--had fun and met new people. Get this--one of the guys (Brent) forgets his passport and we'll all prepared for a long wait at the border. Instead, the border patrol just asks who forgot their passport, then he does a check on Kabir's passport (lame) and lets us pass through! He doesn't even ask Brent if he's a US citizen. I couldn't believe how easy that was. That would never fly if I forgot my passport.

This has been movie week for me. I'm finally chilling after 3 months of constant social activities and birthdays. For the last three nights, I've gone out to the theaters, watching Control Room, Open Water and Napoleon Dynamite.

I got back from an amazing few days last weekend at Jigna & Matt's Wedding in Portland, my first ever Indian wedding (though, from what I'm told, it was a rather toned down wedding compared to your average day-long Indian wedding ceremony). We all woke up early on Saturday, getting dressed in our colorful saris and kurtas, placing bindis in our foreheads and shimmer on our arms. We arrived at the country club to a perfectly gorgeous day for a wedding--the sun was out, everyone was smiling. As friends arrived, we all gasped at how cool everyone's outfit was...I'm so happy that we all decided to get dressed up in Indian dress for this event. Saris and kurtas are so incredibly comfortable...yet anyone looks awesome in these clothes. The ceremony began and then we all saw Matt and his brothers..and soon after, a stunning Jigna. She couldn't be any more beautiful that day...it was perfect. You could tell how incredibly happy she was inside to finally be marrying Matt (they've been engaged for about 4 years) and to have her entire family (flying in from Mauritius and London) there to share that moment with her. The event, from start to finish, was so fun as so many of our Seattle friends were there. We all celebrated afterwards, going out to dinner and finishing the night dancing to Bollywood fusion hip-hop at a local club called Fez with all of Jigna's cousins, brother and Matt's brother & cousin. Congratulations Matt & Jigna! It was a really beautiful wedding and an extremely fun weekend.



I hired a housecleaner to come once a month just to check it out. This morning, Jonathan came over and started cleaning..really nice guy. I came home to a really clean home--loved it! I've learned from talking to friends that more and more of them grew up with a housecleaner...and lots of them actually have current housecleaners. I never realized that! Do you have regular housecleaning?



I've also decided to be insane and get in shape by joining the X Gym, which several friends of mine have raved about (Eric, Nadine, Tim..) It was either that or going to a personal trainer at my regular gym, but I figured I'd probably end up spending about the same amount of money..although XGym is probably better. This is going to really whoop my ass into shape. Let's see about it..first appointment is tomorrow and I'm already scared...