July 8, 2010
Remember online dating? Gosh, that seems so last century. An iPhone application which allows cruising gay men to locate one another instantly using Global Positioning System technology is now spreading to the heterosexual market.
This latest rage in online romance is called Grindr. Grindr is a free, downloadable iPhone app that lets you find “gay, bi, curious guys near you.” It’s sort of a sexual version of toptable — an iPhone app that allows you to search for all the restaurants offering a certain cuisine in your immediate vicinity. Similarly, Grindr provides a grid of who else in your neighborhood is using Grindr, what they look like and — tantalizingly — exactly how far away they are from you, measured in feet. If there’s mutual interest, you can begin to “chat” and . . . who knows? The night is young.
Grindr has been hugely popular since its release in March 2009. There are now more than 700,000 men in 162 countries using Grindr, with 2,000 downloading it every day. A BlackBerry-friendly version was launched last month. It’s so popular that its creator — the 33-year-old American-born Joel Simkhai — will be releasing a “straight version” by the end of the year targeted at heterosexuals.
Read the rest of this article at www.PoliticsDaily.com…
Image: i-Blue GPS 757 logger and TOKompass midlet via Flickr under a Creative Commons license.
3 Comments | 
Gadgets, Relationships | Tagged: monogamy, adultery, online dating, Grindr, Chatroulette, GPS for gay sex, GPS, iPhone app for gay sex, iPhone apps, Joel Simkhai, Grindr for straight people, Grindr for heterosexuals, toptable, old fashioned dating, dinner and a movie, technology and sex, social networking and STDs, Facebook and syphilis, e-affairs, email affairs, chexting, nexting, Prince, Darling Nikki | 
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Posted by delialloyd
June 28, 2010
3 Comments | Gadgets, Lifestyle | Tagged: Apple, World Cup, iPhone 4, recycling iPhones, recycling cell phones, ewaste, USA v. Algeria, longest tennis match in history, camping out for iPhone, iPhone sales, iPhone sales predictions, smart phones, sleeping with your cell phone, Treehugger, ReCelular, cell phone ewaste, pre-orders for iPhones, cell phones in developing countries, global demand for cellphones, cellphones in africa, iPhone 3g, iphone 4 launch, global ewaste | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
June 14, 2010
For my mother’s 79th birthday later this month, her four children are going to give her an e-reader. We have yet to decide which one to give her, but she’s very keen to join this trend.
As a frequent traveler, and avid reader, she finds that she’s always lugging 12 hard-cover books wherever she goes (often London to visit me!). So she’d like to lighten her load. Apparently, several of her friends already have e-readers and they are all thrilled with them.
I have mixed feelings about this present. On the one hand, as someone who — by her own admission — barely has running water and electricity, my mother is not exactly what you’d call techno-savvy. So there is a dragging-her-into-the-21st century quality to this gift, which, as someone who spends all day online, I welcome with open arms.
On the other hand, I’m also wary of the onslaught of e-readers. I worry about what happens to our society when we no longer read those great artifacts of the 20th century: books.
Read the rest of this post at www.PoliticsDaily.com…
Image: 23/365 plus 1 [eReader] by The Hamster Factor via flickr under a Creative Commons license.
6 Comments | Books, Creativity, Gadgets | Tagged: Verlyn Klinkenborg, kindle, roger ebert, book groups, reading, Books, Laura Miller, ereader, hardcover books, travelling with books, brain development and twitter, brain development and novels, kids reading books, having books in your house, children reading, reading to children, ereaders, ereaders vs. books, Nicholas Carr, The Shallows, War and Peace, brain development and internet, contemplative thought, importance of libraries, social value of reading, commercialization of reading | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
April 28, 2010
Every Wednesday I offer tips for adulthood.
We’re moving in exactly one week. And so I’m pretty single-minded right now. When I’m not actually doing something connected to the move, I’m thinking about the move.
I’ve fessed up before to just how very much I hate moving. (Some would say irrationally so. I name no names.) But I’m also trying to take my own advice from last week’s volcanic ash crisis and remind myself that “Ce n’est pas gràve.”
And it really isn’t all that “gràve.” In fact, there are a lot of positives that emerge when you move house and they aren’t just the simple pleasures of decluttering.
In that spirit, here are five ways to stay upbeat during a move:
1. Reconnect with your kids’ childhood. One of Gretchen Rubin’s four splendid truths is that “The days are long but the years are short.” She employs this principle to capture what it’s like to be a parent: how those long, seemingly endless days of reading Good Night, Moon and potty-training dissolve – overnight – into adolescence. Her point is that you really need to savor your kids’ childhood while it lasts because while it may feel long in the day to day, it’s actually fleeting. (I had this same realization last year while re-reading Peter Pan with my daughter.)
Moving helps you to savor their childhood. Because of the many things you unearth as you re-open those frightening storage containers that you hid in the depths of your closet when you first moved in are the myriad art projects, report cards, essays and birthday cards that your kids have done over the years. My own favorite was a picture that my son drew when his (quite progressive) nursery school did a unit on Martin Luther King. I’d forgotten all about this picture, which used to hang above the desk in my old office. It depicts a sort of Monsters, Inc.-style version of MLK addressing an audience with a disproportionately large microphone while saying “I hope that one day Black people and White people can be friends.” Priceless.
2. Reconnect with your own past. You may not have any kids. But you’ll still be forced to take a trip down memory lane as you yank stuff out of those dusty old cupboards. I found a pair of my father’s orthopedic shoes. He left them here on his last visit to London in October of 2008. We saved them so that we could give them back to him on his next visit. But he never came back. He died, suddenly, of a heart attack in March, 2009. Back when he was alive, I hated those shoes. They were large and clunky and a visible reminder that the body of a man who used to take jump shots in our driveway well into his 50s was slowly giving out on him. (It ended up giving out on him much more quickly than we expected.) But seeing those shoes again actually made me happy. They were a tangible reminder of his presence in our lives. And I needed that.
3. Allow yourself to let go of the *shoulds*. I’ve written before about how many of us go through life tethered to an endless list of things that we feel we ought to be doing, yet never quite manage to accomplish: making photo albums, reading the Bible, joining a gym. During the course of going through my files the other day, I came across some notes from a Hebrew class that I took while pregnant with my son and which I’ve schlepped around with me for (gulp) ten years. The thought was that some day I’d get my act together and really learn Hebrew. Well folks, I still haven’t let go of the goal of figuring out my relationship to Judaism. But I think that I’ve finally acknowledged to myself that despite my best intentions, that process will not entail learning Hebrew (a least for the foreseeable future.) Toss. Ditto my hopes of ever actually using that over-sized fish poacher that we got for our wedding. After twelve years doing noble service as a de facto spice rack, I think it’s finally time for me to dispatch that particular item from our lives. Phew.
4. Imagine new vistas literally and figuratively. One of the most exciting things about moving is that it offers the prospect of a whole new neighborhood to discover. There will be new cafés, new book stores, new dry cleaners – not to mention new neighbors! I love change so imagining these things is always a way to motivate myself when I just don’t feel like calling the Gas company to request new service or whatever arduous task lies at hand. It’s a bit like singing My Favorite Things from The Sound of Music, if you’ll forgive the cheesy Musical analogy. And change in one’s physical scenery can also furnish a new take on life psychologically. Out with the old and in with the new, and all that good stuff. I really believe that.
5. Trust that things will be better once you make it to the other side. Like childbirth, if you really remembered all the gory details, you’d never move more than once in your life. And yet, most of us do it several times. So, yes, moving is painful but it also does come to an end. And when the clouds part, there’s a whole new world to explore.
*****
For those of you who’d like to hear my latest thoughts on this unbelievably exciting British election, please head on over to PoliticsDaily.com.
Image: Statue of Dr. Martin Luther King by zug55 via Flickr under a Creative Commons license.
4 Comments | Aging Ungracefully, Gadgets, Lifestyle, Nostalgia, Parenting, Self-development, Tips List | Tagged: British elections, childbirth, Childhood, children's art projects, connecting with your kids, connecting with your past, days are long years are short, de-cluttering, death of a parent, discovering new neighborhoods, father's death, fish poacher, fleeting nature of childhood, goodnight moon, Gretchen Rubin, imagining new vistas, joys of de-cluttering, Learning Hebrew, learning to speak Hebrew, letting go, letting go of "shoulds", Martin Luther King, meeting new neighbors, MLK, Monsters Inc, moving, my favorite things, orthopedic shoes, pain of childbirth, potty training, re-reading peter pan, relationship to Judaism, remembering your kid's childhood, sound of music, trip down memory lane | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
March 30, 2010
1 Comment | Gadgets, Lifestyle, Parenting, Trends/Studies/Research, Work | Tagged: video games, Fifa09, executive function, handwriting, Civilization, children, computers, computers and children, home computers, computer skills, computer literacy, digital divide, computer addiction, computers and violence, computers and sex, siphilis, ofer malamud, christian pop-eleches, Pew Internet and American Life Program, computer vouchers, romania, computers and short attention spans, computers and brain development | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
March 10, 2010
Every Wednesday I offer tips for adulthood.
I mentioned yesterday that we will soon be moving.
Did I mention how much I absolutely *hate* moving? If I had my fictitious wife, I think I’d put “orchestrate all moves” at the top of her list of duties.
Not everyone feels this way about moving. I think it’s a great example of something where there are just two kinds of people. One friend of mine, for instance, loves to move because it enables her to throw away all the things in her house that annoy her. My husband doesn’t actually mind it either. It gives him an excuse to re-allocate our many gadgets within an entirely new space. (Aha! So the Dustbuster really *can* fit on top of the television! Whaddya know?)
But for me, moving is the very embodiment of hell. So if, like me, you dread moving house, here are five tips to make the process easier:
1. Get boxes beforehand. Lots of them. This sounds obvious but it’s amazing how many boxes you need to carry out even a small move. Fortunately, after all of my work on the PTA soliciting donations from various local businesses, most of the merchants in my neighborhood on a speed-dial relationship with me already. So I don’t foresee a problem obtaining boxes when I need them. But if that weren’t the case, I’d begin collecting now. Buying them from Mailboxes Etc. really adds up. Trust me!
2. Make a Change of Address List. Right now – while you’re thinking about it – sit down and make a list of every possible place that needs to know that you’re moving. Not just obvious places like your kids’ schools and your doctor’s office, but all of your frequent flyer programs, any utility companies who send you a paper bill, your grocery store if you have food delivered, and especially your local voting authority. There are way more than you think.
3. Declutter Now. I’m not a natural de-clutterer. I tend to favor putting things into neatly stacked piles, only to ignore them until said pile topples over under the weight of freshly sorted material. And particularly with this move we’re about to embark on, it looks like we’ll be moving into a considerably larger space. So it’s really tempting to just hang on to that PlayMobil Castle and all its attendant turrets, even though my son hasn’t played with it for years. But that would be a huge mistake. Because there are so many things – clothes, toys, kitchen aids – that we simply don’t use and must go buh-bye. (Unsure of what to toss? Here are 8 specific tips from the decluttering guru, Gretchen Rubin.)
4. Have someone else pack for you. Sadly, we can’t afford to pay someone to pack up for us this time round. But I have done that twice in my life and my husband often comments that those may well have been the two happiest days of my life. (Too bad all I owned at the time was a suitcase, a guitar and a futon, which did take a bit of zing out of the pleasure, it must be said.) But there is *nothing* like having a couple of people whisk into your house and pack up your belongings while you sit there sipping a cup of tea with your feet up.
5. Buy some Xanax. Really, just do it now. You’ll thank me later.
*****
Speaking of moving, Aiden Donnelly Rowley had an interesting post over the weekend on Ivy League Insecurities about what it’s like to sell a house and that bitter-sweet feeling that accompanies the open house. Have a look…
Image: Packed Boxes Upstairs by Arthaye via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.
13 Comments | Consumerism, Gadgets, Lifestyle, Tips List, Wisdom of the Ages | Tagged: aiden donnelly rowley, boxes, change of address forms, decluttering, dustbusters, Gadgets, Gretchen Rubin, hiring someone to pack for you, ivy league insecurities, mailboxes etc., moving, moving house, open houses, packing, playmobil castle, xanax | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
February 8, 2010
Awhile back, I posted on five household items you can do without, as well as five household items you *can’t* do without. Both posts were inspired by the myriad tchotchkes that pepper our house, courtesy of my gadget-loving husband.
I got to thinking about this very issue once again this weekend on a somewhat grander scale when two things that had gone missing from my life unexpectedly reappeared.
The first was a dishwasher. As I noted when talking about why we all need a wife, my dishwasher died about six weeks ago. Ever since, I’ve been washing dishes for our four-person household by hand. On Friday, the new dishwasher finally arrived and I’ll say it here first: God, do I love my new dishwasher. Yes, I could have managed just fine without one. But I literally feel *blessed* everytime I place a dish in its new home, rather than piling them up in the sink.
The second thing from a former life which reappeared over the weekend was – oddly enough – a health club. When I first moved to London, I wrote an essay for the Guardian Weekly about how the cost of living was so high in this city that my husband and were forced to become Green by default. It wasn’t so much that we embraced Green living as that we had no choice; overnight, certain things had just become prohibitively expensive. So we gave up those staples of middle-class American life: two cars…a tumble dryer… and our health club memberships. And both of us started exercising outdoors; he cycling and I running.
But this past weekend my son was invited to a birthday party at a health club. While the kids played, the adults got a free workout. I went nuts. I climbed a StairMaster, I used an elliptical trainer, I lifted some weights…heck, I even took a sauna. And I topped it all off with a lovely cappuccino in the adjoining cafe where – posh mama that I am…(not) – I purchased some long overdue yoga gear. In a word: spectacular.
But unlike my new dishwasher, I came away from the whole health club experience thinking that – much as I enjoyed being in a fancy gym for two hours – I’m not sure that it’s something I actually need in my life. I’m actually quite happy just going running. I like the feeling of freedom it affords. I like the odd assortment of people and animals that I encounter along the way (which in my hood’ runs the gamut from Helena Bonham Carter to wild foxes). I like the cold air waking me up as it hits my face. And most of all, I like that it doesn’t cost a penny (pence).
In short, I learned that I could live without a health club.
As we grow older, it’s worth reflecting now and again on what we need in our lives to make us happy and what we can do without.
How about you? What creature comforts could you let go of?
*****
I was absolutely thrilled to get this shout out from the blog This Bird’s Day about my essay “Married to a Metrosexual” in the forthcoming Chicken Soup For The Soul: True Love. It made my day!
Image: day1DSC_0055.jpg by journojen via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.
22 Comments | Consumerism, Gadgets, Lifestyle | Tagged: Gadgets, cycling, green living, married to a metrosexual, chicken soup for the soul, washing dishes, wives, dishwasher, health clubs, what can you life without, doing without something, creature comforts, StairMaster, Elliptical Machine, Helena Bonham Carter, foxes, This Bird's Day, household items, needing a wife, running, going running, gyms, metrosexual, yoga wear | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
August 19, 2009
OK, so I think we’ve all been there.
Sooner or later, whether while living in near-squatter conditions when fresh out of university or just when you think you’ve finally settled into the semi-hygienic status of middle age, they invade. If you’re lucky, it’s just a few mice. If you’re unlucky – as I’ve been over the past week or so – it’s the other white meat. Either way, it sucks.
I remember once in graduate school when my roommates and I came home to find a dead squirrel on our kitchen floor. One of my roommates – a gentle, ecologically-minded Finn – burst into tears. She was terribly upset about the unfortunate fate of “the animal” and had to shield her eyes. My other roommate – a more pragmatic young woman from Peru – grabbed the thing buy its tail and tossed it into the garbage. “Hey man, I’m from Peru,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “We eat this sh$% for dinner.”
Boy, do I wish I had her with me now…
About the only positive thing that’s come out of this harrowing experience is that it’s united me with numerous friends on Facebook suffering from similar infestations. At this point, I think we could form some kind of Pest Control support group and set up a Facebook page of our own. Lord knows the rats have already done something similar. (“Hey guys, c’mon over to the Mews tonight…great crumbs!”)
And so, for this week’s tips list, here are five ways to deal with rodents, born of experience together with a little help from my friends:
1. Traps. There are two options here. The first is the old-fashioned snap trap where a giant spring snaps down on their head. I must admit a certain partiality to this rather Draconian technique for catching – and killing – a mouse or rat. Or, if you’re a kinder, gentler soul, you can go for a humane trap that enables you to set these darlings free once they’re caught. Gotta admit, that last one lost me with its photo banner.
2. Pets. Some say cats are best because mice (at least) can’t stand the smell of them. Others say only a dog can deal with rats. Me? I hate pets. But I can see getting a hold of one of these babies – a rat-eating plant. Now that’s a pet I could live with.
3. Sirens. Who knew? Apparently, mice and rats can be repelled by powerful, ultra-sonic waves. No fuss. No muss. We just bought a few of these to give them a test-drive.
4. Poison. OK, I know it’s evil. But it works. And I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed watching those tiny pellets go from green to white after they’d been nibbled.
5. Alcohol. As with so many things, alcohol is often your best strategy. I’d recommend taking a good, healthy swig of whatever suits you before you dive into that coat closet to look for bodies.
*****
I was delighted that yesterday’s post in PoliticsDaily.com about the U.S. postal service was picked up by this blog of transportation professionals. I’m learning more about this issue by the moment!
Image: Rats by Yaatra via Flickr under a Creative Commons License.
9 Comments | Gadgets, Lifestyle, Tips List | Tagged: humane mouse traps, humane rat traps, mice, pest control, rat poison, rat-eating plant, rats, rodents, snap traps, transportation industry, ultra-sonic waves, US postal service | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
April 1, 2009
In last week’s tip list, I posted about 5 Household Items You Can Do Without.
When my husband read that post, he said: “You know, a lot of people might not find those odd.” To which I responded: “C’mon! A pickle picker? Really?” But I stand corrected. To date, the running count on (self-declared) pickle picker owners is three.
UPDATE: THE OFFICIAL COUNT IS UP TO FIVE.
So this week, in a nod to my gadget-loving husband, I’m going to post about 5 Household items I’ve learned – courtesy of him – that you can’t do without…or at least can’t do without once you’ve had one yourself:
1. Recipe Holder – You know how whenever you’re making a recipe, you either can’t hold the page open, can’t see it from where you’re cooking and/or something splatters all over the cook book, rendering the recipe illegible? Search no more. Get one of these babies and you can just prop it up on a table while you cook.
2. Lap Desk – Don’t get too excited, folks. This is just a lap desk, not a lap dance. It’s a small, flat surface you can write on when you want to work somewhere other than a desk – e.g. your favorite chair, your bed, etc. Yes, I know. There’s such a thing called a book. But it’s often hard to locate a book that’s large enough to hold whatever it is you’re writing. And if you’re working on multiple sheets of paper at once – grading papers, for example, or cross-checking lists – this comes in really handy.
3. Vertical Chicken Roaster – Here’s the one we own. For reasons that elude me (gravity??) chicken cooks better – i.e., is more juicy and succulent – when you cook it vertically. And who doesn’t like succulent chicken? (I’ve always thought it would be great to come up with a list of food descriptors that really turn people on and off. I’m a sucker for anything that’s “pan seared,” but loathe the term “drizzled.”)
4. Lever Model Corkscrews – Yes, these are expensive. But if you drink wine with any regularity, you will welcome this easy, one-stop method for removing the cork without leaving any of the bits inside. Added bonus: they make the deltoid-challenged among us feel like strongmen. Also make great wedding presents.
5. Roncilio Silvia Espresso Machine - Also pricey. But if you drink espresso/cappucino/latte and care about how it tastes, once you start using Ms. Silvia (as some friends affectionately refer to theirs), you’ll (a). never go back to Starbucks and (b). easily earn back the money you would have spent there in a month. True believers should add the Roncilio “Rocky” grinder to the mix.
For more household gadgetry, check out burbiajuice.
And if you’re feeling angry, be sure to vent your frustration through this gadget (hat tip: freakonomics).
6 Comments | Consumerism, Gadgets, Lifestyle, Tips List | Permalink
Posted by delialloyd
Last week was quite a week for novelty and inspiration. Alongside the 
Many parents have become hard-wired into thinking that computers are bad for children. But are they? New research suggests that it’s actually a mixed bag.
