Reading the news again

Current raves: Steve Madden flats, basking in the sun, big comfy couches, skirt season, setting up my new duke.edu email account

Back in New York City, I used to spend the first two hours of my day reading a variety of news websites to catch up on what happened after I left the office. My must-reads were:

NYT
Bloomberg
WSJ
China Daily
McKinsey's Global Institute
Dealbreaker
Abovethelaw
Perezhilton
Reuters
Washington Post
NY Mag


...and then whatever links were emailed to me while I was asleep. After I resigned, during the two weeks I had in Manhattan and for my first month in Beijing, I developed an aversion to news. I didn't read the NYT for 3 or 4 weeks in a row, I never checked Bloomberg, and I only bought one copy of the Wall St. Journal (which I didn't read and used to soak up the orange juice I spilled on my desk one morning.) It was a serious patch of time that I needed to myself, and somehow, I found my life went on without having to know what the Somali Pirates were doing or how big of a hole Chrysler was in. (Granted, I did buy the China Daily three times to make sure I didn't walk out into like a massive epidemic)

This nonchalant boycotting of news did provide for a couple awkward instances where people would be like...did you hear about *insert current event*?? I'd mumble...oh yeah, that, crazy isn't it?...while feeling somewhat ashamed that I hadn't touched a major newspaper in days after considering myself highly knowledgeable for so long. It was a great feeling to be out of the loop though; I realized that U.S. fiscal policy no longer affected my personal mood for the day. Yet, it was bad timing because this coincided with President Obama's first 30 days in office, and to this day, I still have no idea what the heck he is up to back in the States. (yes, you can hit me)

Somehow the dislike of news wore off, and I find myself reading the NYT website at least twice a day now, and the other week, I even checked out Bloomberg.com a few days for the raw economic data feed. psycho...

I'm active on twitter though, and many of the people I follow tweet useful news links (while I tweet about what I'm doing). This H1N1 (flu A, swine flu) hoopla/pandemic/media gangbang got on my nerves a lot, but now its started to scare me a little. My heart dropped the other day when I read that Mexico City has closed most of its schools, restaurants (take out only), libraries, public squares, etc)

China is so damn crowded and hygiene seems to take a back seat sometimes because its just not possible to keep everything clean. If that thing hits China? Holy shit. Seriously. I know that many more people die of the common flu each month, but still, I'm getting a little uncomfortable following H1N1's transmission path in the news.

H1N1 hit Hong Kong yesterday...This article in today's NYT made me simultaneously chuckle nervously while slathering on antibacterial gel.

While the United States has stockpiled treatment courses of Tamiflu, a powerful flu medicine, equal to about a quarter of its population, and France has a stockpile equal to half its population, Hong Kong has a stockpile equal to three times its population.

Six years after SARS paralyzed this city and killed 299 of its citizens, Hong Kong is not taking chances with swine flu.

HK H1N1 Article

PLEASE GOD. KEEP IT AWAY FROM MAINLAND CHINA. Its already hitting too close to home with confirmed cases in Texas. (I miss the Lone Star State wherever I am in the world. Home is where the heart is. College Station, Texas: "Everybody is dreaming big, that's how it goes, every day America, a little town, great big lives.")

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In more exciting news, many of you know my fond preference for Hillary Clinton. I think she's the most interesting public female figure alive. Despite the crap she's had thrown at her, she's kept fighting and knows how to pull a few punches herself. She's raised an incredibly intelligent and successful daughter. Not her fault for marrying a man who can't control himself in that way...

The NYT had a short (too short, imo) article on her being busy beyond belief these past 100 days.

Hillary Rodham Clinton insists her transition from presidential contender to secretary of state has been seamless, and in one respect, it is hard to argue with her: she still hustles like a candidate down a few points in the polls the week before Super Tuesday.

In this, the latest mutation in a career of many changes, Mrs. Clinton’s days have become a whirl of diplomatic talks, White House meetings and foreign travel: 74,000 miles and 22 countries as of last Sunday.

At 11 p.m. last Saturday, after 13 hours of meetings in Baghdad, Mrs. Clinton’s aides dozed on the military transport plane flying back to Kuwait. She sat alone at the front of the plane’s dimly lighted cargo bay, squinting as she plowed through a pile of briefing papers.

HRC rocking as SecState

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This week, I set up my Duke Law School and Fuqua Business School email account. Psyched!!

I absolutely adore how every Duke student website has a specific section relating to Basketball related news. God, what a culture! I feel like jumping up and down and yelling in excitement.

I was wondering how itd be going to school in the south again after 6 years up north. I'm a fairly liberal person when I'm in the south, yet, I am still moderate when compared to some of the kids I went to school with at Harvard. Its all relative, I guess...

I got an email from a Dean in charge of graduate student campus life about how this anti-gay group from TN was coming to Durham to protest LGBT students. The Dean said that its such a shame that this group is bringing their hate to campus, and these kinds of people thrive on attention. Therefore, to answer them by not answering them, Duke was sponsoring a picnic on a big lawn to celebrate the LGBT students on campus and encouraging all students to wear their "Love=Love" t-shirts in support. :) Such a huge smile on my face after reading that. These next few years are going to be amazing. I heart Duke.

It was still weird seeing Duke University next to Harvard University on my FB networks. Its just for so long...I associated any type of higher learning with H and all of my collegiate memories are in Cambridge. I'll obviously never forget Harvard, but these upcoming years at Duke are going to be priceless in their own way.

Duke's campus has been voted by several different sources in the US as America's most beautiful campus.