It's all about confidence, baby.

Amongst the sea of doom & gloom that is the mainstream media, I saw this and thought it was worth sharing...


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Hope you're enjoying today's little winter encore.

Fend off Tough Times with Small Comforts.

While rummaging thru the bad news of the day, I came across this little bright spot. It's especially bright if you make ice cream or rent DVD's for a living...

Americans Reach for Small Luxuries amid Sour Economy


"In hard times, chocolate is comforting and affordable," says Fabrizio Parini, senior vice president of marketing at Ghirardelli, where 2009 sales are projected to surpass 2008.

The need to fend off tough times with small comforts — whether laced with sugar or blanketed by fur — runs deep in human beings.

"It's a basic human trait to have indulgences in one's life, things that reinforce your identity and keep you moving forward," says Eric Almquist, head of global consumer insights at Boston-based consulting firm Bain & Company, which recently produced a study called The Consumer of the Future.

And my personal favorite..

"Ice cream, music, DVDs all will persist," he says, noting that the Bain study found that "vice" purchases are still popular.

Of course, I'm still pulling for a rebound. And Spring.

TED, the opposite of the MSM.

With cable tv, the daily newspaper, wifi in the shop, a desktop an arm's length away from my batch freezer, and a shiny new Ipod Touch in my pocket, it's just way too easy to know exactly what's going on in the world at any given moment. I suppose this wouldn't such a bad thing if all the news was rosey and shiny. But as I'm sure you've noticed, bad news is what sells. And it must be selling well because the bad news seems especially bleak and plentiful these days. The sky over the stock market is truly falling, right along with the housing market, the job market, and the credit market. The farmer's market would probably be falling too, if it were not mercifully spared by the current occupation of winter. With all this negative energy bombarding us every day, I'm surprised we don't all implode into our own pigpen clouds of bleakness.

Too dramatic? It's late, another winter mess approaches, and it seems the deep seated angst over my 401K has taken control of my keyboard.

In any event, I've tried to quit the news, (Dr. Weil calls it a 'news fast' in his book, 8 Weeks to Optimal Health), but with such ready and constant access, it's not so easy. I'm sure you know what I mean, my good FaceBook friends.

So as an alternative, along with taking my vitamins and eating less red meat, I've been hunting around the world wide one in search of more positive information sources. I think I've shared this one already. I've recently discovered another. It's called TED. It's a giant collection of amazing and interesting talks from TED conferences held all over the world. I'm sure few of us have the time (or the $4000) to attend one, but fear not, all the talks are right up there on their site. Free of charge to peruse in your pajamas. You can even get an app for your Iphone and watch 'em while you're in line at the RMV.

I'll let you go find the talks that interest you, should you be inclined, but here are a couple, just to wet your appetite...

Secrets of Success in 8 words, by Richard St. John (this one will only take 3 minutes of your workday)...


Aimee Mullens on running (an amazing & inspiring woman)...



A founding father of the self-help movement, love 'em or hate 'em, Anthony Robbins...

There's plenty more where that came from. Just click on Talks, and you can search by 'most inspiration', 'most jaw-dropping', 'most emailed'...

You've probably been there before, but if not, check it out sometime.

"We're never more beautiful than when we're most ugly." Inspiring stories about everyday people from Chris Abani.

And if you frequent some other sites that are of a positive bent, feel free to drop them into a comment. Thanks in advance.

To Mars Alice!

All bad sitcom references aside, I gotta say these are cool times, technologically speaking, we live in. Recessions, economic stimulus debates, & stock market implosions be darned. I was skiing with a buddy last week when he pulled out his I-phone and in about 8 seconds, we were looking at a trail map of the entire ski area. And on that map was a dot showing where exactly we were on the trail. From a satellite. My buddy was telling me his I-phone can tell him how fast he's skiing (although I'm not sure how you could actually pull it out, punch the keys, and look at it without crashing into a tree), point to which trail to take next, and give him the weather for the rest of the afternoon anywhere in the world, all the while playing his new Slightly Stoopid album in his ears. The future, it seems, is indeed here.

So I guess I shouldn't have been surprised to read in today's news that you can now Google Maps of Mars. I'm not sure, aside from sheer curiosity and science trivia, why you'd have a need to look for directions on Mars. The housing market here on Earth is bad enough. And I suspect it's either really, really hot or really, really cold most places on Mars anyway.

In any event, in these times of technology explosion where you can punch in the name of your favorite band into Pandora and hear their songs in an endless mix of songs from bands that sound like them all day long without interruption (or cost!), why shouldn't we now have access to directions on Mars?

If only technology could progress as impressively on pressing matters such as curing cancer & other deadly diseases, developing alternative energy sources to power our cars & charge those I-phones, and even perhaps the discovery of a space age material to fix potholes that's better than that loose hot tar stuff that sticks everywhere but in the pothole...

Alas, such feats still seem elusive, so in the meantime I suppose a good game of Ilitebrite on your Iphone while drinking a cold one after a great day of skiing will just have to suffice.

And perhaps a virtual stroll on Mars... Google Earth 5.0

How I start my day.

There's always a ton of stuff to do before I open up shop every day - sweep, put out the chairs and tables, take the covers off the ice cream, turn on all the warmers, clean the bathroom (yes, being CEO of your own little corporation isn't all glitze and glamour), and a host of other 'chores'. Most of them I do without even thinking about them, like scratching an itch. There is one check on the setup checklist, though, that does require me to actually flip on my brain. It's when I search for a 'quote of the day' for the little whiteboard behind the cash register. I don't know how many people actually read it or appreciate it, once in a while someone will thank me for doing it. It's just become one of those little morning exercises that pushes me past all those doomy headlines into more positive territory. Like a good run, a jazzercise class, or a bowl of grapenut ice cream, it's just a better way to start the day than reading about how frightening Britney Spears was on the VMA's the night before. It can be a little tricky to find a quote short enough to fit on the board, but that just means more time wading around in affirmations and positive thoughts from famous, infamous, and influential people. Hard to complain about that.