At the Davos Economic Forum in Switzerland the world complained that China doesn’t buy enough stuff from the rest of us.
China’s response: “Just sell more things to us cheaper than made in China!”
Reported on the NY Times Davos Diary….
American Apparel, operator of the largest garment factory in the USA, is known for its controversial, racy ads. Now they are venturing into the controversial world of politics. Their new ad takes immigration head on.
In a new series of ads, American Apparel is moving in a political direction. The cause is immigration reform, and the ads say in part that the status quo “amounts to an apartheid system” and should be overhauled to create a legal path for undocumented workers to gain citizenship in the United States.
I don’t feel educated enough to praise or criticize AA’s stance in the complex immigration debate. But I do think that if more clothing companies and/or brands would not try to distance themselves from…
From Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat about the promise of China’s future:
In China today, Bill Gates is Britney Spears. In America today, Britney Spears is Britney Spear – and that is our problem.
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#45 Research on YouTube
And then killing time on YouTube
…
Wall Street Journal reporter Hannah Karp email interviewed me while researching her story The Stay-at-Home vacation. The article is about people who are concerned about their carbon footprint choosing not to fly, even if it means missing a siblings wedding or dream vacation. I take a slightly different stance:
That’s misguided, says Kelsey Timmerman, a 28-year-old Muncie, Ind., scuba-diving instructor and author. If he’d never been to the Great Barrier Reef, he wouldn’t care as much that it is dying from rising ocean temperatures. Decisions he makes as a consumer and a voter offset emissions resulting from his travels, says Mr. Timmerman, who visited Bangladesh, Cambodia and China last year. “Travel helps us care more about our world.”
I’ve heard rumblings of this debate, but had no idea…
It’s my first conversation with my editor at Wiley and he’s giving me lots of great ideas of how to structure the book and, in general, the direction I should take it. He’s scanning through the chapters, which are named “My (insert article of clothing.”
He says: I’m looking at My Underwear…
I say: (irrepressible school girl giggle)…sorry….
The New York Times has an interesting article on the origin of the fortune cookie, but I just couldn’t get over this…
Ms. Nakamachi, a folklore and history graduate student at Kanagawa University outside Tokyo, has spent more than six years trying to establish the Japanese origin of the fortune cookie…
6 years!? Researching the fortune cookie!? Is the world a better place? Does anyone really care about the fortune cookie – that much? I’m really not sure if I can think of a less worthwhile topic to research for 6 years. One month – maybe. A year – that’s pushing it. 6 years – no way.
Get your online fortune cookie (more fortune, less cookie) HERE. Share ’em if you like….
I did it. I responded to the Chinese businessman that wants to supple me. Here’s what I wrote:
In all honesty, I think you are most excellent. To be truthful, I have not doubt that you are legal sellers. I’m not lying when I say that I’m intrigued by your low priced, quality products. If you could supple me with more information about your outstanding products, I would be forever in your debt.
Your friend,
Kelsey
It will be interesting to see what happens. I’ve never responded to SPAM before. I’ll keep you posted….
The blog I read the most is science fiction writer John Scalzi’s Whatever. Yesterday he posted 10 things that I’ve done that you probably haven’t. At first I thought this would be an exercise in one-ups-manship, but it’s more of a revelation of how unique, coincidental, and just plain stupid our individual lives are.
Here’s my list.
10 things that I’ve done that you probably haven’t
1. Been sprayed by a skunk
2. Watched David Blaine take a leak
3. stuck a sweater defuzzer on my tongue
4. held my breath and dove to 100’ beneath the Atlantic Ocean
5. Spent the night in Dracula’s Castle
6. been molested by a drag queen
7. touched a shark
8. melted a penny in flowing lava
9. been zorbing
10. taken 19 kids and one old man into a Bangladeshi amusement park for $67
How about you?…
Publisher’s Marketplace made the official announcement today. If you can’t read the pic here’s what it says:
14 January, 2008
Non-fiction Narrative: www.whereamiwearing.com blogger Kelsey Timmerman’s WHERE AM I WEARING?, in which the author learns about the garment industry by following the Made In China/Bangladesh/Honduras tags of a complete outfit and goes to the countries to visit the factories that made his clothes and talk to its workers, to Richard Narramore at Wiley, for publication in 2008, by Caren Johnson at Caren Johnson Literary Agency (World).
It just goes to show that any idiot with a pair of Jingle These underwear and a propensity to blow money on strange around the world quests can become an author.
Living the dream baby. Living the…
