He talked about the old times in Revere and how times were nicer. He mentioned the street cars that passed through the city.

I am just 10 years more than half his age, but I remember the street cars. One aspect of local public transportation that I always liked is that it made people part of their community. Local public transportation brought a community together; people met and talked with each other on the street cars. It made life a bit slower which was a good thing. My dad also said that people were in a rush to go nowhere and we see that every day based on the way people drive.

Certainly we can’t go back in time; that is life. But it would be nice if people were part of their communities and people were more civil. That part of our past we can bring to the present.

And to my friends, I appreciate your friendship. As my dad said, “Give people roses while they can still smell them.”

People are addicted to their cellphones, laptops, and other technologies. We constantly check our email, take phone calls at all times of the day and night, and we text and Facebook constantly. These technologies and services are important but are they that important that they consume our lives?

I want to encourage people to join me in my “Make Shabbos Personal” campaign. You do not have to be Jewish or be religious. The goal is simply to encourage people to schedule some time each day for themselves. Shut off your cellphone during lunch. Use that time to read a magazine or book, or to just reflect and relax. Keep your weekends email and Facebook free; spend time with family and friends. For the spiritual or religious person, take some time for a spiritual workout. Say a prayer, read from the Bible or other religious books, and most importantly, “live the Bible” – take time and act as the Bible tells you to live your life.

My dad always said that people are in a rush to go nowhere. Deadlines are important but so are your health, your well-being, and your quality of life. Schedule some time for yourself.

Please share your thoughts with me.

• If you could add any amendment to the Constitution, what right would it give Americans?
• The First Amendment states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” When schools prohibit prayer in school, does this prohibit free exercise of religion?
• Should the Constitution include an amendment specifying official political parties?
• Should amendments have expiration dates in order to force Americans to review their rights?
• The Third Amendment states. “No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.” This amendment was written in response to the British forcing the Colonists to house soldiers at the time of the American Revolution. Is this amendment still necessary?
• Does the Constitution apply to illegal immigrants?
• Men wrote the Constitution. How would the Constitution be different if women wrote it?

In the spirit of respectful debate, please share your thoughts with me.

According to their website,

 Jefferson’s visionary antidote for societal stasis in American democracy, as he told the historian Sam Kercheval, was to take periodically “as a tally, every provision of our constitution, and see if it hangs directly on the will of the people.” Those provisions that turn out not to reflect the people’s will, he believed, should be entirely redone. “Let us then go on perfecting [the Constitution],” he urged, by supplanting “those powers which time and trial show are still wanting.”

Constitution Café springs from this idea: What if Jefferson’s radical proposal was put to the test in some way today? To be sure, he had in mind that this constitutional makeover would be undertaken every 20 years, and over 200 years have passed since he first proposed it. But better late than never.

I’m in the process of starting a ConstitutionCafe chapter in my community. How about you?

I hope you have the opportunity to hear this talented baritone during your commute. Take a moment to visit his MySpace page.

I love pens. This affair began when I was a child; my dad worked in the post office and brought home many promotional pens from the local businesses. Many were generic cheap pens but some companies distributed better pens like those made by Schaeffer.

However, the Bic pen is the one pen that has stayed with me from my school days to my work days. The classic Bic Crystal was a staple of every student. The Bic Stic is very popular both in offices and as a promotional pen. I love them.

Through the years, I have flirted with Parker pens, Cross pens, Esterbrook, PaperMate, fountain pens, and so on. However, there is something special about the Bic, whether it be the traditional Bic Stic or it’s many brother and sister pens. They are inexpensive but write well.

For other Bic aficionados, Bic has a Facebook page, a family-oriented, educational website, and Wikipedia has an interesting article about the Bic Crystal pen that was ubiquitous throughout my childhood.

One exception to my preferences is the Flipboard app for the iPad. It presents your Facebook friends’ links and your Twitter subscriptions in magazine format. It is a great way to read this content. With Flipboard, I actually read all the tweets that I subscribe to.

How does an author or a publisher create an emotional soundtrack? The author has the endless variety of language. The publisher? Typefaces. There are many typefaces that can change or enhance the tone of a story. There is more to typefaces than the ubiquitous Arial and New Times Roman that we see in Word documents.

Every typeface has it’s own personality. Imagine reading Dracula that uses a Blackface typeface.

A story that is told from the perspective of an adult and a child could use a standard typeface for the adult perspective for example, Georgia.

The child’s perspective could be told using a typeface such as Treehouse.

eBook apps such as the Kobo and Nook allow you to change both the typeface and its size. Both offer a limited selection based upon readability. This is understandable. The Kobo iPad app offers Georgia, Baskerville, Trebuchet and Verdana. The Nook offers a slightly larger selection: Georgia, Joanna, Times New Roman, Ascenders Sans, Gil Sans, and Trebuchet MS. Click here to see samples of these typefaces. However, since the reader has the ability to select his or her preferred typeface, it would be nice to have a more varied selection.

Handwriting, hand print, and calligraphy can also act as a soundtrack to a story. The LiveScribe pen captures handwriting, print, sketches, whatever pen marks are placed on paper. One could also scan handwritten documents. While my handwriting is atrocious, many people have beautiful handwriting or calligraphic skills. Would people read a handwritten PDF? Comic boos, Manga, and graphic novels use this technique.

Obviously, the key is legibility. There are many ways to express a story. Technology offers many choices. Let’s explore all of them.

All images in this post are from Wikipedia.

I downloaded the Kobo app after reading an article about it’s social reading capabilities – sharing what you read with others, Facebooking and tweeting your thoughts about a page of a book or a chapter, and so on. Initially, I thought this might be another use of updating your status with info that is important to you but that most people really don’t care about. Then, I thought that this might be the Internet version of a global book club.

The Kobo app came with a free version of Dracula and a few other books. It’s a good story, I like the diary format, and it is a popular enough book that I thought even the casual reader would find interest in my updates.

My first post resulted from the Places functionality. Simply, when the story talks about a country, city, or other place, you can use the Places functionality to post that you just visited Transylvania reading Dracula on the Kobo. The feature that I enjoy most is the ability to select a section of text and tweet it. It can be an interesting description, a funny passage, etc.

Are people responding to my posts? Yes and no. Nobody has commented about my posts but new people are following me on Twitter.

What is the value of social reading? There are educational values. Students can share comments about a book. More importantly, with planning, two classes, maybe one in England and one in Boston can read the same book. Sharing comments from two different cultures can bring valuable perspectives about a book and it’s contents. Different cultural perspectives about a historical book, a book about a current event, a philosophical book, religious book, etc. can become an exciting learning experience.

eBooks and social networking open many possibilities. It is just a matter of how you use them.