This op-ed article appeared in today’s LA Times. It is especially interesting because there is a similarity between the celebrity charity work done by people like Bono for Africa, and the work done by Al Gore for the Environment. Notice how the articles points to the way in which celebrities distort facts–an important point given that they influence public opinion and policy. In any case, the article raises some interesting questions about celebrities and charitable causes. On the one hand, they can shed light on an issue that otherwise might go unnoticed. On the other hand, they can mislead the public, offer an incomplete vision, or simply distort reality to better serve their pet-cause.

At the moment I am at my parent’s house in Los Angeles, house and grandma-sitting while my mom and dad vacation in Italy. In all honesty, I haven’t been doing much at all aside from working on this website and researching. It’s really hot here, and I find it hard to motivate myself to do a lot here since my life is really in Providence now. (Well, we have moved into Providence already, but we have yet to make many friends and all that good stuff, so we are kinda half-living in both cities for now) In any case, my current plans are to return to Providence on July 16th. On the 17th my good friend Jared Auld (who rode across the US with me) will be coming to visit me. I am really excited because I haven’t seen him in two years and he is one of the people that I most respect. After that, I will move on with my plans to build a worm-composting bin at the apartment. I also hope to train on my bicycle, as I have begun riding with the Brown Cycling Team, and I would like to do a race or two with them.

Congratulations: you have taken a big step by venturing into my virtual world. I’m really excited to finally get this site up and running, and it is my sincere hope that I will able to share exciting ideas, thoughts, ponderings, musings, cogitations, ruminations and the like. Even if I don’t achieve that lofty goal, I’m sure that I’ll have a good time doing it!