A while back Vanguard published Dilbert’s guide (Scott Adams) to Personal Finance: Make a will. Pay off your credit cards. Get term life insurance if you have a family to support. Fund your 401(k) to the maximum. Fund your IRA to the maximum. Buy a house if you want to live in a house and you can afford it. Put six […]

There is a moving article in the New York Times this morning about a couple (Wang Zhijun and Li Wanzhi) that survived last Monday’s earthquake in China.  The article reminded me of the book, The Long Walk the story of a group of Siberian prisoners who escaped and trekked 4,000 miles to their freedom in India.

Showtime launched a new series last year called, The Tudors starring Jonathan Rhys as a young King Henry The VIII.  At first, I didn’t pay much attention to the show (partly because I am not a Showtime subscriber), but when season one become available on DVD at my local library I became an immediate fan.  Rhys is pretty convincing as the […]

The Wii Fit is receiving a ton of media attention as of late and was featured on the Today Show this morning and in the Fashion and Style section of the NY Times on Thursday (why not the Sports section?).  I’m not convinced the attention is warranted but if the video game system can get American’s just a few inches off […]

Okay, it’s my tenth post and I should tell you a little more about my last name and the domain name of this site, Scordo.com.  Both my parents hail from the extreme southern province of Calabria, Italy – think of the tip of the boot (they were born there and could see Sicily from the Mediterranean coast near their 200 […]

Well, the search is over! Heather Armstrong runs a blog called, Dooce.com which has recently been all over the media.  Armstrong also just published a collection of essays entitled, “Things I Learned About My Dad”  I read Heather’s blog pretty regularly and I’m not quite sure why, but I think it has something to do with how engrossing and ever changing the […]

There’s lots of talk about how traditional classroom learning is dead, see:   However, and I don’t know about you, but I really enjoy the small lecture type experience (ask questions, get a response back kind of thing).  And I think deep learning is not about text messages, Facebook, or web enabled distance learning (they’re not bad instructional tools), but a liberal […]

I’ve always told friends, colleagues, and family that the New Yorker is essential reading.  After all, where else can you, as an amateur intellectual, get the best in short stories, profiles, feature stories, book and movie reviews?  The New Yorker is not only essential reading, but critical to continuing one’s life-long education. The latest book review from The New Yorker […]

Remember making that mix tape for your girlfriend in high school?  The mix tape was a right of passage for US teenagers in the 1980’s and now Muxtape has brought all that  pre pubescent musical excitement to the web.    I’ve been listening to “SumAgency’s” mix and loving it!

Who says that today’s college student is only interested in making money?   According to the New York Times, college students are still opting for the “examined life” and pursuing philosophy as a major – learning critical thinking, presentation, and writing skills along the way.  Looks like those bearded guys reading Kant and Rorty weren’t wasting their time after all.