I just read an article about nine companies who have never had layoffs. Lately, it seems like every time I turn on the news, they are talking gloo and doomand irresponsible CEOs driving their businesses into the ground and screwing over their workforce so they can throw enormous parties for their wives on the company dime with dancing midgets and champagne waterfalls. So it’s nice to read about companies that are fiscally conservative, who care about their employees. A pattern that emerged in the article is that most of this companies are family or privately-owned. That makes a lot of sense to me. Too often the people who are in charge of making financial decisions for the company don’t know or care more about it than its stock price.
As the sole employee of my own company, I’m free of the layoff conern, but not of the “going out of business” one. I’ve been reading lots about how to survive in bad economic times, and it’s nice to read something that doesn’t scare the pants off me about the impending apocalypse. 
Speaking of saving the world, does anyone else (other than me and Julie) love the animated show AVATAR: THE LAST AIRBENDER? I just discovered this (sadly, due the to the controversy over M. Night Shyamalan casting the live-action version entirely with white people, depsite the fact that all the characters on the show are recognizably Asian and come from distinct and recognizable Asian cultures) and I LOVE IT. It’s funny and exciting and creative and the world it builds is such a beautiful blend of fantasy and borrowing from legend and culture. (Those of you who know more about the unicorn series are already aware that I’m a huge fan of that sort of fantasy creation.) For example, one character, Aang, is the “Avatar” of the title. According to the legend, the Avatar is the one person in all the world who can learn to “bend” all four elements (earth, air, fire, and water). When the Avatar dies, he is born into the next of the four tribes of the world in a particular pattern. They recognize the avatar because, as a child, he will pick up the belongings of the previous avatar, which is a tradition of Tibetan Buddhist lamas as well. (Aang has the appearance of a Buddhist monk — he wears saffron robes and shaves his head). I’m about halfway through the first season now, and the other two main characters are from the “water” tribe, who seem similar to the Inuit people. (By the way, they cast “Jasper” from Twilight as the Inuit boy, which, ::goggle::). The coolest part so far is that all the different “bending” styles are based on different types of martial arts. I’m no martial arts expert, and I woudn’t think you’d be able to do this in cartoons, but you can totally see how different the fighting styles are. It’s amazing.
Anyway, I’m totally loving it. It’s available on DVD if anyone is interested.
January 31st, 2009 at 5:39 pm
My kids watch Avatar all the time, but I’ve never seen it. I’ll have to Netflix the series.
I’m watching less and less cable news these days. The drama has been to abrasive on the lining of my tummy.
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January 31st, 2009 at 8:13 pm
If you really want to see different fighting styles in animation, try Kungfu Panda.
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January 31st, 2009 at 8:16 pm
My daughter got me hooked on the series when it first started and we’ve since started collecting the episodes.
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January 31st, 2009 at 11:04 pm
I will have to tell Jeffrey that you are now a fan of Avatar. He is an avid viewer. He makes me tiVo it.
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January 31st, 2009 at 11:06 pm
Maybe because I don’t allow my daughter to have a television in her room, but if she’s watching a show, I’m watching a show. Avatar is one of our favorites and yes, the martial arts styles are very distinct. Diana, have you gotten to the episode with the Kioshi warriors yet? They’re the coolest. But it is very funny and stylish and it just gets better and better as the series goes on.
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January 31st, 2009 at 11:12 pm
BTW, I had no idea they were making a live action version. Why? The animated version is new! I mean, if they want to do it in 20 years, have at it…but is Hollywood so hard up for new ideas that they have to copy a cartoon that only had it’s last season a year or two ago?
As for the non-Asian actors…that perplexes me and doesn’t. Mostly, it saddens me. I’m not a fan of M. Night Shyamalan, either. You’d think he wouldn’t be afraid of ethnicity–and would, in fact, embrace it.
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February 1st, 2009 at 4:26 pm
I’ve never heard of it but it does sound my kind of thing. It reminds me of a series I adored as a child, I think it was called The Deathgate Cycle and it revolved around air, earth, water and fire – it was fabulous!
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February 1st, 2009 at 5:59 pm
Julie, I don’t understand why they would wait 20 years — people are big fans now, why shouldn’t there be a movie? They didn’t wait 20 years to put out the Harry Potter films.
Alexa, I don’t think I’ve heard of that one.
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