An American businessman was standing at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat were several large yellowfin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish.

“How long did it take you to catch them?” the American asked.

“Only a little while” the Mexican replied.

“Why don’t you stay out longer and catch more fish?” the American then asked.

“I have enough to support my family’s immediate needs” the Mexican said.

“But” the American then asked, “What do you do with the rest of your time?”

The Mexican fisherman said: “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take a siesta with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life, senor.”

The American scoffed: “I am a Harvard MBA and could help you. You should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds you could buy a bigger boat and, with the proceeds from the bigger boat, you could buy several boats. Eventually you would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you would sell directly to the consumers, eventually opening your own can factory. You would control the product, processing and distribution. You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then LA and eventually NYC where you will run your expanding enterprise.”

The Mexican fisherman asked: “But senor, how long will this all take?”

To which the American replied: “15-20 years.”

“But what then, senor?”

The American laughed and said: “That’s the best part. When the time is right, you would announce an IPO – an Initial Public Offering – and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich. You would make millions.”

“Millions, senor? Then what?”

The American said slowly: “Then you would retire. Move to a small coastal fishing village where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take a siesta with your wife, stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos…”

Today, a true tale of heroism that takes place not in a war zone, nor a hospital, but in Victoria station in London in 2007, during a tube strike. Our hero – a transport journalist and self-described “big, stocky bloke with a shaven head” named Gareth Edwards, who first wrote about this experience on the community blog metafilter.com – is standing with other commuters in a long, snaking line for a bus, when a smartly dressed businessman blatantly cuts in line behind him. (Behind him: this detail matters.)

The interloper proves immune to polite remonstration, whereupon Edwards is seized by a magnificent idea. He turns to the elderly woman standing behind the queue-jumper, and asks her if she’d like to go ahead of him. She accepts, so he asks the person behind her, and the next person, and the next – until 60 or 70 people have moved ahead, Edwards and the seething queue-jumper shuffling further backwards all the time. The bus finally pulls up, and Edwards hears a shout from the front of the line. It’s the elderly woman, addressing him: “Young man! Do you want to go in front of me?”

A step-change in sustainable home building practice

As the Stern Review highlighted, there is now an overwhelming body
of scientific evidence showing that climate change is a serious and urgent
issue. In 2004, more than a quarter of the UK’s carbon dioxide emissions –
a major cause of climate change – came from the energy we use to heat,
light and run our homes. So it’s vital to ensure that homes are built in a
way that minimises the use of energy and reduces these harmful emissions.
Construction and use of our homes has a range of other environmental impacts,
created for example through water use, waste generation and use of polluting
materials, which can be significantly reduced through the integration of
higher sustainability performance standards within the design of a home.
More sustainable homes can also provide us with improved overall wellbeing
and quality of life.
The Code for Sustainable Homes has been introduced to drive a step-change
in sustainable home building practice. It is a standard for key elements of
design and construction which affect the sustainability of a new home. It will
become the single national standard for sustainable homes, used by home
designers and builders as a guide to development, and by home-buyers to
assist in their choice of home.
It will form the basis for future developments of the Building Regulations in
relation to carbon emissions from, and energy use in homes, therefore offering
greater regulatory certainty to developers. And in this era of environmental
awareness amongst consumers and increasing demand for a more sustainable
product, it will offer a tool for developers to differentiate themselves.
If we build the homes we need, then by 2050, as much as one-third of
the total housing stock will have been built between now and then. Current
house building plans therefore offer an important opportunity to build high
standards of sustainability into the homes we will use in the future. The
Code for Sustainable Homes will play a key role in enabling us to seize
this opportunity, and to build a future housing stock which both meets
our needs and protects the environment.
This booklet explains what the Code for Sustainable Homes is and how it
works. It also includes tables showing the criteria that assessors will use to
measure achievement of sustainability performance under the Code.

BREEAM is the world’s foremost environmental assessment method and rating system for buildings, with 200,000 buildings with certified BREEAM assessment ratings and over a million registered for assessment since it was first launched in 1990.

BREEAM sets the standard for best practice in sustainable building design, construction and operation and has become one of the most comprehensive and widely recognised measures of a building’s environmental performance.

A BREEAM assessment uses recognised measures of performance, which are set against established benchmarks, to evaluate a building’s specification, design, construction and use. The measures used represent a broad range of categories and criteria from energy to ecology. They include aspects related to energy and water use, the internal environment (health and well-being), pollution, transport, materials, waste, ecology and management processes.

A Certificated BREEAM assessment is delivered by a licensed organisation, using assessors trained under a UKAS accredited competent person scheme, at various stages in a buildings life cycle. This provides clients, developers, designers and others with:

market recognition for low environmental impact buildings,
confidence that tried and tested environmental practice is incorporated in the building,
inspiration to find innovative solutions that minimise the environmental impact,
a benchmark that is higher than regulation,
a system to help reduce running costs, improve working and living environments,
a standard that demonstrates progress towards corporate and organisational environmental objectives.
What does BREEAM do?

BREEAM addresses wide-ranging environmental and sustainability issues and enables developers, designers and building managers to demonstrate the environmental credentials of their buildings to clients, planners and other initial parties, BREEAM:

uses a straightforward scoring system that is transparent, flexible, easy to understand and supported by evidence-based science and research,
has a positive influence on the design, construction and management of buildings,
defines and maintains a robust technical standard with rigorous quality assurance and certification. ?
Who uses BREEAM?

Clients, planners development agencies, funders and developers use BREEAM to specify the sustainability performance of their buildings in a way that is quick, comprehensive, highly visible in the marketplace and provides a level playing field.

Property agents use it to promote the environmental credentials and benefits of a building to potential purchasers and tenants.

Design teams use it as a method to improve the performance of their buildings and their own experience and knowledge of environmental aspects of sustainability.

Managers use it to reduce running costs, measure and improve the performance of buildings, empower staff, develop action plans and monitor and report performance at both the single building and portfolio level.

 

Once upon a time a very strong woodcutter ask for a job in a timber merchant, and he got it. The paid was really good and so were the work conditions. For that reason, the woodcutter was determined to do his best.

 

His boss gave him an axe and showed him the area where he was supposed to work.

 

The first day, the woodcutter brought 18 trees

 

“Congratulations,” the boss said. “Go on that way!”

 

Very motivated for the boss’ words, the woodcutter try harder the next day, but he only could bring 15 trees. The third day he try even harder, but he only could bring 10 trees.Day after day he was bringing less and less trees.

 

“I must be losing my strength”, the woodcutter thought. He went to the boss and apologized, saying that he could not understand what was going on.

 

“When was the last time you sharpened your axe?” the boss asked.

“Sharpen? I had no time to sharpen my axe. I have been very busy trying to cut trees…”

If the circus is coming to town and you paint a sign saying
‘Circus Coming to the Fairground Saturday,’ that’s advertising.

If you put the sign on the back of an elephant
and walk it into town, that’s promotion.

If the elephant walks through the mayor’s flower bed,
that’s publicity.

And if you get the mayor to laugh about it,
that’s public relations.

If the town’s citizens go the circus,
you show them the many entertainment booths,
explain how much fun they’ll have spending money at the booths,
answer their questions and ultimately,
they spend a lot of money at the circus,
that’s sales. 

After many weeks with little rain, southern and eastern areas “remain at high risk of drought” in coming months, the Environment Agency said.

Despite some wet weather last month that helped improve river flows and reservoir levels, overall dry conditions meant water levels remained low and groundwater recharge was also slow.

On Friday night, officials warned that unless significant rain started falling soon “more drought permits and customer restrictions on public water supplies” could be introduced by the summer.

The Government quango admitted that continued drought conditions would have “significant impacts” on British habitats, agriculture and navigation.

Drought orders ultimately allow water companies to bring in hosepipe bans and other restrictions.

Water levels were also low in areas including Shropshire, Nottinghamshire Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, East Sussex and Kent.

Areas that still remain in drought include Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire, parts of Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and west Norfolk because of last year’s “very dry spring and autumn”.

“Groundwater recovery is very slow and soil moisture deficits increased this week meaning soils are still dry for the time of year,” its January Drought Management briefing stated.

“Parts of the east, midlands and south east of England are still vulnerable to drought in spring and summer 2012.

“We need above average rainfall for the remainder of the recharge period for the significant recovery of groundwater.”

It added: “These areas remain at high risk of drought later this year if we do not continue to have prolonged periods of rainfall.

“Drought could have significant impacts on the environment and habitats, agriculture and navigation. It may also lead to more drought permits and customer restrictions on public water supplies remain possible.”

Already Anglian Water and South East Water have been allowed to bring in drought measures, asking customers to have short showers rather than baths and pumping water out of rivers to replenish reservoirs.

Bewl Water in Surrey, that provides water for southern Water, has its lowest water levels in 25 years, leaving a muddy puddle where there was once a popular boating site.

Thames Water has also said it cannot rule out a hosepipe ban as it launched a campaign this week to try to prevent a drought.

The company said last year’s “exceptionally dry weather” meant the threat of a drought this summer remained “real”.

Last month residents throughout the South East were asked not to take a bath over Christmas to save water after the first winter drought order in almost 10 years was imposed.

More than 65,000 homes in Sussex was asked to take short showers instead of baths and not to wash the car with a hosepipe over the festive period.

The company, which also serves Kent, Surrey, Hampshire and Berkshire, was granted a drought order by Caroline Spelman, the Environment Secretary. She allowed it to pump more water from the River Ouse to refill a reservoir.

The only time the emergency measure has been issued in the winter before was in December 2003, in the North – West.

Richard Aylard, a spokesman for Thames Water, said water could be saved by being “water wise”.

“One dry winter does not necessarily lead to problems but two in a row can, which is why we are hoping for decent rainfall this winter, as well as urging people to be water-wise,” he said.

There was a blind girl who hated herself just because she was blind. She hated everyone, except her loving boyfriend. He was always there for her. She said that if she could only see the world, she would marry her boyfriend.

One day, someone donated a pair of eyes to her and then she could see everything, including her boyfriend. Her boyfriend asked her, “now that you can see the world, will you marry me?”

The girl was shocked when she saw that her boyfriend was blind too, and refused to marry him. Her boyfriend walked away in tears, and later wrote a letter to her saying:

“Just take care of my eyes sweetheart.”

A philosophy professor stood before his class with some items on the table in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with rocks, about 2 inches in diameter.

He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

So the professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles, of course, rolled into the open areas between the rocks.

He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else.
He then asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous “Yes.”

“Now,” said the professor, “I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The rocks are the important things – your family, your partner, your health, your children – things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full.

The pebbles are the other things that matter – like your job, your house, your car.

The sand is everything else. The small stuff.”

“If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued “there is no room for the pebbles or the rocks. The same goes for your life.

If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you. Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take your partner out dancing. There will always be time to go to work, clean the house, give a dinner party and fix the disposal.

Take care of the rocks first – the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.”

An ancient Indian sage was teaching his disciples the art of archery. He put a wooden bird as the target and asked them to aim at the eye of the bird. The first disciple was asked to describe what he saw. He said, “I see the trees, the branches, the leaves, the sky, the bird and its eye.”

The sage asked this disciple to wait. Then he asked the second disciple the same question and he replied, “I only see the eye of the bird.” The sage said, “Very good, then shoot.” The arrow went straight and hit the eye of the bird.

Unless we focus, we cannot achieve our goal. It is hard to focus and concentrate, but it is a skill that can be learned.