What I’ve learned since moving to D.C. (some of which should be obvious): 0046

2251.  The Napoleon House’s (NapoleonHouse.com) first occupant was Nicholas Girod, the mayor of New Orleans from 1812 to 1815.  He offered his home to Napoleon in 1821 as a refuge during his exile.  He never came;

2252.  New Orleans is (like) Key West on crack;

2253.  You can (still) smoke in bars in New Orleans;

2254.  Supposedly, you can get a free drink and a souvenir glass on your birthday at Pat O’Brien’s (PatOBriens.com) in New Orleans.  You just need to show them your ID (when you order) at the bar;

2255.  Where can you find a black midget, wearing glasses and missing a few teeth, as a shot girl?  The answer is: Bourbon Street in New Orleans;

2256.  Jonathan Brown (JonathanBrownPoetry.tumblr.com) performing live reminds me of Eminem;

2257.  Supposedly, Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop Bar (LafittesBlacksmithShop.com) in New Orleans is the oldest structure (i.e., built between 1722 and 1732) used as a bar in the U.S.;

2258.  Canal Street, in New Orleans, reminds of Washington Avenue in South Beach;

2259.  Every day, “The Beach on Bourbon” (BeachOnBourbon.com) in New Orleans has a 3 for 1 Happy Hour;

2260.  The blonde shot girls on Bourbon Street (in New Orleans) can be very persuasive;

2261.  Don’t (sarcastically) tell a woman you’re about to leave and you wanted to give her one last chance to slap you. . . . She just might;

2262.  If you return the souvenir glass from your “hurricane” to one of the (side) bars at Pat O’Brien’s (in New Orleans), you’ll get $3.00 back;

2263.  Scholars estimate that there are as many as 27 million slaves today; the majority is not in forced prostitution, but instead in other forms of exploitation (though rape and/or other forms of torture are often tools for coercion);

2264.  Slavery permeates northern India, where children, to help pay off their family’s exorbitantly high debts to corrupt local businessmen, hunch over in the dark for hours at a stretch as they weave carpets on looms until their fingers bleed;

2265.  Slavery is embedded in Nepal, where children and families in debt bondage spend years making bricks by hand, never making enough money to pay off their debts;

2266.  Slavery is also rooted in Brazil, where poor farmers are lured to remote forests and forced to work in hot kilns to produce charcoal for the production of pig iron, which goes into the steel of the cars we drive and the appliances in our kitchens;

2267.  Slavery is found in West Africa, where the cocoa industry obtains about half of its world crop, in part from child labor, for the chocolate we enjoy and the cosmetics we use;

2268.  Super Bowl Sunday is the largest annual sex trafficking event in the U.S.;

2269.  Every Tuesday from 5 o’clock to 11 o’clock, Bar Pilar (BarPilar.com) in D.C. has taco night.  For $12.00, you get a (chef’s choice) meat, four (corn) tortillas, (diced) onions, (chopped) cilantro, salsa roja and salsa verde;

2270.  There’s a great view of the White House from the top of the Hay-Adams Hotel (HayAdams.com) in D.C.;

2271.  How do you know you’re cheap?  The answer is: You sneak in rum and vodka into bars in (empty) 5-hour Energy bottles;

2272.  The average academic journal article is read by only seven people;

2273.  Happiness is not the belief that we don’t need to change; it is the realization that we can;

2274.  The belief that we are just our genes is one of the most pernicious myths in modern culture–the insidious notion that people come into the world with a fixed set of abilities and that they, and their brains, cannot change;

2275.  There are a lot of farms in Delaware;

2276.  Delaware seems really flat;

2277.  There’s no sales tax in Delaware;

2278.  The (ocean) water in July is pretty cold in Dewey Beach, Delaware;

2279.  On the beach, an umbrella is (the) key to surviving the scorching, midday sun;

2280.  You know it’s windy when the beach umbrellas are flying out of the sand;

2281.  I must be (pretty) delusional (and stupid) to think that a gorgeous (and much younger) woman, whom I just met and may have spoken to for less than five minutes, would be interested in me;

2282.  It seems to me that (a lot of) military guys (i.e., current and former) don’t believe in monogamy when they’re away from their wives/girlfriends and/or on deployment;

2283.  A recent study published in the Journal of Economic Psychology suggests that people may be as much as 10% more willing to trust someone who smiles;

2284.  There’s a lot of marijuana at a Phish concert. . . . The last time I smelled that much (marijuana), I was in Amsterdam;

2285.  Everyone who touches you, teaches you;

2286.  “Murphy” isn’t necessarily a guy’s name;

2287.  Gary Rissling played for the (Washington) Capitals and (Pittsburgh) Penguins.  In the 1983-84 season, he had 297 penalty minutes in 47 games for the (Pittsburgh) Penguins;

2288.  Studies have found numerous ways we can rewire our brains to be more positive, creative, resilient, and productive – to see more possibility wherever we look;

2289.  Bugsy’s (BugsysPizza.com) in (Old Town) Alexandria has an all-you-can-eat pizza (and salad) buffet from 11:30 AM to 3:30 PM on weekends and holidays for $7.95;

2290.  We do not know the limits of human potential.  Just as we can’t know the limit for how fast a human can run or predict which student will grow up to win a Nobel Prize, we still don’t know the limits of our brain’s enormous potential to grow and adapt to changing circumstances.  All we know is that this kind of change is possible;

2291.  Studies have confirmed numerous ways we can permanently raise our happiness baseline and adopt a more positive mindset;

2292.  People can become happier, pessimists can become optimists, and stressed and negative brains can be trained to see more possibility;

2293.  Far too often, just having the knowledge is not enough to change our behavior and create real, lasting change;

2294.  There is no single meaning; happiness is relative to the person experiencing it.  This is why scientists often refer to it as “subjective well-being” – because it’s based on how we each feel about our own lives.  In essence, the best judge of how happy you are is you;

2295.  So how do the scientists define happiness?  Essentially, as the experience of positive emotions – pleasure combined with deeper feelings of meaning and purpose.  Happiness implies a positive mood in the present and a positive outlook for the future;

2296.  Martin Seligman, the pioneer in positive psychology, has broken happiness down into three, measureable components: pleasure, engagement, and meaning.  His studies have confirmed (though most of us know this intuitively) that people who pursue only pleasure experience only part of the benefits happiness can bring, while those who pursue all three routes lead the fullest lives;

2297.  Perhaps the most accurate term for happiness is the one Aristotle used: eudaimonia, which translates not directly to “happiness” but to “human flourishing;”

2298.  Happiness is the joy we feel striving after our potential;

2299.  The chief engine of happiness is positive emotions, since happiness is, above all else, a feeling;

2300.  Barbara Frederickson, a researcher at the University of North Carolina and perhaps the world’s leading expert on the subject, describes the ten most common positive emotions: “joy, gratitude, serenity, interest, hope, pride, amusement, inspiration, awe, and love;”