Word: spartanism
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...foundation is as spartan in structure and style as an Internet start-up. There are just 25 employees, in contrast to 525 for the venerable Ford Foundation. The Gates Foundation staff members wade through more than 3,000 serious funding requests each month. And that doesn't count the perpetual-motion machines and colonic-cleansing devices with which promoters could save the world if only Bill and Melinda would throw a few million dollars their way. Worthy projects are filtered up by Stonesifer, Dr. Gordon Perkin and Bill's dad for review by Bill and Melinda...
...majority of boomers, your career has hit a brick wall, you haven't saved enough, your pension is underfunded, your health is deteriorating, even the medical advances that will probably extend your life will, in an especially cruel paradox, probably mean that late life will be meaner and more spartan. You'll have a hard time selling the house that you considered your nest egg (the generation behind just won't have enough buyers). And your neighbors' children, simultaneously burdened with the cost of your aging and victimized by the one thing you'll hold onto--your political power--will...
Though both writers are in their late 30s and happily married, each with two kids, they are a study in contrasts. In their spartan Beverly Hills office, the reed-thin Alexander works at his neatly organized desk while the beefy Karaszewski lies on a nearby sofa, surrounded by a mess of scattered papers, barking out lines of brash dialogue. Both are cocky yet self-deprecating and say that writing about offbeat subjects gives them a sense of creative liberation and inspiration. "We've embraced all these weird true stories because they've allowed us so much freedom," says Karaszewski...
That even goes for where you sit. Amazon offices are scattered across Seattle: the flagship Art Deco Pacific Medical Center, the Pike Street skyscraper, the original Columbia building and so on. Stunning mountain-flanked views of Lake Washington and Puget Sound are the only luxury the spartan corporate aesthetic allows. Employees are crammed two to a bare-walled office and work at Bezos-designed desks made of old doors with legs stuck on them (design director Helen Owen bets me lunch that she will still have a door-desk in five years, even if Amazon flourishes...
...been going ever since. "The minute I get there, something inside of me relaxes," she says. "And after I get back, I continue to feel blissed out for a long time." The Sivananda Ashram Yoga Retreat on Paradise Island, open year-round, is not for everyone. The accommodations are spartan, the meals simple, and the schedule--well, meditation begins at 6 a.m., followed by yoga at 8 and a vegetarian brunch at 10. But for those who want to experience the healthful pleasures of this gentle exercise for mind and body--no experience necessary, all ages welcome--in spectacular tropical...