Oprah reminded us on her last show that we've all kept gratitude journals together. Actually, we may have missed a day (or 27), but we're getting back on the wagon. Every Friday, we'll be sharing what's making us happy right here. This week, we're thankful for...

• Hugs from mama cat
  
• The sign-language dance to "Hold On" at the end of Bridesmaids
• This little boy, who knows everybody can ride a bike "if you believe in yourself" (via Grist)
  
• Poetry doesn't have to rhyme; it doesn't even need words  (via Everynone)
  
• A love story, told by finger puppets
  
• El Portrero Trading Post's dried red chile molido which goes great on tacos, in sauce and in scrambled eggs (the store has a recipe)—just keep out of the reach of children, pets, and anyone else lacking a taste for atomic heat
  
• Short summer workweeks (gracias, Memorial Day)!
  
  

The decade-old diagram that told us to eat lots of grains, less meat, some vegetables and a minimal amount of sweets and fats has moved into a retirement community, off to play golf with the Marlboro Man and other long-gone icons. Its replacement: a plate, half devoted to fruits and vegetables, a little more than a quarter for grains and less than a quarter for "protein." There's a little circle off to the side for dairy. While I applaud the USDA's endeavors to help Americans eat a more balanced, healthy diet, I still have a few questions...

1. How big should my plate be?

2. What are they trying to tell us without actually saying? The word "meat" doesn't appear anywhere on the diagram. Is using "protein" instead code for "eat less meat" (not that there's anything wrong with that, as we learned from Michael Pollan)?

3. Isn't there protein in vegetables, grains and dairy? So why is there a separate section for protein on the plate?

photo: Thinkstock

At the therapist's office, the man with the clipboard has been replaced by a woman. That may not seem like a problem, but it is, as Benedict Carey, one of our favorite science reporters, concluded in a recent article in the New York Times. Carey reports that among mental health professionals, men earn only one in five of all master's degrees awarded in psychology, account for less than 10 percent of social workers under the age of 34, make up 10 percent of the American Counseling Association's membership and "appear to be declining among marriage and family therapists." The lack of male therapists presents an obstacle for men who are open to talking to a professional about their problems...but only if that person looks and sounds like them.

If this describes someone you love, you could tell him that, in terms of the research, a psychologist's gender makes little difference in the outcome of therapy. Or you could be a bit more useful. (Even if you don't agree with him, it's his belief that matters—you want him to get help, remember?).

To find out exactly what you can do, we followed up with one of Carey's sources for the article, Ronald F. Levant, EdD, a professor of psychology at the University of Akron, who is recognized as an authority on the psychology of men and masculinity.

As if he wasn't blue-eyed enough, sharp-jawed enough or cut enough (perhaps you too glanced in the open V of his rumpled, unbuttoned shirt in The Hangover?), it also turns out that Bradley Cooper speaks fluent—and very sexy—French.
 
This morning, a drool-inducing video of Cooper chatting away en français with an anchorwoman hit Popeater.com. The mere sound of each romantic Gallic syllable issuing forth from his mouth was enough to cause women all over the world to sigh and men all over the world to cry—or to run out and buy a Rosetta Stone CD.

 
And yet, it all gets so much more dreamy—because, when translated, what Cooper said to the French anchorwoman during their 3-minute-22-second talk about The Hangover Part II and Limitless was so surprisingly deep and thoughtful that we may not recover.  
 
On the Nature of Reality

"I am 36 years old. I know what is important for me in my life. If celebrity had happened to me earlier, it would have been difficult for me to tell what is real and what is...rien de tout (nothing at all)."
 
On the Value of Being Present
"Robert [De Niro] is very present. He knows what he wants. He knows what he believes. And it's very easy to speak with a person like this."
 
On the Importance of Change

"I want to learn. I want to increase my experience."
 
On the Absolute Truth

"George Clooney is the best. Il est le roi (He is the king)!"
 
In search of more Bradley Cooper wisdom, we consulted his speech last September at Georgetown University—the school that sent him to France on an exchange program, where he lived with a French-speaking family. Talking to the throng of young, adoring students, he advised them, "Fall on your face, really—it's the only way you're going to learn."
 
Hmm...we do not mean to be difficult. We want people to learn. But if you look anything like Bradley Cooper, please, we beg of you: Do not fall on your face.

"The world is not yet exhausted; let me see something tomorrow which I never saw before." — Samuel Johnson

One hundred years ago today, the world's largest ship, the Titanic, was launched into the dark, cold waters of Belfast. Fourteen years ago, the world's first movie to rake in over a billion dollars, Titanic, was released into the dark, warm theaters of America.


The Five-Second Titanic lacks the beauty and mystery of the 1994 regular Titanic. There is a sweep of dreamy music, then a clip of a minor character saying in a fancy English accent, "This ship can't sink." After which, splash, the ship sinks.

I've ruined the joke but not the point: Sometimes, exceptionally complex things in life can be distilled down to a single moment.

A close friend of mine recently told me a story about her old, dear college roommate, Sarah, who didn't come to her mother's funeral. Sarah, my friend told me, had had all kinds of terrible situations with her own mother. Sarah had two kids. Sarah was under a lot of stress at work. Sarah had troubles with intimacy. But Sarah was still a good person and a good friend.

I listened to all this. I groped around for something to say. But what I needed was a video camera in order to tape the 10 minutes that my friend spent talking about Sarah, then cut the footage down to the five seconds during which she said, "Sarah didn't come to my mom's funeral."

Yes, life is complicated and messy. Yes, people do regrettable things for a myriad of understandable reasons. But sometimes five seconds all is we need to tell us what is really going on in a relationship. Then we can spend the next five—or 5,000—seconds figuring out what to do about it.

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