In my earlier post I mentioned that I recently took a personal productivity retreat, inspired by a podcast featuring Mike Schimitz. One of the things Mike talked about was organizing his time around a “12 week year.” This idea immediately clicked with me. A year is a timeframe that I use to view my accomplishments…
Last weekend I took some time away from my to-do list to contemplate a series of questions that had the potential to rock my world. I learned about the “Three Questions Spirit Quest” on a recent episode of the Free Agents podcast with David Sparks and Mike Schmitz. Mike shared how he periodically clears his…
When I think of architecture and urban design I think of people who are working together to create pleasing spaces that promote all kinds of social interaction. Tongva Park in Santa Monica is a fairly small piece of land that feels expansive because of the way its interconnected walkways hide and reveal new areas to…
I wrote this article on the 101 freeway during the morning rush hour. To be completely honest I did some light editing and added links afterwards, but the bulk of the material was drafted while I was behind the wheel. Before I go too far, there are some risks to multitasking while driving even when…
It’s easy to neglect your personal contacts on your Mac. For starters your phone is probably where you are most likely to reach out to people – make calls, write text messages, set appointments, even fire off an email. This is why I said in a previous post that it’s important to keep your iPhone’s…
I recently got into heated argument with Siri about whether or not I had entered an important contact’s phone number into my Contacts app – the native address book on the iPhone. It turned out that Siri was right (I hadn’t entered the number) but I couldn’t prove it to myself until I was off…
Search the App Store for “To Do” and you get 249 hits. Do the same search for “Address Book” and you get 43 results…and half of those are utilities for cleaning up your contacts, not apps for managing contacts. This is a little weird seeing that your “Rolodex” is supposed to be the most valuable…
Three days in the saddle, you know my body hurt.. – Me and My Uncle, The Grateful Dead My motorcycle is cooling in the garage, windscreen marbled with a smorgasbord of bug guts. The summit conference I am returning from is fading away like Interstate 40 in my rearview mirror. The three aluminum cases I…
The other morning I had a mind-blowing revelation – this breaking news that has people freaking out – it’s all bullshit. There’s a bigger problem facing us and we don’t even see it. The insight came to me while I was headed for work southbound on the 101 freeway, taking a break from the headlines…
Aerogramme Studio, a blog dedicated to resources for writers, recently published an extensive list of short story contests for 2018. The list is heavy on established contests and offers with prize money and fellowships for the winners. Why should you consider submitting your work to a writing contest? To get noticed. Why should you think…
Let’s say you want to rip-cut some planks and plywood for a chicken coop and you don’t have a table saw. The Kreg Rip-Cut is a stand-alone fence that lets you make long, straight cuts with a circular saw. Yes, many saws come with a rip fence as an accessory, but these accessories usually don’t…
Inflammation is one of the key symptoms of osteoarthritis accompanying pain and joint degeneration. It would make sense, then, that an anti-inflammatory diet would help to relieve some of the pain and discomfort, and possibly slow some deterioration. The problem is that there is no clear evidence that an anti-inflammatory diet will relieve the symptoms…
If you like trees and love exploring, check out the site Monumental Trees. Here is an archive of some of the biggest, the tallest, the gnarliest and the oldest trees in the world. Monumental Trees catalogs extraordinary trees and provides lots of tree-facts in the process. I’ve written previously about the mysterious Grove of the…
I’ve really tried to love Bible study apps like Youversion but I end up feeling like I’m trying to view the scope of history through a keyhole. Bible study seems to be richer and more effective when I use an old-fashioned paper Bible and mark the pages as I go. Some people take the process…
When it comes to architecture and urban design we often hear about the designer’s intentions but we hear less often about the impact the design has upon users. But according to John Cary good design must be considered within the web of impacts on users, stakeholders, and community. At every level, design is a matrix…
