It was a rainy Saturday. Perfect weather to check out Chicago’s Little Saigon neighborhood for some Phở.
The food was delicious and the people were friendly. The waiter even offered up some free advice, which I thought was rather poetic. He said,
Take time. Go slow. Live long life.
🙏
. . .
Sometimes working from home can be quiet. Too quiet. And some days I don’t want to leave and go to a coffee shop, meet up with a friend, or go somewhere. I like being home.
So I’ll put something on. I’ll listen to music, usually something with few to no words when coding, planning, and discussing. I put on a podcast while designing because there’s something comforting about a human voice when you are home alone.
And then there’s Mumble Meetings.
I have two very close friends who also work from home. We are all in different states, working for different companies, and every so often our schedules sync up and we have a Mumble Meeting. Basically we all jump on a video chat and just work. I guess you could call it virtual co-working. (We say mumble because we mutter to ourselves under our breath when we work.) We click away at our keyboards and trackpads, we vent, we catch up, we help each other out. Its a great way to break up the day and it has the added side effect of staying in touch with long distance friends.
. . .
The box said it was for ages 14 and up. I decided to show my 4-year-old nephew how to fly my little drone anyways. And by fly I mean just to use the up and down throttle. He eventually figured out if he moved the same control a bit to either side he could spin it as well.
Hours of entertainment. Well, until a few propellers broke. Related: We are both now eagerly awaiting new propellers.
“Did the flying things come yet? Does the mailman know?”
. . .
Only have the tabs open of things you are currently working on. Not what you are about to work on, are meaning to respond to, or would like to get to soon.
Keep them open until you have completed the task. Then, close them, open the next thing, and repeat until happy hour. 🍻
. . .
My dad is an auto mechanic. Growing up I spent many days in his shop, learning how to change oil, use a grease gun, clean parts, and pay the bills.
I liked listening to the interaction between customers and the mechanics. There was one lesson I learned that has stayed with me.
Tell me the problem, not how you think I should fix it.
Meaning: the mechanics don’t want to hear your solution to your car’s problem. They want to hear what is wrong. They are the experts. Let them figure it out.
As I got into art and design, I’ve learned this is true in my line of work as well. It really applies to any type of feedback. The receiver benefits far more from hearing the what rather than the how. At the same time, the giver stands to learn something new.
. . .
We have this one rule.
No phones in the bedroom.
It started out as an experiment, but we’ve managed to stick with it for several months.
I go to sleep sooner at night and don’t stay in bed all morning feeling the need to check everything. Oh, and we have more time to talk and stuff.
. . .
I needed a little break from work so I went mountain biking on a familiar trail. I noticed that someone had sawed away the part of a fallen tree that was blocking the trail. I thought,
“Oh, nice! Now I don’t have to get off my bike to climb over; I can keep riding.”
Then I had another thought:
“Is this how people feel when I fix a bug?”
I’d like to think so.
. . .
Sharing is made up of two main actions:
. . .
Sappho, spelled (in the dialect spoken by the poet) Psappho, (born c. 610, Lesbos, Greece — died c. 570 BCE). A lyric poet greatly admired in all ages for the beauty of her writing style.
Her language contains elements from Aeolic vernacular and poetic tradition, with traces of epic vocabulary familiar to readers of Homer. She has the ability to judge critically her own ecstasies and grief, and her emotions lose nothing of their force by being recollected in tranquillity.
Designed with WordPress