Zen Habits: The Many Paths to Simplicity

“As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness.” - Henry David Thoreau

ZenHabits.net is a very personal blog by Leo Babauta. Somehow, married with six kids, this writer, runner and vegetarian models of honesty and serenity, as well as provides a trove of simplicity hacks.

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Air Pirate: Arrr! The Oxymoron That Is Radio Cartooning

Mo Willems has wanted to be a radio cartoonist since he can remember. Lots of cartoonists, he said, want to make it to print publications. But inspired by New York City Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia, who read comics on the radio in the '40s, Willems wants to take his art to the airwaves.

From All Things Considered, September 4, 2008 ·

Monkey Public Radio

Even America's most middleof-the-road media outlets recognizes the universal appeal of monkey business. NPR's new blog commenting upon pop culture is titled: Monkey See.

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The We-Think Generation

CNN's Becky Anderson looks at how the internet has helped shape a new way on innovative thinking and sharing. This video features our friend Garrick Jones, founder of The Ludic Group and long-time lover of art, innovation and creative business strategy.

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While a Magician Works, the Mind Does the Tricks

We often refer to graphic recording as a magic trick: We watch a human pull images from thin air, grabbing pictures and ideas from the vapor of conversation and giving them physical form. This NY Times article gives insight on why the physical performance of illusion is so captivating and how the brain uses neural tricks to do this: approximating, cutting corners, instantaneously and subconsciously choosing what to “see” and what to let pass.

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I Want You to Want Me

Massive touchscreens. Three-dimensional animation. Realistic interaction. Real-time synthesis of expressions of love, longing and loss by real humans looking for love in the ether of the net by interactive designers of rich-media storytelling platforms, Jonathan Harris.

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TED: Louise Leakey: Paleoanthropologist

In 1999, I visited the Rift Valley in East Africa and sketched the Olduvai Gorge where Louis Leakey, his wife and family members scratched and dug out the earliest ancestors to humans. It is good to see that the family is carrying on the tradition of asking: "Who are we?"

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TechShop

Remember your friend's dad with the way over-the-top organized garage with every tool imaginable? (If that was your dad, I'm sorry.) Well, I bet he didn't have plasma cutter or 3-D printer, and if he did, you didn't have the security clearance to touch it!

TechShop is that cyber-cool chop shop. Plus, if you are a member, you can touch all the tools, and, for example, make your own BattleBot. They have wicked classes like "How To Cut Shapes Out of Metal with the Plasma Cutter" and "How To Use a Laser to Cut and Etch Food".

TechShop was founded in 2006 by Jim Newton, a lifetime maker, veteran BattleBots builder and former MythBuster. The original TechShop is located in Menlo Park, California, on the San Francisco peninsula 25 miles south of San Francisco, with nine other locations across the US.

[ Thanks to M. Frisse. ]

clipped from techshop.ws TechShop is a fully-equipped open-access workshop and creative environment that lets you drop in any time and work on your own projects at your own pace. It is like a health club with tools and equipment instead of exercise equipment...or a Kinko's for geeks. Anyone can come in and build and make all kinds of things themselves using the TechShop tools, machines and equipment, and draw on the TechShop instructors and experts to help them with their projects. TechShop is designed for everyone, regardless of their skill level. TechShop is perfect for inventors, "makers", hackers, tinkerers, artists, roboteers, families, entrepreneurs, youth groups, FIRST robotic teams, arts and crafts enthusiasts, and anyone else who wants to be able to make things that they dream up but don't have the tools, space or skills.

Fast Company: 10 Rules of Effective Brainstorming

Somehow they didn't get the memo: In order to do brainstorming right, you need to make ideas visual!

Still, this slideshow by Fast Company itemizes (and validates) the creative elements needed for innovation sessions. 

[A facilitator] is the traffic cop of the session, and should be an outsider. An insider brings baggage that can inhibit the free flow of ideas. HR consulting organizations are one possible resource; if you are working with a design firm like IDEO or Continuum, they may be able to help.

If bringing in an outsider is difficult for some reason, the second best option is to bring in someone from a different group inside the company. Facilitators need to be skilled at group dynamics, able to read when the team is flagging or when it is hitting on all cylinders.

They have to be patient, yet willing to exercise discipline if one person can't stop talking or is becoming aggressive. It is more a matter of personality than formal training, but it can't hurt to bring in people to watch a well-run brainstorming session to see how it works.

Alphachimp Emergency Vehicle Purchased

Thanks to everyone in the Alphachimp Studio Network for once again making the impossible possible.

This spring and summer have been busy with bizarre challenges, interesting new projects (including animation) and frantic last-minute requests (Hey! Keep'em comin'!).

Launa passed on to me that Drew D. suggested an ambulance as the company car.

So, thanks to Ebay and the internets, I have purchased a custom-built red raised-roof 1971 Chevrolet Suburban Sentinel ambulance from Langford's Funeral Home in Jonesboro, Arkansas (see photo).

Unfortunately, it only gets 4 miles to the gallon and they forget to clean it out after its last job in 1988.

So, it will be on display in my mother's driveway until further notice.

Thanks team!