Web Miscellany: Compilation #5

What are you up to this weekend? I’ll be saying goodbye to my sister before she crosses the country for a new job, and an exciting new adventure. I’m still ripping out my hair in search of new flooring, as our home renovation begins next week. Finally, I’ll be doing a whole lot of nothing as my body recovers from valley fever.

Here are a few fun links from around the web to fill the blank spaces in your long weekend:

1. Quote I’m pondering: “Sometimes reality is too complex. Stories give it form.” –Jean Luc Godard
2. Recommended blog of the week: That Tiny Website. I’ve been enjoying Tim’s brilliant short stories for about seven years. Check out his book of short stories, An Epilogue to Innocence!
3. “What would it be like to buy things with time instead of money? How might we make the relationship between time and money more obvious when you’re in the act of shopping?” Apparently there’s an app for that.
4. Raymond Loewy’s 1934 chart of the evolution in design is fascinating. I found the streamlining of the railcar and chair particularly interesting.
5. Thoughts on the mistake schools are making from Stanley Kubrick. Hint: fear is a bad motivator.
6. Struggling to find a new job. Talk to your network because 40% of positions are filled through referrals. Referrals also get hired more quickly, and are paid more than cold applicants.
7. Résumé Virtues Vs. Eulogy Virtues. When you die, will people will talk about your high paying job and 4.0 GPA, or will your eulogy present you as a kind and purpose-driven individual? If you’re not in alignment with your true values, consider drafting a “personal constitution” to help you stay true to what matters.
8. Amateur mistakes are costly, so focus on eliminating rookie blunders one-by-one to slowly build up your professional skills.
9. I’ve never been that interested in video games, but my boyfriend is insistent that I would love the episodic graphic adventure game, Life is Strange. He also wants to play Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime together. Have you checked out either of these?
10. 40% of Americans can’t cover a $400 emergency expense. This is such a startling statistic, but also a timely reminder to put aside some extra money each month. I auto-transfer 10% of each paycheck into a hard-to-access account, and even 10% of minimum wage adds up when done consistently. I know because I’ve been there.
11. As a department manager, I’m quite fond of setting objectives with a key result, where the objective is a goal and the key result is a quantified measure of success. A lesson drilled in by my boss and plainly stated by Edwin Locke: “Hard goals drive performance more effectively than easy goals… Specific hard goals produce a higher level of output than vaguely worded ones.”
12. Some interesting thoughts on mental autonomy, which includes introspection, attention, and ownership of mental content. How can we reclaim agency of our consciousness in a rapidly-developing world that begs for our attention?
13. “To be a successful creator you don’t need millions. You don’t need millions of dollars or millions of customers, millions of clients or millions of fans. To make a living as a craftsperson, photographer, musician, designer, author, animator, app maker, entrepreneur, or inventor you need only thousands of true fans.” From Kevin Kelly.
14. Quote of the week from my goofy boyfriend, a long-time vegetarian: “Chickens are just cute, little feathered puppies. Do you really want to eat the puppies?!”
15. What I’ve been listening to on repeat this week: A Rainy Night in Soho by The Pogues, an Irish-British Celtic punk band from the 1980s and 1990s.
16. Wait for the ending…