Happy Halloween

http://www.realestateecards.com/pumpkin/ayang

Warm in October

It's amazingly warm for October. I'm going to fright town tonight. I walk to Thai BBQ for lunch. Me.dium is fun. So is Pandora. I found old songs of New Order and Psychodelic Furs's Ghost in you. I've added a bunch of my social media in to Pownce.

Pandora's Box

I have open the Pandora's box! I am streaming the music as I type this. I like the smooth sound of acoustic guitar of Dominic Miller. I discover Dominic's music through Sting.

micro stock

http://us.fotolia.com/p/330135
It's been an interesting amount of work for perhaps a minimum return. But I'm glad that Fotolia accepted 9 out of 28 photographs that I have submitted. Back in the days before the inter-net, I was trying to break into the world of Stock photography. In the early days of Tony Stone, before it was sold to Getty's image, submission process was cumbersome. This was in the early nineties. Photographers send in slides, then it was upgraded to high quality jpg files. Now many people are submitting there works.

Shutterstock is also another good source for micro stock: Submit Photos to Shutterstock and make $$$!

See chadmcdermott.blogspot.com for more info about micro stock.

amazon store

http://astore.amazon.com/dnl-20

Squidoo lens

http://www.squidoo.com/lensmaster/referral/duc

Interim post

5.5 POSTING REGULATIONS.

If you have a Blog accepted into the Marketplace, you must comply with the following Posting Requirements:

1. Frequency of Posts. You may post a maximum of two (2) PayPerPost Marketplace Opportunity-related posts per blog in any given day. Sponsored posts may not appear consecutively on your Blog. Each Sponsored post must be separated by at least one non-sponsored, original content, post. 'Sponsored' posts apply to both PayPerPost Direct and Marketplace Opportunities, as well as other sponsored posts from competitive services.
2. Interim Posts. Your last non Opportunity-related post must have been within the 7 days immediately preceding your Opportunity-related post. After any break in blog activity of 7+ days, interim posts, that is, posts between Opportunity-related posts, submitted on the same day as your paid Opportunity-related posts will not count towards this requirement.

Shutterstock

 Submit Photos to Shutterstock and make $$$!

Mindfulness

I've been listening to this book on tape but you can also read it. I feel very relaxed. This is not some new age thing. It is written by a Zen master. I like his methods and metaphors. One metaphor which have stuck with me is of a stone thrown into the body of water. It accepts and sinks to the bottom. This is the position for meditation. He discusses the Sutra in layman's terms. These ancient philosophy and methods illuminates. Another metaphor is of the breath. He describes each breath as a climb on the rope to get to the top. He talks about the concept of the five aggregates. This is Dharma. This book seems to touch up on a lot of smaller detail items that I've read in the life remix, life hacks, and life improvement tip blogs. When I eat, I slow down and respect the food, I'm mindful and thankful. When I write, I'm mindful and thankful for the paper, computer, and typewriter etc. Hand writing has now become a form of meditation. An example of mindfulness image which the author gives is when one breathes, focus as though it was the axis on which the planet rotated.

'The Dead Fish Museum'

I read 'High Divide' and 'Drummond & Son'. These two stores are about a father's relationship to his son. 'High Divide' is about a father and son who take a camping trip to Olympia Washington. The hike culminate in one night when at the very peak of the mountain, the father asked his son to move to California after the divorce. Indeed the title suggests that there is going to be a divide. It is also a fork in the road which hikers often confront. Midway, there's a sign post which ask lets you choose the difficulties of continuing further.

I want to compare these with similar stories by Michael Chabon collected in 'A Model World'. They deal with the confusion which boys feel in their father's divorces.

'Drummond & Son' is a story about a typewriter mechanic and is son. If you like typewriters like I do, then this story is for you. There are several reference to communication. The typewriter is a machine for communicating. It's ironic that the mechanic spends more time fixing the machine then trying to fix the communication between him and his son. There is a lack of a motherly figure in both 'High Divide' and 'Drummond & Son'. And it is this lack of the wife and mother which seems to have broken up the wholeness of the family structure and leave the men lost and estranged.

Snow Crash

‘The Art of Innovation’ led me to ‘Snow Crash‘. I started reading it over the weekend and didn’t want to put it down. It’s very funny. For some reason, I latched onto this book. Maybe it’s because it talks about the Metaverse. Recently, I got into Second Life (SL). I need to do a little bit of research to find out which came first. It talks about people building houses in the virtual world. I can see some similarities between the Metaverse that Neal Stephenson renders and the world of SL. I think this book has influenced a lot of people and companies. For example, the book talks about goggled into the virtual world through the vision apparatus, a goggle. Hm…Google sounds a lot like goggle. Was the book the source?

update: “The Metaverse is a fictional structure written in code” - Neal Stephenson

meta-mater

I’m not a big fan of Sc-fi books, but once in a while a book like ‘Snow Crash’ proves to be readable. I’ve try William Gibson’s ‘Neomancer’. I didn’t make the leap into it yet. Maybe it’s too far out there for me to grasp. ‘Snow Crash’ seems very plausible. I remember, in my younger days, buying David Brin’s ‘Startide Rising’ because it had a cool cover of the man and dolphin. Uplift series

Art of Innovation

Earlier I happen upon ‘Ten Faces of Innovation‘ on Levenger’s website. My local library didn’t have this particular book yet. So I decided to check out it’s predecessor: ‘The Art of Innovation’. This book opened my eyes to things, my work place, my everyday experience and interactions with products. I read this yesterday and Saturday and couldn’t put it down. I took lots of notes on my CircaToma notebook of course and began making lists of things that bug me. IDEO call it a ‘Bug List’. I called my brother Andy and talk to him about it because he has read this and is reading ‘Ten Faces of Innovation’. I remember interviewing at an Architectural firm in Portland. Their studio practice imitated IDEO. I have a whole new respect for design. What we do with products, hacking it and modifying it are our ways of influencing and adjusting the product to our needs. I wasn’t aware that what we were doing is quick prototyping. Now I look at Judy of the Wood’s, NayNay, Mlle_Bleue, Shris, ArtisticSara,R.Rassemusen, Chet, and many other’s work (and even my own) with new eyes. I see DIY communities are like Hot teams working together to strife for better products.

The book is entertaining and the way Thomas and His co author wrote put complex projects into readable terms. It made me think back to reading about Jason’s story of how he started his business. He was looking with his eyes observe his friend with a problem in organization. What can be done better? His quick thinking and prototyping lead to a new line of product that are useful. IDEO encourages looking across the sea for ideas. Jason has done that as well as others. I used to work with the father of the founder of Oregon Chai. He told me a story of how his daughter’s travel to India lead to her idea of making the India version of tea call Chai in their home kitchen. It was very popular drink among friends. She shopped it around to different grocery stores. Eventually the demand for it out grew the kitchen area. Her father, the architect, built her the building for the start of her company.

http://diysara.wordpress.com/2007/06/08/diy-2-in-1-combo-rollacirca-notebook/

http://hdbizblog.com/blog/2007/06/06/using-a-capture-notebook/

Ready for organization philosophy

Chicken or the Egg

I received ‘Ready for Anything’ (RfA) as a belated birthday present from my sister. She saw it on my Amazon wish list. It proves that once it’s on a list, the mind can forget about it and go on to the next thing. This came as a surprise. I don’t remember putting it on the list. Earlier, I dismissed this book in a conversation with Jennifer George, who thoroughly analyzed the text. I’ve been wondering several points about this slim book. I want to make comparisons to it as investigations into the organization philosophy. This book was born after ‘Getting Things Done’. In the order of thing, ‘Ready for Anything’ is the egg. If I compare the two, Ready for Anything is the philosophy in which GTD is the systematic execution, a methodology. There are some 52 short sections, which can be read as or compare to Koan. At times they are like Koan, because of they are mysterious in nature. At times, it’s hard to understand without a through understanding, and systematic practice of GTD. At times, RfA is a ‘Cliffnote’, a synopsis for the real text. Even though it is written after GTD, I wonder if this could have been a prequel, a predecessor, a subconsciousness lurking underneath GTD. It acts as if an introduction to the systematic execution of a process. In some ways, I prefer RfA, as it is not as dogmatic as GTD nor is it as instructional. It is rather a pondering about a methodology, a pretense for the rigor which is spelled out in GTD. The marvel of it is that, as systematic as GTD is, people who have read it devised their own system. GTD methodology is flexible. Another book by David Allen could not have conjure up a better scheme. It is better to revisit the existing scheme with new eyes and perspectives. I think that this is what RfA does best.

Eastern Philosophy or emptiness….

Interestingly, the majority of the book is spent defending his theory against the ‘Priority Based’. This was and may still be the pervasive thinking. When I was a ‘Franklin Covey’ (FC) guy, I didn’t prioritize my tasks either. In Eastern Philosophy, we are taught not to look at the duality of good or evil. Thus, prioritizing seems to pass on a judgment. I struggle with the goals and mission statements. Because at the time, I concentrate on the moment, the present. Again, this is a Zen philosophy. The other is the notion of Emptiness, which relates to Feng Shui. It is an idea that if your mind is empty it can receive insights. If your channels of energy is clear, more energy will flow. I would say that the majority of GTD philosophy is based on Easter Philosophy. David’s analogue to the ‘Mind like water’ is a zen practice. Stephen Smith has caught on to this and have found quotations from ‘The Book of Five Rings’ which matches David’s thinking. In RfA, much of the quotations are peppered along the margin. I find these quotes match well with the text and marvel at how David has found them to seamlessly illustrate his point.

52 card pick up

Strangely enough, the number 52 made me think of Decks of Cards. Because GTD has been adapted into the Hpda, index size, I wonder if the whole book can be squeezed down into this playing card version. Each sections can be on a card, maybe in a form of a Haiku: Collect, Process, Organize,/Review, Do (it). I think Jenifer George is right in saying that the chapters don’t relate or appear to be in any particular order. True to the form of non- prioritization, this book can function well as a shuffle deck of card. There is a theory of randomness and chance and organized chaos. This is where we step into the new age territory.

digg story

thesimpledollar.com/2007/06/03/review-ready-for-anything/

GoodReads

auction ads

Electronic Closing

Ah finally a post opportunity that is about mortgage. I have been a big advocate of paperless submission in the mortgage industries. I like it's effientcy. I trust it more then the fax. It is scarry to see faxed papers flying around in a copy room with very private and security risks involve. With the latest technology. I don't see why this isn't possible. Well to tell you the truth, a lot of the hassle and cliches of the computer problem still has to be worked out. I've tested the system for three years now. only a few company does a good job in this department. As users of the process, people must train themselves to new ways of interacting with the technology. many of the promise of stream line is still in some infancy stage. Electronic closing is the latest in line of this methodolgy.

Rustico

You know those Google mail ads really work! I was reading my gmail and noticed the Rustico Leather advertisement. I had my eyes on these gems for quite sometime now. A coworker gave me one long time ago a small pocket book with leather and a wrapped tie. At the time I wasn’t so much into writing about notebooks. I took that notebook with me to Hungary on an Artist residence. The small size was perfect for keeping phone and email addresses of people I met. The 3×5 inch was good for sketching too! The creamy paper was gorgeous to write and draw on. It took a variety of ink pens with out any problem. Years later, I discover that it is similar to, if not, a Rustico Journal! The year was 2000. Since then, the leather has aged beautifully in my hands.

I wrote to inquired about featuring Rustico’s fine line of leather journals. Isaac of Rustico replied quickly and is glad (and I’m glad to feature it.) to have us look at the numerous journals in different sizes that Rustico has to offer. There’s even a 3×3 exquisite little gem. I am to select one to examine. Hm…. what should I choose? Decision decisions…Well I leave you with this dilemma. Tell me which journal should I pick? Unless I hear other wise, I’m leaning towards the Traveler Journal with a distressed bomber leather jacket enclosed by a buckle. Issac tells me this is one of the most popular items. Here’s just one example of their popular Bomber Jacket Leather journal: http://www.rusticoleather.com.bomber

Starcraft 2

agloco

Get pay to look at the website or browsing any site you want: agloco.com

My starcraft addiction started as a boy's night out. It was a LAN party. We play Starcraft Broodwar until 3am. That was before I was married so three or four years ago. I still play that game. It is a game of modern Chess for me. My favorite is the play against the Hardcomp 7 vs 1. I introduced my nephew to the game last year. Then I got an email from him with the link for Starcraft 2. I'm glad they improved the graphics. You know, I wasn't excited when the made a role play version of Starcraft for the PS2. But this PC version of improved graphics is something I'll get to play. My existing Rrood War has a defect because I can't play Zerg. I miss playing Zerge. It is very biographic and organic, almost sexual. A lot of the imagery is based on the movie Alien.
There's a blog about StarCraft: CreepColony.com


starcraft

RfA

Chicken or the Egg

I received ‘Ready for Anything’ (RfA) as a belated birthday present from my sister. She saw it on my Amazon wish list. It proves that once it’s on a list, the mind can forget about it and go on to the next thing. This came as a surprise. I don’t remember putting it on the list. Earlier, I dismissed this book in a conversation with Jennifer George, who thoroughly analyzed the text. I’ve been wondering several points about this slim book. I want to make comparisons to it as investigations into the organization philosophy. This book was born after ‘Getting Things Done’. In the order of thing, ‘Ready for Anything’ is the egg. If I compare the two, Ready for Anything is the philosophy in which GTD is the systematic execution, a methodology. There are some 52 short sections, which can be read as or compare to Koan. At times they are like Koan, because of they are mysterious in nature. At times, it’s hard to understand without a through understanding, and systematic practice of GTD. At times, RfA is a ‘Cliffnote’, a synopsis for the real text. Even though it is written after GTD, I wonder if this could have been a prequel, a predecessor, a subconsciousness lurking underneath GTD. It acts as if an introduction to the systematic execution of a process. In some ways, I prefer RfA, as it is not as dogmatic as GTD nor is it as instructional. It is rather a pondering about a methodology, a pretense for the rigor which is spelled out in GTD. The marvel of it is that, as systematic as GTD is, people who have read it devised their own system. GTD methodology is flexible. Another book by David Allen could not have conjure up a better scheme. It is better to revisit the existing scheme with new eyes and perspectives. I think that this is what RfA does best.

Eastern Philosophy or emptiness….

Interestingly, the majority of the book is spent defending his theory against the ‘Priority Based’. This was and may still be the pervasive thinking. When I was a ‘Franklin Covey’ (FC) guy, I didn’t prioritize my tasks either. In Eastern Philosophy, we are taught not to look at the duality of good or evil. Thus, prioritizing seems to pass on a judgment. I struggle with the goals and mission statements. Because at the time, I concentrate on the moment, the present. Again, this is a Zen philosophy. The other is the notion of Emptiness, which relates to Fung Shui. It is an idea that if your mind is empty it can receive insights. If your channels of energy is clear, more energy will flow. I would say that the majority of GTD philosophy is based on Easter Philosophy. David’s analogue to the ‘Mind like water’ is a zen practice. Stephen Smith has caught on to this and have found quotations from ‘The Book of Five Rings’ which matches David’s thinking. In RfA, much of the quotations are peppered along the margin. I find these quotes match well with the text and marvel at how David has found them to seamlessly illustrate his point.

52 card pick up

Strangely enough, the number 52 made me think of Decks of Cards. Because GTD has been adapted into the Hpda, index size, I wonder if the whole book can be squeezed down into this playing card version. Each sections can be on a card, maybe in a form of a Haiku: Collect, Process, Organize,/Review, Do (it). I think Jenifer George is right in saying that the chapters don’t relate or appear to be in any particular order. True to the form of non- prioritization, this book can function well as a shuffle deck of card. There is a theory of randomness and chance and organized chaos. This is where we step into the new age territory.

agloco

Get pay to look at the website or browsing any site you want: agloco.com