First Week

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After being at the same company for almost 5 1/2 years and having great success on the Application Engineering team there, I decided to make a change and take on a new opportunity.

And I just finished my first week at my new job. I think I’m really going to like it, but it’s a long walk to the coffee maker.

Favorite discoveries of 2011

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With the year at a close, here’s my list of the favorite things I discovered in 2011.

  • ifttt.com and Evernote. The best way I’ve seen to create a searchable repository of your “Likes”, “Faves”, “Reblogs”, and “Stars”.
  • Multigrain Tostitos Scoops. best chip on the market.
  • Hypercritical, Back to Work, and The Incomparable podcasts. These podcasts have introduced me to new ideas, reinforced and also debunked long held opinions, and made me a fan of the medium.
  • Frozen Butterbeer. Only available at Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando. I need to learn to make this at home.
  • Nylabone and Kong dog toys. Especially the durable toys for active chewers.
  • Ender’s Game. I had never read it. I might just re-read it in a couple of months.
  • AppleTV Airplay. THIS. more of this, lots more.
  • Clay Christensen’s lecture on successful innovation. He gave it at an IT Symposium in October and it is the best hour long video I’ve watched all year. Changed how I think. Watch it here.
  • Keurig. I’m not a coffee snob, so it’s perfect for me.
  • Married Life. So great. Not always easy.

support your local web comic

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I’ve kept an obscure item on my Amazon wish list and figured one day I would buy it. It’s this t-shirt print of XKCD’s #552 Correlation. Go read this wikipedia article on statistical correlation, go read the Freakanomics blog for a couple of hours, then go listen to two partisans argue over which U.S. President (Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton usually) had the greatest impact on our economy, then go reread the Correlation comic. You’ll smile, maybe laugh.

On a seemingly unrelated note, my wife complains that I’m impossible to shop for. So I directed her to my Amazon Wish List for ideas this Christmas. Where the Correlation t-shirt was pinned as a wish list item. And I got it for Christmas. My wife and in-laws admitted they really didn’t get the nerd humor, but they got it for me anyway.

The Christmas gifts I love the most are the ones where the “thing” represents the “mission”. This year my cousin gave me Fair-Trade coffee through World Vision, proceeds of which goes to their Maximum Impact Fund. I gave my dad a Pancake Pen so he could make pancakes with fun shapes for his grandkids  (my nephews) when they sleepover. And my in-laws bought me this t-shirt. In so doing, they financially supported my favorite web comic.

I hardly ever stop and think about gift giving on a metaphysical level; mostly I just buy an thing/artifact/stuff that looks nice or sounds nice, but doesn’t serve a deeper purpose. I am now convinced the best gifts aren’t just something the recipient might like, but serve their interest/passion/mission. I think this will help me give better gifts. And might make me less impossible to shop for.