Newsletter the Fourth

You may know that when you post on LinkedIn or Facebook, not all your friends and connections see what you write. In fact, often only a small percentage do. It's called "The Algorithm" — and It decides what gets shown and when. That's why I enjoy this newsletter format… free from The Algorithm at last! (Or, at least "until The Algorithm catches up with us.")

Flying

I gotta say… I am really looking forward to flying again. 20 years ago I started working on a manuscript that turned into The Flying Book: Everything You've Ever Wondered about Flying on Airplanes (currently out of print, but you can find it used or at a library). 

Here are a few quotations I included in the book, for those of you who are, like me, dreaming of airplanes:

?? "In our dreams we are able to fly… and that is a remembering of how we were meant to be." —Madeleine L’Engle, Walking on Water

?? "The airplane has unveiled for us the true face of the earth."" —Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Wind, Sand, and Stars

?? "He rode upon a cherub, and did fly: yea, he did fly upon the wings of the wind." —Psalms 18:10

?? "If God had really intended men to fly, He’d make it easier to get to the airport." —George Winters

?? "The wish to be able to fly is to be understood as nothing else than a longing to be capable of sexual performance." —Sigmund Freud ??

You Can Put Your Recipes On It!

When I was a kid, personal computers were just coming on the market, and the most common argument for why anyone should have one in their home was: "You can keep your recipes on it!" So I laughed when I walked into our kitchen and found my younger son making pancakes from a recipe my wife had hand-written years ago.

Of course, he is keeping this recipe on his "personal computer" (a.k.a. his phone), but he has simply taken a photo of it!

But how far have we really come? A photo on his phone has all the same problems we were dealing with back in the 1970s: you can't search for the recipe by name or ingredients, it's easy to lose it, it's hard to read… 

So, gosh, look how far we've come!

Audible Sensitivity

Our sense of hearing is fundamentally a way to notice what's moving nearby, by sensing changes in air pressure. But here's something mind-blowing: Our ears are can pick up changes of less than a billionth of the atmospheric pressure, where air molecules are moving less than the diameter of an atom.

We are far more sensitive to the world around us than we think. Stop for just a moment and listen… really listen.

(Image courtesy of my book Spectrums: Our Mind-Boggling Universe From Infinitesimal to Infinity.)

Trying to Multitask

People say we can't truly multitask… I don't believe that. The human brain is multi-tasking all the time without us even trying! Perhaps a better phrase is: we cannot multi-focus.

Just try to focus your eyes on two different things at the same time… even two people sitting next to each other. Can't do it. Focus your hearing on two conversations… nope. 

I think it was Jim Benson's book Personal Kanban that included the example of how his dog was great at catching Cheerios one at a time in its mouth; but if you threw 5 at the same time, the dog would spazz out and be unable to catch any of them. 

Boy, I know how that dog feels.

Where To Find Me

Pretty much all my focus these days is on CreativePro Week 2021, the annual conference I produce for graphic designers, marketing professionals, educators, and communication specialists. It's all online again, of course, and it's going to be our biggest event ever, with over 100 sessions and 50+ speakers from around the world. Perhaps I'll see you there. ??

Thank You!

I enjoy sharing my musings… and I enjoy hearing yours! Feel free to follow this newsletter, follow me on LinkedIn, and send me feedback. You can always reach me at [email protected]