Things have been a bit slow around here.  There have been good and bad reasons for that.  The good reasons are involving starting a new consulting project which is eating up a huge amount of my time, while also getting engaged.  To a girl, not a consulting project.  The bad news is that I have just been lazy (in some sense) about getting things updated on the site.  It’s not that I have stopped writing.  In fact I have a few month backup of content I’ve created.  It’s that I’ve been holding off on doing that until I upgraded the ...

I get excited all the time: During Steelers games (well maybe not this year).  When I get a new idea.  When I read a book.  When I think something cool's about to happen. If you talk to most people they will tell you excitement is a good thing.  We want our clients to be excited by our products.  We want our audiences to be excited by our words.  I want you to be excited about this blog. But sometimes excitement is the enemy.  Sometimes enthusiasm kills. How you ask?  Because when we get excited we can often lose our way.  We run blindly ...

There is a new controversy in Cincinnati, which is where I live.  Perhaps the word controversy is too strong.  But there is movement afoot on the "dissatisfied people of America" front.  Who are the?  Well if you read the news you will quickly discover that they are everyone. Let me explain... In Cincinnati a group of people who don't believe that a god exists have placed a billboard reading, "Don't believe in God? You are not alone." Don't panic.  This isn't a post about whether you should believe in ...

"All too often education actually acts as a form of aversion therapy, that what we're really teaching our children is to associate learning with work and to associate work with drudgery so that the remainder of their lives they will possibly never go near a book because they associate books with learning, learning with work and work with drudgery. Whereas after a hard day's toil, instead of relaxing with a book they'll be much more likely to sit down in front of an undemanding soap opera because this is obviously teaching them nothing, so it is not learning, so it ...

The last year has been particularly hard on people.  The economy has been stagnant at best, and in a free fall at worst.  Now there's rumors of a recovery under way.  I don't know if that's true or not.  That's for economists to debate. But for the people directly impacted by the economy this has been a painful time.  Downsizing often brings health problems (headaches, physical illness, sleeping issues) and emotional problems (depression, anger, stress). Many people turn to alcohol and drugs ...