My daughter was born a week after my grandfather's second wife died. He said to me on the awkwardly joyful call, "One comes, another leaves."
My grandfather died this morning. And a close friend became a father for the first tiem. Is that how it always is? Maybe we should hope that it's true.
"A rich man asked a Zen master to write something down that could encourage the prosperity of his family for years to come. It would be something that the family could cherish for generations. On a large piece of paper, the master wrote, "Father dies, son dies, grandson dies."The rich man became angry when he saw the master's work. "I asked you to write something down that could bring happiness and prosperity to my family. Why do you give me something depressing like this?"
"If your son should die before you," the master answered, "this would bring unbearable grief to your family. If your grandson should die before your son, this also would bring great sorrow. If your family, generation after generation, disappears in the order I have described, it will be the natural course of life. This is true happiness and prosperity.""
I'm taking a food writing course, so much of my writing energy that isn't taken up with LinkedIn is spent in that endeavor. If you are a food-oreinted person or you just miss my wacky take on existence, head over to foodtwit.com (or follow foodtwit on twitter) to keep up. For example:
My father was an Iowa native, child of a meat and potatoes culture more or less untouched by the canned-soup-casserole revolution, and set many of our food expectations. Vegetables were considered suspicious but necessary elements of the meal, and to be rendered safe by vigorous and long cooking. Meat was a gift to the table, and cooked with care. More importantly, somewhere along the line he'd tripped over the holy trinity of James Beard, Craig Claiborn and Julia Child, and had converted to francophilia. Perhaps it was in college, hotbed of all radical thought. I can imagine him flambéing crepes while others were setting fire to the ROTC building.read more on foodtwit.com
For those who do not follow me on twitter or see my statusi in their many locations, I hurt my back.
It's a long story, beginning with a fall almost ten years ago, and another fall almost five years ago and then years of Yoga holding back pain at arms length. But I've been working two-three jobs (Linkedin, Boxes and Arrows, Cucina Media) and I skipped a couple yoga practices and one weekend I found myself taking care of Amelie while Philippe worked (we are both workaholics) and noticing I had a dull annoying pain in my back. And then I lifted our tiny elf (only 25 pounds!) out of a shopping cart and knew with a dark certainly something was wrong.
But I have rallied many times in the past from the "something is wrong" moment. I did what I always do-- ibuprofen, ice, careful stretches and slept with the wedge. The wedge is a good friend to me in times of pain. It's a triangle shaped pillow I bought at the physical therapist's the second time I was hurt. It goes under the knees, and keeps your body in the correct neutral position while you sleep. So I did my magic and went to bed, certain I'd wake up better. But I didn't. I was still in pain. I went to the doctor, got medicine, got steadily better and then I went to SXSW. I was on two panels! How could I not go!?!
Well, SXSW was amazing, and I had a terrific time, although my back continually troubled me. The pain shot down into my foot, rendering it weak and forcing me to limp around and almost never sit. But I was okay, not too much pain. I was funny and informative at my panels, and I even got the courage to stand up at fray cafe and tell the story of the time I reached enlightenment (a good story for another time!) I got on the plane home feeling proud of myself for conquering a number of fears. I nearly canceled my Guy Kawasaki panel because I was convinced I had nothing to say of interest. I bless Rashmi who insisted I join, because by the time the panel ended, Guy was turning to me at each question asking if I had a "christina-ism" for the audience. I felt like a superhero, the feeling you get when you do something you were convinced you couldn't do. At the airport I was preening as I hobbled through security.
I lifted a suitcase full of swag --including heavy magazines-- into the overhead bin, out of the overhead bin, into my car, out of my car. I went to bed with the wedge, and woke up broken. Iwas in light pain when I laid still, in horrid screaming (literally) pain when I moved. I called up the recommended specialist and found her practice was full, but I could see her partner. Dr SooHoo is a Asian woman of utterly indeterminate age -- she could be 26 or 46 -- whose defining characteristic is million mile eyes. Each time she looked at me, I felt she was in the next room or maybe the next county. I cringed as I walked for her, unable to do so normally. I found out I couldn't walk at all on my right heel, I had no strength in my right foot or big toes, and found the getting on, rolling over and getting off the table resulted in me crying in pain. I told her that I had numbness along my leg and I had known about pain and pins and needles feeling, I didn't know my leg was dysfunctional.
It is a bizarre feeling to look at your toe, know that you are trying hard to press it up against the doctor's hand and see with your eyes it isn't going anywhere. Your mind says you are moving the toe; your eyes see nothing happening. I went home with a stockpile of medicines, and looked them all up. A steroid, a opiate-acetaminophen blend (vicodin) and "mellow yellow" a muscle relaxant. Wikipedia entires were amusing: the one on my muscle relaxant wondered aloud why it wasn't abused more often. Hopeful, I downed them immediately. The next day agony was worse, and I called up the doctor begging to supplement them with something-- aspirin, ipuprofen, tylenol, something. I was told that "I was on a lot of drugs" and not to take anything else. I'll admit I was mostly1 obedient, using ice and heat but not ingesting anything else. The next day the pain has receded slightly so that as long as I lay still i didn't have much pain. And the weekend went on like that. I never got high on my amazing selection of drugs. I don't know if pain makes you sober, or if she just didn't give me anything fun, or if my metabolism is unwilling to let me have a good time. I watched two seasons of Dexter, a season of Dead Like Me, a season of House, and I'm moving through Friday Night Lights (I hate football, yet I'm enjoying it.) TV (from Netflix ondemand) turned out to be the single best drug to distract me. The alternative was watching the ceiling. When I could focus, I read:
,
.
A weak later the doctor, realizing nothing was improving, changed the drug prescription to one that worked on nerve trouble, and finally I start to feel some relief. I have a MRI first thing Monday morning, which I'm excited about (remember, I watched a season of House!) and then we'll know. Or rather, I hope we'll know. Surgery may be in my future. I'm walking with a cane like a 70 year old woman who didn't drink her milk. I want this to be done. It's been three weeks next Monday. I'm pretty done with this.
1. "Mostly" means a large scotch around 4 p.m. when the pain meds had worn off but it wasn't time for the next dose. God will forgive me, but will my liver?
Who am I? I pasted in my recommendations on Linkedin to find out.
LinkedIn made me an offer I couldn't resist, and Jim and I are both camping out here for the duration, delighted that the rest of the world is discovering what we just figured out: this company is going places.
Cucina Media is still alive, and we were able to come to an agreement with LinkedIn that allows it to continue and prosper. PublicSquare will be seeing a number of new features in the coming months. Stay tuned.
Where is the icanhascheezeburger for babies??
(yes, this is proof parenthood rots your mind.)
It's that time of year again-- time for all us hopeful panelists to bag for votes. The field is more crowded each year, I swear. This year is no exception: 700 offerings!!!
BUT I think I've got some offerings that will inspire you to click through and vote yes, I can't live without seeing Christina's panel on X, Y AND Z!!!!!
Designing Social Media: Interface Tricks and Tips
We all know the core concepts -- Identity, Presence, Relationships, etc -- but how do these manifest themselves in our design choices? From avatars or log-in pages, a million tiny choices make the difference between lively community and crickets chirping. We'll teach you how to make social software social!
http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/323?return=%2Fideas%2Findex%2F2%2Fq%3Awodtke
From Designer to Founder: Starting Your Own Company!
We've all dreamed of starting our own company, where design would matter and things would be done right. Christina Wodtke discovered nothing was as it seemed. She made usability blunders, launched bad designs and felt utterly helpless -- and loved every minute of it. Get the real skinny on the start-up life!
http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/324?return=%2Fideas%2Findex%2F2%2Fq%3Awodtke
Barbarians at the Gate: User Generated Content and Traditional Media
Digg, Facebook, MySpace and Blogs are on the rise, and traditional newspapers and magazines are in trouble. Yet attempts are citizen journalism have yet to provide real competitions. Will tomorrow bring a revolution in media, or are the established players untouchable? And if there is a revolution, what will it look like (and who gets lined up against the wall?)
http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/322?return=%2Fideas%2Findex%2F2%2Fq%3Awodtke
Get thee to a voting booth!
I saw Sicko last night. I have many many thoughts on it, but I think I'll restrain myself to a anecdote.
My younger cousin and I were traveling across France together, and as we prepared to go into Lascoux (the reproduction caves), she said, "I think I might have an ear infection. I get them a lot."
When she emerged, she was glassy-eyed with agony. We drove down to the tiny village at the foot of the mountain, and headed to the first giant green cross we saw. "The pharmacy will help you. They always do." I said.
"I don't think so, I think I'll need a prescription." She went up to the pharmacist and in her formal college French requested assistance. He replied, and she burst into tears. She pleaded and he shrugged. She explained to me (my street French having never had to incorporate words like "ear infection") that she had to go to the doctor for a prescription. Imagining she'd be in pain for days until they fit her in, she cried to him to please just help her. He called the doctor instead, and told her she just needed to walk across the square to see him.
"When?"
"Now."
We walked across the square and entered the doctor's office where, to our great surprise, only one other person was waiting. A moment later, she was swept in by the doctor himself (no nurse was on duty), and we idled in the small and sunny room speculating on what it would cost us, foreigners not covered by the state. About 15 minutes later, we were ushered into a room that was more living room than examination room. It was also sunny, with the disturbing machinery tucked away in the far end, and the doctor's desk and comfy chairs at the other.
The doctor examined her, wrote a prescription for an ear infection, and then turned to tell us sadly that we would have to pay because we weren't in the system. He was deeply apologetic, and as Katy started to tense up, I told her don't worry, I've got my credit card. Then he gave us the bill. It was 20 euros. About 25 bucks. I put away my credit card and pulled out a 20 euro bill.
We walked back to the pharmacy, and they were closed for lunch. Rather than drive to another nearby (French laws require a pharmacy be open at all times, but they tend to take turns), Katy napped in the car while I walked around the charming village. I eyed the closing times of restaurants nervously, stomach growling. They all closed promptly at 2:30, like every other restaurant in France. It's hard to eat formally between 2 and 7 -- miss the window and its casse-croute* for you!.
The pharmacy opened 45 minutes later, and we got the medicine and were able to get to a lunch spot overlooking the river before the restaurant closed! Katy nibbled her crepe and drank her wine, feeling better every moment. It's funny how just possession of a cure often makes you feel better.
When I think of the famous annoyances of France such as everything shutting down between 12-2, and compare it to America where we are too scared to visit a doctor even when we are in pain, I can't help but feel we've made some poor choices in our life. Watching Michael Moore walking down the rues of Paris in his baseball cap, asking himself the same thing while my (French) husband dissolved into giggles next to me I felt anger than amusement. How did we let the corporations buy our government from us and brainwash us into thinking it was okay.
On the drive home, Philippe reminded me that it has a price. In France, small businesses can barely survive, new businesses can rarely get started because the obligation to employees is so crushing. But I look at Canada, full of many of my favorite start-ups and people and think, we didn't have to give it all away. If you cut off a finger, you shouldn't have to wonder if you can afford to get it sewed back on; if your baby has a fever you should be able to have a doctor see her even if you don't have insurance. Somewhere there is a middle ground.
* snacks, literally "break bread"
Come see me speak Tuesday, June 12, 2007 at the Monthly Program of BayCHI. I'm talking about becoming a founder. I promise to tell the truth, and nothing but the truth...
This presentation, at least the first 45 minutes or so, is the most iportant thing I've heard this year, up with Al Gore's film. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3975633975283704512
but I've been in a house outside a tiny villqge outside of san pourcin outside of vichy/moulin and lost in the land internet forgot. returning to the current century today, but zowie, forgot what it as like....
It's an amusing and little known fact that I cannot post a comment on my own blog. I used to be able to type something random and short, typically "fish" then go into the MT interface and replace it with a real comment; but now nothing works at all. I nearly moved to wordpress, but decided to wait until PS was ready and then migrate. So here I am, holding forth and responding to your recent comments on the blog. I just don't want you to think I'm ingorning you, my pretties.
I think the thing that hit me hardest was that my point was missed. I am not an IA, moreover I haven't been an IA for at least four years. I know a lot about IA, and that informs a bunch of my choices as an entrapreneur (though not as many as one might suppose, and certainly different ones than you'd guess. For example, the taxonomy control on PS currently stinks. And it's going to stink for a little while becasue there are more important parts of the ap to make work well.) I say this while liking IA, and liking IAs and wanting to hire them everywhere I go, because I think they add a lot of perspective, insight and design chops. Same goes for designers, and IxDers, and user researchers and the rest of the merry crew.
What resonated with me about Adam's post is how little I had in common with the lists I was on, and moreover how my intial response was to say to the lists, grow up! But it was me that had to realize I had changed, and that I needed to admit that everybody is who s/he is and not who I wanted them to be. The newbies are new, the masters are masters, and the sideways lunatics are-- well, a bit crazy. The day has only so many hours, and the brain seems to have limited shelf-space. You can spend your time filling it with new things, or go deeper in understanding old things and both are fine pursuits and belong in the larger context of a team.
Angry, awkward, "tribeless" and desperately trying to avoid a bunch of chores I know I need to do, I've lashed out on lists and overexpounded on the blog. While overcritical of many, I realize that the only quality I really need designers to have is not business chops or Microsoft office skills, but the one they profess to already have mastered: empathy. Being dismissive is the opposite of empathy, and if you want to stay a designer, it's a behavior I suggest giving up. (I'm still on step one: admitting you have a problem.)
Beyond that you can learn from others to season your chops, or you can choose to go more deeply and find folks who are digging into the questions you ask -- you can read business journals, or you can read academic ones. Architecture, microbiology, economics: if you are in the right state of mind, everything is teaching you all the time. You can research and seek better and better solutions, but don't sit on your buttocks thinking you know all the answers.
Last week I set a personal record: started flamewars on four mailing lists. It would have been six or seven, but I realized I was edgy, and decided to not watch the mailing list folders for a few days until I cooled off. But I never cooled off. And I wondered why. I recalled a recent blogpost by Adam Greenfield (hilariously if inaccurately mocked by ok-cancel) and I found a clue. I think he, and Peterme, and Lou and Peter Morville... well, we're all outgrowing our favorite pair of jeans: IA. And the waistband is cutting in badly, but it's our favorite pair, so of course we're crabby. We're all going to stay crabby unless we finally take them out of our "skinny" drawer and give them to goodwill. (Okay, I suspect Peter Morville saw a tailor to have his let out, restyled, and pressed; and Lou told us that they were in the garage, but really he cut them into patches and made a quilt -- but hey, let's not beat this metaphor to death. Oops, too late.)
Despite no longer calling myself an information architect (I've been happy with entrepreneur for some time) and despite a deep affection for the community I've been part of for so long, the lists have been making me crazy. I'd been off them for a while, and had gotten back on for a number of reasons, from promoting the new Boxes and Arrows features to seeing if new trends were emerging in my (former?) profession. And I was shocked at the blatant stupidity I thought I was seeing. Only it wasn't stupidity; I had radically changed my point of view. It was as if I had been enjoying the company of swans for some time, went to sleep and woke up a duck-- and thought the swans looked silly, all long necked and white and showy.
Starting my own company, I've had to learn an amazing amount in a short time. I've had to essentially give myself a home-MBA (resulting in similar quality, I might add, to a home-perm). As a result, returning to the lists, I couldn't believe what things people were saying -- I was thinking "Of course they don't implement that feature, there is no upside" "you have to make choices, and in this market that was the right one" " Jesus kee-rist, of course YouTube is designed." and so on.
I've been angry because so many (not all!) design practitioners whine about how no one pays attention to them, when they don't take time to understand the business folks. When they proudly crow about their empathic skills, and just as proudly crow about their hatred of excel. They expect business to read GAIN, but refuse to read businessweek. Too often they judge from their point of view, instead of questioning and learning instead.
And I'm angry because I've been so very stupid in so very many of the same ways, and my hubris pisses me off. I've been humbled by Excel in the last weeks, and made wise by Advertising Age. PowerPoint has been a better friend than Photoshop, and Drucker wiser than Hillman.
I'm not sure I could write another design book ever again without first going to the well of business and drinking deeply. For those "moron sheep" sure know a whole lot. And you cannot learn unless you have ears to hear with, and sometimes that means shutting up.
I'm not even sure if I have a point yet to make from all this research and digestion.
I do know I am a small piece of something big, and I bring my own skills to play along with others, and now I can no more tolerate dismissing of "monetization" any more than I can stand dismissing design as "making it pretty." I don't know if the right thing is to unsubscribe and move on, or to remain, and try to explain some stuff I figured out, while watching for the new stuff others have figured out. Or maybe I should just flame and be done with it, and start the conversations needed to get change happening. I'm not sure I have the stomach (even though I clearly have the talent) for that work.
This blog has more to say these days about publishing than about IA, because it is a blog: a personal journal of one person's view. Maybe it's getting to be time to change that also; change topics formally, change the dynamic, or maybe it's getting to be time to take my own advice and "Shut up and Dance."
Anger is almost always based on fear, and change fuels fear. I am becoming Christina 2.0, and joy and fear and anger as par for the course, I guess. With occasional flamewars and design bashing thrown in.
Drivers on cell phones are as bad as drunks
"We found that people are as impaired when they drive and talk on a cell phone as they are when they drive intoxicated at the legal blood-alcohol limit" of 0.08 percent, which is the minimum level that defines illegal drunken driving in most U.S. states, says study co-author Frank Drews, an assistant professor of psychology. "If legislators really want to address driver distraction, then they should consider outlawing cell phone use while driving."
You can pull over.
You can not answer (voicemail *will* get it)
You can not answer until you get a chance to pull over. Then you can call back.
No one is so important you have to risk your life or the lives of people around you to answer your phone.
Please pass this study on to everyone you know.
Poor service at Freeman's -- megnut.com
My kid is great, sunny and smily and sweet. But that's not enough. Apparently I was supposed to stay sexy and well dressed and then disappear until my kid was old enough-- perhaps 12-- to be sexy and well dressed also.
When I landed in SFO, my stroller was delivered to me with a wheel broken off. I had gone to sprain with no stroller, and bought one the next day, as Seville was way too hot to use a sling. This cheap (<20 euros) stroller was the best stroller I'd ever had.* As I rolled across Seville's endlessly under construction rocks and mud and cobble stones, it took the abused, and kept Amelie comfortable and more importantly, in place. It folded flat, it was light weight, it had a strap so once folded, I could throw it over my shoulder to carry, which I did when we climbed the roman ruins at Italica.
If you aren't a parent, think of your favorite digital camera, or car, or bike. It's not what it cost, but how well it suited who you are and what you wanted to do. I couldn't not believe the wheel had come off, the strolled was well made despite the cost, and I had an almost physical reaction to the abuse I imagined it must have undergone to pop off the wheel. I had come to love this stroller. It was a friend. And when I said to the gate attendant, my wheel is missing, you know what her first words were?
"We aren't liable for strollers gate checked."
Not, "I'm sorry", or "I'll see what I can do." No matter that this was the first I'd heard of their waiver of liability. And she worked hard to shunt me down to the baggage claim center, saying she'd send a manager down with the stroller after they finished looking for the wheel.
At the baggage claim desk, I started explaining that my stroller wheel came off and the clerk interrupted me...
"We aren't liable for strollers gate checked."
Would you let me finish my sentence, for f*ck's sake? No one told me that, my strolled is supposed to be brought down, my husband is waiting, did they find the wheel-- so many things I could have said, many things I did say, and no way to get a manager, and my husband wanted to get back to work for a meeting, and no one bringing the remains of my stroller down to me. I filled out the forms to have it delivered, just for the pleasure of them having to pay to have my strolled brought to me. They I went out to the luggage area, and had a good cry while my husband changed our daughter. A long flight with a small baby, and an airline that not only doesn't give a crap, but actively takes that disdain out on you.
American Airlines, you lost my luggage going to Spain, you lost my luggage going back home, and you broke my stroller and scraped the holy hell out of suitcase. American Airlines, you stuck me in a bad line and made me miss my flight, and then tried to charge me for a new one. American airlines, your stewards chided me for not picking up after my baby fast enough when getting off the airplane, and your people care more about liability than repeat business.
American Airlines, I have many miles with you, but I will never redeem them because I will pay more to fly anyone else. Not for your actions, but for your attitude. Because when you've flown six hours with a baby, you don't need denial, you need reassurance and apologies. I never got an apology from anyone.
You could have acted like the imbiciles you are and gotten away with it if you had taught your people to say "I'm sorry." But you skipped that step. And guess what. This is the age of information, and I'm happy to share this story on every website I find.
And American Airlines, I'm gonna to dance happily on your bankrupt corpse.
* The stroller is BBY, bought at El Corte Ingles... I cannot find it anywhere on the web, more's the pity.
... we need it to stand on this earth.
A friend wrote to me recently, asking if I wanted to do a panel at SXSW. She said, I was going to do it on good interfaces for participatory media, but if you want to join, maybe women and entrepreneurship? I replied that I'd rather not do a panel on women and anything.
I'm going to Blogher because it looks like it has a great lineup. But I dislike the proposition.
The percentage of men and woman online is roughly equal. But, like so many parts of our lives, power tends to lie with the less-fair sex. And so we respond: I'm gonna take my ball and bat and play with someone nice. I remember very well working hard on the first SFWow's Top 25 Women on the Web site, and dreaming maybe someday I might be among them. It was inspirational and it made me determined to not let anyone stand in my way of growing into the person I wanted to be.
But now events that run on "separate but equal" no long have the same appeal. Before, they felt like they showcased women who were just as capable. Now they feel to me as if it's noise about something I just want to be over, and it must not be over since we're still throwing the damn things.
So I said to my friend, let's not. What if we have a panel with four women and not have it be one on "women and..." but just be on a web topic. Perhaps that will make a stronger statement.
Or better yet, perhaps no one will even notice.
With the launch of the new B&A functionality and PublicSquare, secret project #2 is slowly being revealed.
Secret project #1 is happy and healthy and making a lot of weird new noises. She just turned one month old!
This week has been very weird for me. I'm just hitting 39 weeks. my belly is huge. A little while back, she changed from feeling like a big waterballoon to feeling like a sack of rocks-- I can feel her back, knees and feet fairly easily if either of us moves.
Mostly I feel well, compared to most of this pregnancy. Sure, I'm tired and achy and sleep involves a minimum of 6 pillows, but otherwise well. I continue Yoga which is a godsend and I do sleep. Which I understand is rare. But this week I feel myself idling. It's hard to work on anything, except bustling around the house, putting away things, washing things. I understand it's typical of the last week of pregnanacy to do nesting, but I feel unnatural at it while enjoying it, as if I've become a stepford robot. I roast chicken for my husband, make homemade soup, bake bread. I do laundry, and waddle around picking things up around the house. I sit at the computer and try to work on the sekrit project which I love more than anything I've done for some time, yet my mind just rolls around to the hospital bag in the hallway, or to a way to improve the leek tart recipe.
And now, there seems to be some excitement with UX Matters and B&A and I just feel well. I feel happy UX Matters joins the universe of magazines about our profession, from A List Apart, Digital-Web, Usability News, and many others. I am discomforted that the B&A redesign/CMS is still not live, but considering the changes that have happened this year, it can't really be so shocking. Erin stepping down, Liz stepping up, establishign a new company and now this, bigger than everything that has gone before. Maybe I shoudln't be shocked that it is slowly taking over every moment of my waking life (and much of my dreams as well). In a week or two, a little girl will come and she will take over every minute of my day and night for some time.
Maybe we are coded, deep inside our genes, to care about nothing else except the little lives we make. I've always been a feminist, always savored my independence so much that the deliciousness of domisticity surprises me.
And if I disappear for more than a handful of days, watch flickr for signs of the little one....
BTW, if anyone out here is just pregnant, here the most useful things I learned
First trimester: preggy pops. You can get them online or at some stores, and they really work on morning sickness, which really does come all day long.
Second trimester: Motherhood, M&M and Old Navy maternity. You will buy more clothes than you wish to. Might as well make them as cheap as possible.
Third trimester: Try to stop working early if you can. Or work at home. Being able to nap, rest, take a bath for aching bones is invaluable.
All trimesters. Yoga. Prenatal yoga helps you avoid the vast bulk of ailments pregnanacy brings on. Plus you meet other women going through what you are... which is great.
And Babycenter. Invaluable resource. Just remember that the forums are not the most trustworthy advice.
Reading John Battelle's Searchblog: The Times Does the Google Backlash Story
"Now, Google... founders have learned to say the right things in public about past practices (Sergey, for example, told me he regrets the seemingly haphazard way his company hired in the past few years..."
This is another key lesson on how you hire: You must always behave decently throughout the interview.
Often bigger, sometimes arrogant companies see themselves as hiring rather than recruiting, and get a sort of snotty "why should you be allowed to work here" attitute as opposed to remembering it's a chance to enrich your company with talent.
My personal experience: I interviewed at a certain company and they made me so angry I not only declined to move the process further, I ended up at their competitor where I worked extremely hard-- let's say, with personal motivation-- to create a viable alternative to their product. Which, thanks to the humble and talented people I worked with, as well as plenty of motivation, it definately is.
So an interview is not only a place to make friends, it's a place to avoid making enemies.
nuff said.
according to RED HERRING | Magazine Preview: 20 Outstanding Entrepreneurs Under 35.
That makes me a old mogul?
Congrats Scott, ya make us all proud!
Sorry I'm not saying much these days, but I've got several major projects going right now, including
I can't really guarentee much blogging for a bit now, but perhaps that will change. It's funny, business doesn't squash me quite as much as secrecy. Hopefully that will be changing in the next couple months...
Anyhow, be mellow and enjoy the huge number of smart bloggers that are out there these days.
Macintosh Creator Raskin Dies at 61
"Jef Raskin, a computer interface expert who conceived Apple Computer Inc.'s groundbreaking Macintosh computer but left the company before it came to market, has died. He was 61."
This weekend I was at the Future of Information Architecture retreat. I'm still sleepy, as when IA's get together they work each other into a frenzy of ideas that tends to last until 3 a.m. but starts up again at 8. Whew. The summits run that way also. If you are an insomniac, I suggest you check it out-- your night-time will be full of ideas.
This event was a huge pleasure for many reasons. For me it was not just the people (smart and diverse!) not just the location (gorgeous and wild!) not just the format (interactive and participatory!) but the chance to discuss topics out of the ordinary. Honestly, I'm tired of "how to use metadata to improve ROI" and "optimize your site with flash" and so on. It was good to discuss offshoring of design, career paths for senior designers, enabling organizational change and the death of the page.
I'm sure notes will start appearing, and hopefully someone will get enough sleep to write up their notes as a B&A article. But for now I'd like to leave you with a little exercise.
Write down your last five jobs.
Now write down your next five jobs.
Now write down how you are going to get to the next two.
You don't have to hold yourself to these, but thinking about them leads to interesting questions. For example, one participant was CEO of his own small technology company. Asked what his next job was, he shrugged and said "do you mean if my company fails?"
But another participant (who had been CEO of a couple firms before that) clearified the question by asking him if he wanted to stay CEO as his company grew, or would he step aside and become CTO, or be chair, or hire a CEO....
In our world, there is always a next step. Success or failure leads to the next success or failure. It's good to think of what that could be, and prepare for when the future arrives. The future always shows up sooner than expected.
I've been silent as the grave as of late. My apologies. Some of my time is with drupal, which is a pleasure, some is getting widgetopia.net working steadily better, a goodly bit of it is finishing up a consulting project, and part of it is getting ready to drive to Iowa saturday. So my silence is probably not going to change much until July.
For now, enjoy this peculiar poem my father emailed me. things like this remind me why I love the web.
George Meriton
Excerpt...
"The Labouring Man, that toils all day full sore,
A pot of Ale at Night, doth him Restore,
And makes him all his Toil and paines forget,
And for another day-work, hee's then fit;
There's more in drinking Ale, sure that we wot,
For most Ingenious Artists, love a Pot;
Nay amorous Ladyes it will pleasure too,
Make frozen Maids, and Nuns, and Virgins do
The thing you know; Soldiers and Gown-men,
Rich and poor, old and young, lame and sound men
May such advantage reap by drinking Ale"
Having blogged for many years now, I find myself suddenly promoted to guru in the latest Design by Fire: Gurus v. Bloggers, Round 2
All I can say is: dang my front page breaks in his screenshot. Well, I stopped working widgetopia for the evening to fix up the embarrassing mistakes I've been meaning to get to on my personal site.
I guess I should stop doing things like mucking with drupal and building widgetopia and managing Boxes and Arrows and setting up a conference for IA and building a business and get my site spruced up. OR maybe I could ask Andrei for a "Design Eye" makeover.
I continue to work toward getting widgetopia on the drupal platform. it's going slowly. The MT import issues are the last ones keeping me (I've never cared that much about the design, and am moderately content to use a drupal default design just as I currently use a MT default design. Although I have fantasies someone out there will suddenly make a design and email it to me saying, here, your site is dull..)
About 90% anyhow... I've been waiting to make a proper formal announcement with a sexy new website but this weekend was sunny and hey, philippe suggested a hike in the woods and really, I spend way too much time on the computer any way. And this is eleganthack, my personal site, and I can be as human as I wish here, right? No one wants a press release...
Let me start over: I've resigned from Yahoo! My last day was March 29th. I nearly announced April 1st, but I thought that might cause some mischief with being taken seriously.
Why did I quit? Not because of Yahoo-- Yahoo is a pretty exciting place to be these days, so much so I accepted them as my first clients. So I'll be doing a consulting gig there until July. (thus the 90% I mentioned earlier).
Why did I resign? For a lot of reasons: I wanted to go back to consulting. I like the project-based nature of the work. I've always been more of a midwife than a nanny, as I say to anyone who will listen. I like to kick off new things, but then let others refine them and grow them.
And I want more time to write. I don't know yet if it will be B&A work, another book, or maybe try to do some fiction and write that novel, but I know I need to get some writing time for myself. and writing takes a lot of time. Consulting will allow me to build in writing breaks.
So what about Yahoo? Is it a good place to work? I'd say so. A huge team of UED people, including web devs, user researchers, graphic and interaction designers. In house labs. Eyetracking, participatory design, RITE and other things you usually only get to read about. mark-up heading standards/css. Design moving strategic. Smart people like George Olsen and Erin Malone joining. If you wanted a full time job doing design in the valley, you could hardly find better.
So what about the site itself? The infamous no-design design? Look at personals, search, sports, shopping, photos, and autos, for example. I'd say it's getting better every day, piece by piece. These things don't happen overnight. But I think the Yahoo of 2005 will be a very different, very wonderful creature. You could be part of that. Me, I'll be part of it via consulting, then I'll go be part of something else.
What kind of work will I be doing? Well, I got a lead the other day from someone saying "We need to completely rethink X, but we don't really know where to start or how to approach it." and that's me. The big messy design problems where you don't quite know what research, what design-- perhaps not even what sort of people to solve it. I did it at Yahoo as Director of Design, I did it at Carbon IQ (although more focused in usability/IA then). And I hope to do it for many more companies struggling with complex problems, from search to branding, from IA to team building.
Now I've got to figure out how to talk about that. And make a business website. And sort out a legal structure. and get an accountant. and health insurance. Oh, and print cards.
But I just wanted to let you know.
France 2004: Languedoc and Paris photos, if you are interested.
Yahoo! News - Missing Actor Spalding Gray Found Dead brings me to tears.
If you haven't seen it, rent swimming to cambodia.
What a loss.
Last night, as I arrived home weary and dejected, I spyed a strange package form my publisher. I opened it and got a tremendous surprise: Đнформационная архитектŃра: чертежи для Ńайта. Пер. Ń Đ°Đ˝ĐłĐ». My book in russian. I keep saying "this is so cool" over and over again-- I can't tell you how cool it feels. I think it feels better than when the english edition came out. I was too tired from the struggle then-- now I can be giddy and joyful. and I am.
I'll be in paris again, a week from tomorrow. Anyone in the area interested in a coffee or a drink, please contact me.
"Hey Christina - You've been quiet of late, is YAHOO! burying you alive?"
Over a year ago, I hurt my back. I don't know if it was something I pulled, or if it was easy to pull something because of the crazy hours I was working on the new Yahoo! search, but I went down like a ton of bricks. Pain killers, unable to move, ice, heat, physical therapy and so on. The thing is, I never really got better. I spent thanksgiving flat on my back with my grandfather, his heating pad and his scotch to help me through it. I spent several other holiday days flat on my back as well.
I never knew what would set it off. One day I went for a bike ride, the next day I was staring at the ceiling all day. Went to the grocery store one day for ice, spent the floor with ice on my back the next. Sleep wrong, get out of the car wrong, work at the computer a few hours too long... and I'm back on the floor. I've been living my life on a funny edge for a long time, never knowing what would have me back on the floor.
Well, I may be slow to get an idea through my head, but I'm not hopeless. I started doing the stretches (finally) my physical therapist taught me every single night. it seemed to help. I noticed they were rather like yoga stretches. So I added a couple more stretches from a yoga book, and that went well. I could sit longer, walk better... so I started adding a few more yoga moves. If anything felt uncomfortable, I didn't do it. Later, as I grew stronger, I tried the harder positions once more and found I could do them.
In the last month I've been doing yoga twice a day, both for one to one and a half hours each time. This is a huge amount of my waking time; time I usually spent writing on the blog, or for B&A or reading... but you know, I can't really regret it.
I can touch my toes. My downward dog is just beautiful. I enjoy saluting the sun. I kayaked last weekend. I rode my bike to work and back (16 miles) for the first time since the injury, and I felt great.
I feel in my body. And my body feels like a good place to be again. And everyday it's a bit better.
So excuse me if I am not blogging much these days. I'm under repair.
I'm sitting by the fire, looking up English monarchs after having watched The Lion in Winter. I don't really agree with what the reviewers say the movie is about, but perhaps that's the sign of a very good movie (or play). I think it's about the impossibility of replicating greatness-- true greatness is always a moment in time, and almost by its nature refuses replication. It's a surprising leap, and I can't think of anything much worse than being a child of greatness.
I'm spending a lot of time these days thinking about managing, and mentoring. Most of what I read is balderdash-- setting people up for success, rewards, performance reviews, etc... formulas for something that is in its nature endlessly various. Humans. Is it a manger's job to make it possible to be great, or can you not stop the great ones? The mediocre can probably be helped to be adequate, and potential can be coaxed into good-- but the great? Don't they seem to just appear out of no where, rocket past their peers and shine despite the environment? And as a manager all you can hope to do it hire them when you see them.
Then again, that can't be true. At some point the great didn't know what they were doing, or what they should be doing. Maybe if you are lucky you get to be the one to whisper to them their possibility. I don't know. Thinking about it, as I said.
Maybe management and greatness have nothing to do with each other. Maybe the job is simply to staff adequately, meet goals and expectations. After all, to be great means to take a chance, and a chance means the potential for failure, and failure is worse than moderate success.
For me, a gamble is required. I'm always hoping that the daring will lead to a leap forward. This means failure will always be near. I hate failure. So this monday I'm moody, curled up by the fire, tending it, while Philippe works on his car. Puzzling and wondering where I can get better advice than "who moved my cheese"
Great-- I'm now dreaming of work. I'm officially out of whack.
Last night a bunch of us gathered at the end of the day to try to figure out how a bug got through. I keep walking through my actions of the last couple weeks-- where did I slip? Did I slip? Was it a member of my team? I went to dinner with a friend with the back of my mind still puzzling away at the problem, went home to stretch still worrying over it and eventually I feel asleep last night still working away at the question. Unsurprisingly, the worry wandered into my unconscious, and my brain kept cycling through those questions in dreams.
I woke up a couple times to take a drink of water and tell myself, "Stopping dreaming of work" but even then I didn't take myself seriously. My addled brain said back "I'm working on a problem, let me at it" and I told my brain, "You can't do it in a dream, cut it out. Dream of ponies or something, would you? I need the rest"
I don't know why I can't stand mistakes. I try to feel okay with them, remind myself that's how we grow, etc. But a mistake is a burr in my sock. It itches and annoys and I have to scratch at it even after the burr has been removed. It leaves behind prickles and itches.
A higher up in the meeting said "How did this happen, no, let me rephrase that, how can we prevent this from happening again?" It reminded of one of the founders of egreetings, who used to say "you can make any mistake once."
Excellent advice really-- if you aren't learning from your mistakes, you probably aren't learning at all. Sure, there are mistakes that come from carelessness or foolishness, but those shouldn't happen. From a strong creative person, mistakes can show stretching, growth, daring. Once one has identified a mistake as a mistake, it's possible to use that knowledge to excel. Each mistake is a pitfall to be avoided in the future; or a hint to a potential solution.
The alternative to putting oneself in a place where mistakes can happen is to never try something risky. But no risk means to give up ever innovating, to never exceed previous successes. Mistakes-- the right mistakes-- are a sign of a curious and brave soul.
Even so, I keep scratching at mistakes, fussing over them, puzzled and irritated.
I'm waiting for someone.
The cube next to mine is empty. The denizen moved to new york. It has sat empty for a couple weeks, file folders neatly piled in the corner unminded by the replacement, while employees dropped by occasionally to snag a coat rack or a pencil sharpener -- the fate of any abandoned cube.
Now a cleaning crew is attacking the neglected cube-- I can smell the windex, and hear the banging of the drawers. The rest of the floor is nearly abandoned... I can hear one other keyboard clacking, and two people chatting, their voices growing softer as they head for the elevator.
I'm waiting for someone. I want to start something, some task or chore, but I also don't want to have it interrupted. I tidy my desk for the first time in weeks. I check Amazon for new recommendations. I look over my numbers for a presentation; but waiting precludes good thinking. I can't do much but wait.
Time moves incredibly slowly now-- 7:02, 7:08. But I find this slowness precious and not painful. All day I've rushed, meetings folding into hastily accomplished tasks, back into meetings. Open excel, photoshop, homesite, word, email, calendar, make a phone call, repeat....
Now I am waiting and it's like a meditation. I want very little, except the amazing stretch of this now. I'll sit, maybe get up for a cup of tea, and sit some more.
Boxes and Arrows: Coloring Outside the Lines is a fine article by erin on the pleasures of a balanced life, inspired in part by my closing remarks from the IA summit, and in part by her wonderfully full life.
You may have noticed by my blog entires that I'm more interested in the act of being alive than ripping apart other folks interfaces or pontificating on usability issues... I see a trend in other blogs as well, including the reborn peterme.com.
I still love design, but really I love lots of stuff-- making crepes, planting tomatoes, reading Hemingway after a several year absence, cool wood floor on warm bare feet, african guitar, japanese drums, incandescent light-- again, the act of being alive is one full of pleasures if you can remember to pay attention.
In the morning my husband and I crowd the hammock, tilting it precariously, sloshing coffee on our robes. The day promises heat-- I say to Philippe "On a day like this, it feels like Spain, I wish I was in Seville" and he says "Why can't you just be happy to be here, in the backyard, instead of at work. Why do you have to wish you were somewhere else?" Why can't I? Why can't I love Palo Alto the way I love Spain?
Later I'm driving, running errands, it's hot like summer. Suburban buildings slide by and I slide a Ry Cooder into the CD player: "it's that part of the movie" I think as the music begins. Only the insistent scent of jasmine and the throbbing cut on my foot prevent the experience from being entirely cinematic. I am more than a pair of eyes and ears; I feel, I act, I am unscripted.
There is too much technology in my life-- I need to fight for the balance. I pushed an old rusty mower across our yard in the afternoon. It works unevenly, cutting some blades, merely bending others. I mowed barefoot, keeping my toes from the mower blades, but letting them embrace the sensation of the damp cut grass. After, I collapsed into the hammock, and was soon joined by a (flock? swarm?) a dozen wasps. I couldn't decide if I should keep still, move gently or run away. After some thought and more wasps showing up, I opted for moving gently away.
In the evening my husband drives us to San Francisco. We take two hours to do it, driving small winding roads. On highway 85 I yell and throw my hands into the air to catch the wind, eucalyptus dappling the sun on my face and shoulders. Then I hang out the window like a puppy. I have such a big smile on my face, a bunch of Indian tourists who have stopped to look at a view spontaneously wave at us-- I wave back. It's not a queen wave, but a big nine-year-old-kid wave, requiring the entire arm. I keep thinking "I don't have to live forever, I just have to live now." I know it is a trite thought, but it is still exactly true.
Then the ocean appears in the dips between the green rolling hills, and 85 hits highway 1. The cliffs along the ocean startle me again with their beauty. After 14 years of driving highway one, I'd think they wouldn't but they do. It's no less affecting than when I was 22, driving my old fiat down from oregon, hungry, near broke and ready to be a californian. Now the sun is low, making all the colors saturated: the ocean more blue, the cliffs more orange.
Finally san francisco, and dinner, family, conversation, then home to sleep. I stare up at the stars and realize orion is gone-- I suggest to my husband we need to visit a planetarium. I need a new constellation.
I was very excited about the summit-- I still am, but I feel odd, knowing it's happening in such a time. Still, it will be very good to see old friends again. When I feel like this, I always turn to poetry, often T.S. Eliot.
MORE...a new comment on table manners just makes me very very sad.
I feel for my husband... he's not a Chirac fan. I know when I went to Europe at the time of the first Bush, people would ask me why my president did what he did. I'm sure if I went now, I'd get the same. I never know what to say-- and neither does Philippe.
When I was much younger I used to joke that I hated the French, because everyone needs to have an other to hate, and the french already hated everyone so they wouldn't mind. I didn't really hate them, though I did view them with suspicion. I couldn't really believe that no one is Paris understood me when I asked "ooo-ay lee sally de bane." They must be messing with my head-- everyone knows how stuck up they are.
I'm sad to think that the behavior I forgave in Spain I was agreved by in France. We have a lot of hang-ups about French people. They stink, they eat everything disgusting, they chase our women, drench themselves in colognes and chain smoke... do we still think of Irish as lazy? Polish as dumb?
Then, fate begin as she is, I fell in love with a Frenchman, met his friends and family and discovered the French are... well, humans. Smart, dumb, shy, brave, proud, humble and so on. Maybe a few more proud than humble, but still... they could claim the same of us. What is patriotism but pride?
Hate for the French as a people is racism. Let's not pussyfoot around it. And if you have ever had a president you didn't agree with, reconsider your attitudes toward the French people. You can hate Chirac or love him, but don't hold him against the French people. He got a barely higher percentage of votes in his country than our president did here.
Hate the politics, love the people, hope the future will be a bit saner....
Thanks for your well wishes, all. I'm on the road to wellness. The fever is gone, and all that remains is an annoying cough and exhaustion. I'm trying to get caught up at work now, but I'll be blogging again soon enough.
Just saw Dog Day Afternoon . wow. I had no idea... it was amazing.
How did Pacino become such a caricture of himself? This early work is so impressive.
It may just be hype, but I don't think so...despite the stock valuation I felt really warm when I read
"Yahoo Chief Executive Terry Semel told Reuters the company was more concerned with the quality of its user experience than the question of whether it partners with cable operators or telephone companies in other regions of the country. "
That's the kind of comapny I'd be proud to work for.. wait a minute... I do.
As I nursed my cup of coffee this morning, I looked through the photos I look over the past year. 2002 was full of things I love dearly.
I'm sharing ten of them with you....
(click a picture to get a better, bigger view.)
I woke up in 2003 obtuse.
wine, women and smoke is a nifty little animation, made more pleasurable as one realizes it's all back-drawn... they are all good, though pickle may be my other favoritist.
I'm having a lazy slow morning, this last day of 2002. I'm surfing. I realize I don't surf anymore. I used to. I used to get up in the morning, pick a blog-starting point, and go... noting sites as I went for the gleanings newsletter.
But writing the book slowly weaned me off random wanders, and forced me to do only directed searching-- research. Soon the only odd sites I'd find were mailed to me (thank god for friends, family and readers-- keep me sane!).
And now, I'm wandering again, following links, running searches and my curiosity is peaked... wondering what will become of gleanings. I keep thinking I should resurrect it. But do I want to? When I started it, there were only a handful of blogs pointing this way and that-- now there are thousands.
Maybe essays? Or links with mini-essays? Or maybe nothing. Maybe it's time to retire the old newsletter, and go to digests of the blog. Or maybe it's time to stop blogging? it's not like I don't have enough ways to communicate, via B&A, AIfIA, mailing lists and so on...
I wonder what 2003 will be like, I wonder what role I'll play... what will make me happy...
I cannot stop listening to Le Phare and Rue Des Cascades by Yann Tiersen , who did the Amelie soundtrack. extraordinary.
Nothing like seeing a site you had a part in finally launch...
The Urban School of San Francisco.
today I feel good.
Following a serious crash by my server which brough Eh and B&A down, I reinjured my back-- an old injury from when I fell down some stairs that I occasionally redamage. I'm on muscle relaxants now, and laying on the floor watching movies and the ceiling in turn. So sorry, no bloggage for a bit....
Feel free to use this space to suggest intellectually unchallenging movies that are entertaining and good for people with low mobility and impaired attention spans.. ;-)
To my amazement, pleasure and shock, I've just made the Amazon Bestseller list in Computers and the Internet.
Thank you. I know it was you who did it.
I'm crying right now. good crying.
Recently I was on top of that mountain. now it is blowing up. huh.
Mount Etna WebCam (you may not see much due to the erruption producing mucho ash and smoke.)
I've been repriced: Blueprints for the Web is now 30 bucks at Amazon-- last week it was twenty. Hope most of you-all who plan to buy pre-ordered!
It's weird to have been suddenly repriced-- I wonder what happened. It's longer than I previously planned, so maybe that's it.
After a too-long absence, i'm back to bicycling to work as my main form of transport. amusingly, i just tripped over this old pictureon a friend's (excellent) site.
I forgot that it is not only great exercise and good for the enviroment, but that it restores a great deal of sanity to my day. As I bike in, I prepare my thoughts and plans, as I ride home I get rid of stress and worry. it's so damn good for you.
I love jet lag.
I'm writing this at 4.30 in the morning; I've already been up and hour and a half. The house has a deep quiet like no other time of day. The silence and darkness are empty in a way you rarely seen except in the countryside. I feel myself luxuriating in the vast expanse of morning that lies before me. A sunrise in a few hours, perhaps a walk to appreciate it. Writing, and more writing. Maybe a break to read, or think about reorganizing the kitchen. I’m not sure why evenings don’t offer this same luxury. Weekday evenings are hopeless of course; you are battered down by the days events and willing to hide in the TV set or a book with a glass of wine. Weekend evenings seem stuffed full of people to see and fete. But mornings….
When I was young I would have never imagined I would become a morning person. I used to be dragged kicking and screaming from bed to the school bus, on weekends noon was the earliest I would emerge. But now I’ve come to appreciate the morning. Both Lou Rosenfeld and Jeff Veen frightened me when they said they got up at 5 a.m. each morning to write, but now that sounds lovely. Oddly coding doesn’t strike me as an early morning activity. I have no desire to leap up one morning and say, learn SQL. Late night, as you stave off sleepies with caffeine and kiss goodbye to any alertness in morning meetings, that seems the time to daringly try a new line of JavaScript.
My tragedy is afternoons are quite useless for me. I try to stuff all my meetings into the afternoon; not a spark of the creative instinct inhabits my body from lunch to 4 p.m. I’m alert, conscious (except the 3 p.m. sleepies) but uncreative. Personally I would love a European work style, with a long lunch to be followed by working a bit later. 9 to 5 could not be more arbitrary.
It occurs to me that if we all attend to and map our body’s creative and productive cycles, we can then schedule our daily events to coincide to the time in which we are best suited to accomplish them. Useless from 11-1? Eat and nap! Useless from 2-3? Work out! Creative spark at 7 each night? Why not have an early light dinner and work after? Or a late one at 9, if you think you can catch a second wave late at night. Most articulate at 10 am? Schedule meetings for then. Inarticulate at 9? (as I am—the fingers are awake, but the mouth seems to lag behind about two hours.) Avoid meetings like the plague, or plan to spend a lot of time nodding sagely. To be self-aware is to have an opportunity to be effective. Now if I can just figure out how to convince corporate America that I need a two hour nap each afternoon….
Updates will be infrequent, as I am out of the country for two weeks.
Jeffrey Zeldman says
"Writing a book is like doing drugs. You start out happy and end up dirty, wasted, and trembling. "
As I read through my copyedited pages, I am struck by my various ticks (writing is deadly for ego; reading through an edited chapter with "track changes" on is like listening to your voice on a tape recorder.)
One such tick is my addiction for connective punctuation -- em-dashes, elispses, semi-colons -- I love them all. I like the "sound" they make in your head... a morse code for a pause. A codification of hesitation.
Elipses allows you to gather yourself... gather your words. You can almost see the speaker gaze at the ceiling... lick her lips... rub her hands together... as she seeks exactly how to proceed. And when the words aren't found, when the words fail the writer, they simple trail off into four dots, lost ....
A semi-colon couples together sentences like a train conductor; all aboard, next stop: the point.
That is the power of the semi-colon's brother the colon: it's a full stop. With a colon we have arrived; please check to make sure you have not left any personal items in the sentence.
I use connective punctuation as any poet would -- for the "sound" they make. Not, of course, for the rules that demand their use; I'm too ill-trained for that. I'm sure my phraseology would give Strunk the heebie-jeebies; I like to think White might understand.
As I work on my last chapter's author review (to be mailed off tonight!) I start to dream of fiction. What shall I read when this nightmare of professional diligence is over?
I think of those book I can read again and again.. Ender's Game, The Princess Bride, The Big Sleep (yes, I like the book also), Persuasion and those authors.. Road Dahl, James Thurber, Ray Bradbury, Ogden Nash that are so familiar and unremittingly pleasant that reading them is like falling asleep on your grandmother's couch: perfectly safe, familiar and wonderful in a tiny way.
So what haven't I found yet? What are the books and authors you could read a hundred times?
My sister writes:
"Well, with the Blogathon nigh upon us, (it's this weekend!) I wanted to give one last push to get some more sponsors for my charity. So far I've raised over $200, which is much better than last year, but I want more! The Blogathon in general now has over 200 participants and has gathered something like $45,000 in pledges, so we're doing great.
I'm offering one incentive to pledge--as stated on my site. If you sponsor me for $20+ I'll write a bad poem about you during the Blogathon (I only write bad poetry so I'm just making sure no one's expecting too much.) If you sponsor me for $50+ I'll write a short story about you (my fiction's better than my poetry, but who knows how it'll be after some sleep deprivation).
I hope you'll all be reading this weekend and please send me comments, emails, instant messages (I'm on MSN IM and Yahoo! IM as lucylarou if you want to say hi) to help keep me awake. Thanks again for all your good thoughts and good money!
Sponsor me by clicking on this link: http://www.blogathon.org/sponsor.php?part=13 After you sign up, they will send you a confirmation email which will include a link that you need to click to prove that you really did want to sponsor. Then after the Blogathon they will send you an email telling you where to send the money. Thanks again."
she'll do it , you know. imortalize you in verse. be afraid....
In the last few days, I've gone over seven copy edited chapters, rewrote another entirely, and author-edited two more.
If I'm not sleeping or working, that damn book has got me in its grips. Not only has my newsletter stopped going out since I started, but now the blog begins to atrophy. I have two, maybe three more weeks, then I am done and the machine takes over.
I no longer tell other people to write a book. I'm in the marathon stage of book writing, where it's all pain and your eyes toward the finish line that seems to keep receeding as you run to it, like mountains at the western end of Kansas. The worst is the emotional haul: is it any good, why am I doing it, what if people think it's stupid, if I only had more time, when will it be over i want my life back...
Writing Books: just say no.
I tried to spell the noise I made when I saw Amazon.com: buying info: Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web. I was warned by my publisher that I might see my book on Amazon and this is not the cover, it's just a placeholder and I shouldn't panic if I saw it but I didn't realize that meant it exists. I mean, kinda, I'm still doing edits but there it is. It's virtually real.
whoa. i'm dizzy.
the egress.
Well I turned in the last new chapter. This put me at 100% draft, and I'm also at 50% author review (which is done after the tech reviewers and development editor have told you all the silly things you have done and you get to rewrite it completely).
But 100% draft feels big. Philippe and I went to dinner and a movie to celebrate.
If you've got any advice on travel through Spain or Portugal, hop over to my sister's site and share!
Philipe and I had a nice bite at a menlo park eatery... the floors crunched with discarded peanut shells, every surface was carved with intials, the burgers were five bucks, there were several beers on tap, and a pool table. what do you want from life?
Not to get all mushy-gooey, but I'm spending my day rewriting huge chucks of The Damn Book(tm) and I want to stop a second and say I have the smartest most wonderfulest insightfulest tech editors a girl could dream of. Bug huggy kudos for elan and samantha. They will share credit with my sis (who's doing spot editing) and the new riders editors for keeping me from looking like a moron in public.
dang, it takes a village!
warning: personal and ranty
The Sunday Comics aren't funny is a good article, but the cartoons that illustrate it begin to tear off the bland facade to reveal the unpleasantness underneath. Reading all the comics on the Houston Chronicle's personalized comics page, I'm amazed at what passes for humor.. fat jokes, sissy jokes, sexism... the comics page is the last holdout for 50's mores.
Maybe it's that I'm home these days, writing, and finding myself for the first time in my life washing dishes, clothes and cooking exclusively while warning my delighted husband over dinner not to get to used to it, that I'm haunted and disturbed by these morality tales we present to our children as harmless entertainment -- in fact, they are even dangerous as tales we tell ourselves.
It reminds me of my annual trip back to my grandparent's summer cottage community, where I'll have to pick my battles when the gay/women/racist jokes begin at the BBQ. What do you let lie, and what do you stand up against?
I love comics; I loved Calvin and Hobbs, and I still dig Foxtrot, Zits and Kudzu. Rhymes with Orange and Bizarro bring a pleasant surrealism to my day, often accompanied by a laugh. I dig Prince Valiant, though I can't really explain why. I guess it appeals to the same little girl who liked dinosaur books.
I don't think this is a PC issue, it's a simple issue of questioning our assumptions. BC, Wizard of ID, Crock and Beetle Baily are so routinely vicious in their (lack of) humor, I typically skip them.
I guess I'm saying I don't mind so much that comics aren't always funny; I just wish they didn't make me want to cry.
whee!
whee!
whee!
whee!
whee!
whee!
our backyard is heaven.
So I'm reading Helping Businesses Evaluate Their Internet Presence when I should be writing and I'm shouting (in my head) yes! No! Yes! No! as I read when suddenly a sweet scented breeze blows through my open window and I look up and see the oleander and am overcome with the desire to rip off my clothes and run through the backyard yelling wheeee!
I've got to finish this damn book before the neighbors sic the cops on me.
Now I don't consider myself a dog hater; heck no! EH has sported enough puppy pictures to keep any dog lover happy and me vaguely embarrassed.
But when I am in "My Documents" in Windows XP and I click on "Search" I want a text input field, not a three-D puppy. This thing annoys me each and every time I see it.
Lordie, why did I leave 2000 for the siren call of XP? The default interface looks like Mickey Mouse designed it.
And no gloating, you Mac OsX types, your interface looks more like it came out of a Bed, Bath and Beyond catalog. C'mon, chrome is for bath fixtures and 1950's chevy's.
Of course, these are entirely SUBJECTIVE opinions. I'm sure somebody out there feels their life has been muchly improved now that their widgets have the illustion of being three dimensional.
"Last night I had that dream again. I dreamed I had to take a test In a Dairy Queen on another planet. And then I looked around And there was this woman. And she was making it all up. She was writing it all down. And she was laughing. She was laughing her head off. And I said: Hey! Give me that pen!"
A Laurie Anderson song.
IA is like that. So is design
So is book writing.
I'm laughing my head off right now.
I'm going to miss Henry's Diary.
excuse the silence; big deadline coming up on friday.
Long story. 9th inning hassels.
But.
I'm looking for people to be personas in my book. If you are willing to lend yoru face to a good cause for free, please drop me an email. I'll need a high-resolution headshot, preferably casual/snapshotlike.
Other free things I'd love to find: people's IA diagrams, someone who might want to do some illustrations/cartoons, and photographs of a few key items.
I'm personally not making much on this book other than new wrinkles, so i can't offer cash. i can offer free copies of the damn thing, and a chance at extremely limited fame (hey mom, I'm in a book!)
My husband just drove up to the house, ran in, demanded a magnet and a flashlight, then ran out again and drove away.
If I live to be a thousand....
It's with great sadness that I need to annouce I'm leaving Carbon IQ. Carbon IQ has been an amazing place to work and I hope Noel and Gabe continue to innovate and succeed.
It's no secret last year was a tough one for consultants, including Carbon IQ. Although they've pulled through and have a busy schedule ahead of them, I'm come to realize that the lifestyle inherent in running a small business wasn't for me.
When you are in a small consulting company, it's your entire world. Which didn't leave enough room in my life for other things that are dear to me, such as my husband. He moved eight thousand miles to be with me, only to never see me, which isn't a very fair deal.
So now my current focus will be to finish the first draft of my book and to starting looking for a new position, one that will let me balance life and work.
I'll continue to work with Noel and Gabe to spread the IA meme through workshops, cocktail hours and other activities (albeit in a scaled-back fashion). I still love my partners and I'm sure they'll continue to be successful. They are too smart to do anything else.
I'm looking forward to the next chapter in the book of my life...
i'm attempting to work in my hammock on my laptop. it always sounded like a good idea-- but it's impressively awkward, plus I'm jetlagged and the sun is so nice and warm... and my eyes so heavy....
yes, I'm back in mild CA. a soft breeze is playing the neighbors windchimes, I've rolled up my google t-shirt so the sun hits my tummy and the preschool kids next door just finished a lovely cleaning up song and have gone inside. it's not such a bad life here.
the funny angle in the hammock has me trying to type with my thumbs. well, why not?
until thursday.
I'm staying at the thistle victoria which is attached to the huge victoria staion which means I could see to every need I have without going outside. weird.
Hey all you travelling readers (and italians ones, if there are any)
I'm looking for cheap, central and clean accomadation in Rome (I'll be there from saturday to tuesday). Any advice?
I'll take other bits of advice also, especially if it involves pasta or gelato!
Tom Dolan sent me this excellent column to which I said simply yesYou Deserve A Month Off / Our columnist returns from a modest hiatus, realizes we are all working way, way too much
My friend Tracy, whom I've been traveling with comisserates with the the Europeans regularly on this point (or rather, they extend their sympathy to her).
She says simply "I had to quit to get a vacation."
Two weeks is how long it takes simnply to stop twitching. You need more than that to relearn how to relax. To walk slowly. To breath to the bottom of your lungs. To hear your own voice.
And yes, i still have found time to write. It's very peaceful here.
I'm in Greece; excuse my lack of response and posts. I return May 9th. I'll probably post intermittantly. Pictures to come.
MORE...I can't believe it was only two years ago I started this blog. It seems so much longer. So very much has happened in these two years.
I'm not much of a one for sad stories and we hear a lot on the web, but this one hit me. Meet Thomas.
I also swore I wouldn't get political on this blog again, but sometimes I just feel that the health care in this country is criminal.
I guess I just think that yes, we should help this wonderful kid, but what about the other kids who we don't hear of, we don't even ever know of, and their parents who will ruin themselves financially to do the right thing, the thing that we as a society have failed to do: take care of our weak and sick and young.
So go ahead, tell me it's not your problem, that it's nature and survival of the fittest and the price of freedom and many of the other arguments I've heard on the radio when people debate universal health care. But someday it will be your kid, or your spouse or your mother or father and you'll be selling your precious material goods and going into debt for the rest of your life because love has no price; you just do it.
Go ahead, call me a damn commie, if that means I think people should be forced to take care of their own when they don't have the moral fiber to do it themselves, I'll take that label.
Anyhow, for now we're all we've got. Go buy a print.
My magic moment from the conference was when Matt Jones taught me the new "IA gang sign." Here he is joined by Brad " Yeah I live in Palo Alto and I'm really an interaction design wanna make something of it" Lauster and Izumi "yes, we do have IA in Japan it's spelled Ray-Zer-Fish., don't make me kick your ass."
Damn, you tough!
Anyhow, it involves spelling backwards, so I keep doing it wrong...
Noel's birthday was last week, and all three of us went to the Doggie Diner (yes, it's real and not an invention of Zippy). It makes my list of filthy restaurants I will eat at anyway. Amazing milkshakes.
Greg Evan, my response to you bounced. I think you must have mis-entered your email address. please try again...
Joel on Software - Fire And Motion reminds me of my own quandry. I write fast, and a lot-- unless I'm not writing at all. Like now. I've got a ton to write, and I know I can do it, if only.i.could.just.break.through.argh!
I know what to write, I know how to write, why is it so hard?
I find a blog entry or two warms me up.
Want to know one why I'm so busy? Workshop pics
Sorry if the blog will be quiet for a few days, but I'm spent the weekend moving to palo alto, and I'm not done yet....
Starting my book on IA... I'd love to hear you all say what you'd like to see a book on IA address... especially folks who are not labeled IA's, or who are just learning about IA, or have to explain IA to others....
how may I serve you?
Well, my timing is amazing. I came down with the flu on Saturday morning, and was recovered by Monday night, which meant I did not get to take advantage of the fact that my husband has Columbus day off. A perfectly good three-day weekend spend blowing my nose! However, in between naps I had a good time beta-testing the new blog management system, Moveable Type.
with which I built a foodblog
more comments on the new toy on metafilter.
I'm going to be doing usability testing on it next week; please let me know if you are interested in participating. You must live in SF or be willing to come up, and already be blogging or actively planning to start a blog in the near future.
Noel's gotten sick too, which means the carbon log is hopping
So, it's excuse time... I haven't gleaned, I haven't blogged, what have I been doing?
Well, other than "real work,"
I'm working on a secret project. more later...
I did usability testing for Movable Type, and will be writing up results and getting it to them this week. Many people have asked me why I did this for free. Well, two reasons. One, I like these crazy kids with their dream of a good free blog tool (I've got an open source heart). Two, I got to test some of my theories on usability testing. Again, more later...
Carbon IQ had an anniversay party. Two! Can you believe it???
I went to Big Sur for my birthday. Thank you, husband.
I signed a book deal. more later.
damn I'm happy these days.
I think this will be my best year ever.
I'm back from my birthday trip to big sur, with a new entry to the The Mirror Project. I came into the office to be greeted by many glorious packages from amazon, including metafiction and deconstrutionist theory. Love you kids!!!!!
Amazon didn't tell me who bought Chairman Rolf Fehlbaum for me, but I love this book so much! step up and take your thank yous..... you made my day!
Consider yourself invited. I'd love to meet EH readers! Carbon IQ 2nd Anniversary Party - 10.19.01
Peter Merholz, Jesse James Garrett and I are speaking about IA at Berekley. We promise not to define the damn thing again....
Title: Methods for Information Architecture
Speakers: Christina Wodtke, Peter Merholz & Jesse James Garrett
Location: 230 Bechtel Engineering Center, Sibley Auditorium
University of California, Berkeley
Date and Time: 7.00 p.m., October 16th 2001
About BayCHI-East: BayCHI-East is the East Bay arm of the BayCHI organization. BayCHI-East events are held mostly on the Berkeley campus and occasionally at other locations in the East Bay. The talks are free and open to the public. For questions about the organization and updates about events, go to http://www.baychi.org/bof/east/
Directions
Information about Parking around Berkeley
I know recruiters lurk about here sometimes... a former protegé of mine and Jesse's has moved to New York and is job hunting. I strongly recommend you consider hiring Andi Lewis.
noel was playing with the new google tab interface, and looked for images for information architecture. funny!
I had a great deal of fun at Seybold. I wanted to say to anyone who is visiting for the first time because of one of the two panels i was on, feel free to write me with any questions you might have that didn't get answered. If I don't know the answer i'll try to find someone who does, or post it to hte blog for my incredibly smart reader to help.
That's of course true for non-seybold visitors-- we're all trying to get smarter here, right?
Except how to hack. i continue to not know how, I don't know anyone who does know how to hack, and I don't answer mails that ask me to help with hacking.
Seybold's site is worth visiting if only for the huge number of worst practices they managed to jam in. That said, it's still a very cool conference, and I've done to footwork and found you a comprehendable conference planner and a free pass for one day. Now come by and check out Beyond Bread Crumbs: Best Practices and Tactics In Information Architecture and Putting the 'Eye' in Interface: Effective and Beautiful Interface Design.
Many of us are still struggling to shake off the malaise induced by the WTC attack... many of us haven't been as productive as we've been in the past. Talking with friends this week, I've found many are apologetic and guilty: they haven't been able to get much done and since they didn't lose anyone they knew personally, they feel that their grief is somehow out of place, out of measure.
Our president told us to go back to work. He promised to get those guys (who ever "those guys" are). But he didn't tell us how to deal with our loss-- and we all had a loss. The loss of our precious ordinariness. A plane flying over head that was invisible to me last month fills me with sorrow for lost dreams. A large truck makes me nervous about chemical warfare. A young male friend suddenly seems vulnerable to draft and death. Our assumptions have been shaken, and an unfocused fear has taken its place.
So give yourself permission to mourn your everyday life, interrupted so brutally. Don't feel guilty for the past malaise. Then take stock in your pleasures: your favorite album, your favorite movie, your favorite book. Open the nice bottle of wine you've been saving, buy the hardback version of the novel from your favorite author, the rare import CD from your favorite band. Stop staring listlessly at the monitor and steal away from work to catch some sunshine. Admit we all lost something Tuesday-- not metaphorically, but truly. Only then we can do what we each need to return to our lives. Each in our own way, at our own pace.
The New Yorker notes the passing of Alice Trillin. If you have never read The Tummy Trilogy this would be a great time to pick it up. Calvin Trillin is one of the great food writers of all time, and his books are funny and delightful. If you like Peter Mayle, or MFK Fisher, or if you just love food, read them. We all need as much joy as we can get into our lives right now.
"ME: Anybody who served a milkshake like this in Kansas City would be put in jail.
ALICE: You promised not to indulge in any of that hometown nostalgia while I'm eating. You know it gives me indigestion.
ME: What nostalgia? Facts are facts. The kind of milkshake that I personally consumed six hundred gallons of at the Country Club Daily is an historical fact in three flavors. Your indigestion is not from listening to my fair-minded remarks on the food of a particular American city. It's from drinking that gray skim milk this bandit is trying to pass off as a milkshake. "
Alice was Calvin's muse, his cohort in crime, a funny and amazing lady if the books don't lie, and I think their adventures in cuisine will be a model for my own marriage.
Good bye Alice, and thanks for all the meals.
John of webword has gotten some rough treatment around here lately, what with all the feminism and browserism.... but he is a great guy and is known to wear pants in public. Webword continues to be a great resource, and that's why he got called out. Please read his responses to the relevent posts; good answers. We love ya John!
Wish him a happy one on his blog, then stick around to read his great post on faceted classification.
I just received a nice little note from Amazon reminding me that my birthday is coming, and perhaps I'd like to update my wishlist? Things they thought I might like to add included the book I just raved about below, and also a Linksys BEFSR41 Etherfast 4-Port Cable/DSL Router, which I have been shopping for, but offline, not online. They are getting a little too prescient. What's next? "Christina, we've made reservation for you at La Folie for your birthday, and after tickets to Dave Brubeck. click here to cancel, click here to confirm?" (shudder)
I've removed all my political stuff except for the day of the 11th, which i view as a unique day.
I'm too emotionally distraught to bring diatribe here-- the results are more tears and I think I'm nearly out.
If you hate me or love me or whatever, go over to metafilter and curse me out there. I can ignore that site when I need a break; because I need to watch for hackers and flamers I can't ignore my own.
Come beat me for the crime of the Trail of Tears, for I have settler blood.
Come scream epithets at me for the crimes of slavery, for I have Dutch blood.
Come, tell me I deserve to die for crime of imperialism, for I have French blood.
Come throw rocks at me for the crime of the holocaust, for I have German blood.
Come spit on me for putting innocent Japanese-Americans in interment camps, for I am American.
Come defile my church, as my people did to black churches in Georgia, for I am American.
Come throw a Molotov cocktail at me for killing innocents children at Kent State, for I am American.
Come throw garbage at me for killing 35,000 women, children and older people in Dresden, for I am American.
Come traumatize my children for acts of terrorism, for I am native born American, just like Timothy McVeigh.
But do not, please do not, hurt Middle-Easterners and Muslims who have committed no crime beyond the one you have:
being born with the same blood as killers.
"In Brisbane, a schoolbus packed with Islamic children was damaged by stones and bottles and there had been abusive calls to mosques, said Queensland Islamic Council chairman Sultan Deen."
"In Chicago, a Molotov cocktail was tossed Wednesday at an Arab-American community center. "
"In Huntington, N.Y., a 75-year-old man who was drunk tried to run over a Pakistani woman in the parking lot of a shopping mall, police said."
"Mosque windows were shattered in Texas, a New York man was arrested for an alleged anti-Arab threat, and a prison fight broke out over Muslim slurs in Washington state. "
"In Suffolk County, N.Y., authorities arrested a man who allegedly made an anti-Arab threat and pointed a handgun at a gas station employee. "
"In Asbury, N.J., Ramandeep Singh, a Sikh who wears a turban for religious reasons, said he had garbage and stones thrown at his car and stayed home from work. "
"At the Kuwait Embassy in Washington, Tamara Alfson spent Wednesday counseling frightened Kuwaiti students attending schools across the United States. One student was told, ``You should all die,'' Alfson said. "
an opening thang from gleanings, sept. 13th 2001
Good morning all of you dear readers. This has been a horrific few days. Yesterday I tried to go to work yesterday and realized I couldn't be that far from my husband. I ended up going home so that I could get up from the computer every hour and hug him. I feel deeply for those who have been stranded far from their loved ones, the source of comfort. Lane is one such individual. If anyone can offer Lane a ride back to Austin from San Francisco to be reunited with his love Courtney, let me know and I'll pass on that info to them.
Philippe and I turned off all the media for a couple of hours yesterday at midday to cook and consume a big lunch. I think a lesson for me is that we must take the time to value our ordinary life activities. The TV only circles around, rarely offering new news and mostly offering scenes to terrible for us to comprehend, repeated endlessly. I was treated to watching the plane slice through the WTC tower like a knife through butter forwards, backwards and in slow-mo as Peter Jennings tried to think of something to say "The same technology that allows us to watch sports plays in a multiple ways allows us to... see...this..."
When the media went off, and the only sounds in the house was the wind at the windows and the frying pan sizzling, I felt a bit more human, a bit more able to process this impossible event. Take a walk, cook an egg, ride a bike, see a movie-- give yourself permission to rest.
Please consider giving blood, but wait a couple more days. The blood banks are flooded with people caught up in emotion and willing to give. But I fear in a few days we'll be back to our shortages. Write yourself a note on your calendar, or put it in your pilot-- unless you have O-, wait a bit, but do give.
Amazon is showing real class but setting up a place to donate money to the Red Cross. One click makes it very easy to help out.
A surprise class-act comes from X10, the inventers/utilizers of the pop-under, who have replaced those with direction on how to help in this time of disaster
All the newsletters I receive, and all the mailing lists have changed in the last few days. I'm on lists for writers, usability specialists, web developers, IA's and suddenly they all look the same. Stories form New Yorkers expressing relief for their lives and anguish for those who weren't lucky. Prayers and love sent to all. Whispers of fear for the future.
Robert Scoble said it best, I think "Today, we're human again."
Anyhow, I wanted to reach out to you all. I've written a ton on the blog, and there are even links to ordinary web stuff there.
and if anyone has heard from Andi Lewis, please tell me. I'm sure she's fine, but I'd like to know for certain.
Yahoo! News - Top Stories Photos
I'm done. i'm tired, and I don't really know what to think much anymore. I know I have no way to process something like this. I hoped my blogging might clear my head, but it's about the same. Maybe I'll sit in the backyard and feel the sun, maybe I'll watch a movie, maybe I'll read a book or try to concentrate on the work I need to be doing but can't seem to ramp up to. Or maybe I'll crawl onto philippe's lap one more time.
Charles says
"This is the start of a new era in civilization. God (if you exist) help us.
The coordination and scale of this attack is unbelievable. It's important for us to realize that the creatures who do this evil will never stop. Their intent is to bring the entire world into a religiously dominated Dark Age.
I'm very afraid of what happens next."
"Who did this? To what end? I can anticipate the draconian measures our government will now take in the name of safety and democracy; and this terrorism will rally the country around the most extreme measures. And the people in those planes and in those buildings, the firefighters.... I'm heartsick in so many ways...."
kottke says
"i'm so scared right now. I don't want to hear any reports of Americans grabbing the nearest Arab and beating the crap out of him or her. Don't do it. Please."
Please check in here.
In musings
"the thought of the people in the plane seeing this building coming toward them as their flight gets rammed into it, the thought of office workers just like me going into the Pentagon as if nothing unusual might happen only to have the floor buckle under them then the roof collapse on them, the thought of terrified workers running down stairs to get out of a burning building only to find it crumble around them...my stomach churns and my throat chokes up."
anil dash says "I've been sitting here this whole morning, choking back tears... this is just too much, too big. I can see the smoke and ash from the street here."
Last night I was puking-- mild food poisoning, flu, something I don't know. I had decided to stay home the next day, and I got up this morning just to drive my husband to caltrain. We aren't much for tv or even the radio, but the traffic was a bit congested on the way to the station to I turned on kqed.
This is how I found out. Taking the third street exit onto bayshore to the caltrain station, learning the pentagon had a "notch" in it, and smoke and something about the world trade centers... a bomb? what had happened? planes? An accident like that?
Philippe and I sat listening at the station in horror as we learned about the two planes that crashed into the world trade center, how they collapsed, how the pentagon also suffered from a plane crash-attack. Philippe turned to me and said, "Let's go home."
We've spent the last few hours on the couch, trying to call Andi, receiving calls from friends and family. Nobody has much to say. These are phone calls that you make just to say, "Are you still there? is this happening? Do you feel it too?" We sent out emails well, little pings to other friends and coworkers, and discovered Gabe is staying home, wondering about a friend in Manhattan, and Noel is also gone home to hunker down with his loved one, and Carbon IQ is empty today. As you can see, I've been surfing the blogs looking for reassurance.
Philippe called his mother to let her know he's okay (mothers worry, no matter what coast you are on), and found out there was an earthquake in Holland. Sometimes it seems the world is going insane.
I think they said forty-thousand people were in the world trade center. Mayor Giuliani said he saw people jumping out of the top floor windows. I could imagine those people choosing their death-- they could not live, so all they could do was choose their death. I cried for about the fourth time this morning.
I guess this is one of those events... people will ask you where you were when you found out. I'll see the third street exit, when they ask me about the beginning of world war three, or about the event that ended civil liberty in America, or the event that caused us to bomb Libya/Iraq/Iran, or led to the relocation of Palestine... or maybe it will be merely the worst tragedy in my lifetime. I hope that this is all I remember when I take that exit again, that this was an isolated incident, that this will be the worst tragedy in my lifetime and none will ever overshadow it.
I'm going back to sit with my husband now. I wish I could stop watching, but I can't. The only thing scarier than what has happened is what will happen next.
Noise between stations interrupts your regularly schedualed blog to give info on how to help in New York. As the new stations all seem to be slowly but steadily whispering the word "war" more often, I'm heartened by his quote
'An eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind'
- Mahatma Gandhi
but doubtful it will make much difference.
from CamWorld
"9:50 AM: I was supposed to be in Manhattan this morning for a doctor's appointment at 9:30 AM, but skipped it. I have no answer to why I skipped it (a feeling?). I've never been so glad I listened to my intuition."
andi moved to new york last month, and the phonelines are jammed, so I don't know. She's probably fine, but I'm scared.
I had fun at Web '01 last week, and I promise insights or at least photos this week. But for now-- one of the discussions that sprang up several times was generalists vs. specialists. There is a great article on the benefits of geeneralists in WebTchniques. Check it out.
Heather's photos from the show are here
Vanderwal is running a travel blog on his observations
I'm extremely bummed I missed Stewart Brand, but you can check out a highlight of his thoughts here.
we got some kottke brand love, and I'm all warm and tingly...
"Last Friday, the folks at Carbon IQ had a brown bag lunch discussion about their AtomFilms/Shockwave.com project. An hour and a half, eat some lunch, learn a bit, get some discussion going, meet some smart folks (although I skipped that part because I had to leave at the conclusion due to some pressing afternoon errands), &c. I'd like to see more companies doing this sort of thing, getting people together, sharing their knowledge and experience freely. Nice going."
and I'd like to see more companies doing it. or more people. if you want to speak at the next brownbag, drop a line...
looks like I've found a partner in crime to work on badpractices.com. Right now we're trying to think up general catagories for it such as evil banners, rude customer services, confusing navigation, flash abuse... what can you think of that would make good galleries of bad practices?
Sorry for the neglect but I've been enjoying a second or third honeymoon in which the mundane joys of married life like cooking dinner for each other and falling asleep together on the couch are being explored.
Does jargon have its place? Is there a right time to chuck plain English out the door and dazzle them with your bullsh*t? Great comment from Tony Burgess defending jargon on the blog
Sometimes I'm surfing around, and all the sites I find seem to be trying to tell me something. Last night they all seemed to be about the designer's role on the web. Without the control of print, with usability gurus breathing down their necks, with a host of consultants mouthing hastily invented best practices, with statistics appearing every a link changes from blue to purple, how can a designer get his/her head above water long enough to create?
btw, I just picked up badpractices.com at the urging of mike (mr. biggerhand.com). anyone want to suggest how to use it, I'd love to hear from you.
My husband Philippe got his green card, after a year of paperwork and
fussing with the INS. I have only one thing to say.
YIPPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
See Noel explain why Herman Miller gets it and why Gabe's butt is worth $700.
At twilight, I could hear someone practicing a trombone. They occasionally managed a melody, but mostly just it was just poot-poot-poot. It's not like hearing a lonely saxophone waft across the city, but it's kind of pleasant.
At 10 last night there were fireworks going off in the neighborhood. This morning the garbage truck woke me. The garbage guys are actually pretty quiet-- the move to plastic cans has changed their noise level. But the truck has a distinctive rumble, and anyway I might as well get up and slide you all a glean before the holiday. I still love this city, despite the occasional disturbing event
... there is a strange comfort in being surrounded by familiar people you don't know.
Poet George Oppen wrote of the shipwreck of the singular, about the pleasure of being numerous, being part of a city. He lived in San Francisco, and this is the only book of his that is available in print; but it holds his complete works and it is amazing. I highly recommend it.
strangely enough none of his poems are online. not that I can find, anyhow...
originally sent Tuesday june 26th, archived today
Ever wake up and think: "what would my 16 year old self think of my current life?"
Last night my sister, a friend and I went to a club in the tenderloin. The friend drove, and we parked on 6th, across from tu lan-- a heavily trafficked street. Heavily trafficked by drug addicts, street people and society's underprivileged. We came out two hours later to find the window broken into. They'd hurriedly gotten into the trunk, grabbing my sister and her friend's two bags.
I didn't carry a bag, and my jacket was untouched, but my sister had been apartment hunting lately, and almost everything she valued, including many artifacts of her identity, was in her bag. She spent 2-3 a.m. last night and 8 a.m. this morning trying to protect her identity, as well as canceling cards, disabling her phone, freezing her checks etc. She's an office manager for an university, underpaid and will be unable to replace her birthday/christmas gift, or the fruits of her tax refund. She lives a precarious life, making enough to live and a little bit more. Which means when something bad happens, there isn't much to do except cry a bit and move on. It's frustrating, to work hard and finally get ahead, and then just have it gone.
I've been robbed twice, and the worst thing is the personal items the thieves will discard-- they mean nothing to the thieves and everything to you and it's still taken away. In seattle my bag was stolen from my sister's van, and my sister and I walked down the nearby alleys to see if we could find anything. We were lucky-- we found my sketchbook, a trail of origami paper, the novel I was reading and other personal items scattered every few feet as if the theif had been emptying the bag as s/he ran. In Europe I wasn't as lucky. My bag was stolen and the item I still mourn was a sketchbook with about 30 drawings of Paris in it. I'm sure it ended up sitting in a trash can somewhere in Avignon.
Another friend told me a story about how she was in the lower haight, some years ago, and was jacked by three girl drug addicts. She was beaten with one of those sticks that are used to hold up sapling trees. This particular stick had a couple nails that ripped up her skin. She told me she would fall, and then get up and didn't know why she kept getting up, because the girls would beat her again. Her mind had stopped working. When she told me this story, as we drove through the now-gentrified lower haight I had a chill-- how easily she could have died, how easily I could have been cheated out of meeting one of the dearest people in my life.
San Francisco has always been startlingly beautiful and now it is so cleaned up and gentrified I think we've started considering it our personal Disneyland. Safe and clean and full of adult games, like "live in the heart of the mission" or "clubbing in dangerland". My sister and I started to walk down an alley to see if the thieves had thrown her bag in a trashbin or a corner, and we did see a pile of discarded purses (though not hers.) Then I looked up, saw several men in black parkas, and encouraged my sister to quickly return to the main street where we hailed a cop.
When I got home -- after my sister talked to several remarkably unhelpful institutions -- I called my husband. I just wanted to hear his voice, hear him tell me about his ordinary day at his Dijon university. In five days I'll know if he can come here for good, if the INS will allow us to finally live in one country as man and wife. At that moment I felt a strong urge to just see that he still existed. I was checking to see if my valuables were safe.
Why I am telling you this, why am connecting these events? I guess I'm warning you to remember that this world we live in is always dangerous, is never a themepark. Know what matters to you. Keep your valuables close at hand.
What is most precious to you?
Busy, busy, busy.
When I joined Carbon IQ I had certain ideas about what I would do: I would do things my way. I would create schedules that made sense. I would do unstintingly quality work. I would speak honestly and openly with my coworkers, and politics and game-playing would not exist and above all I would remember that we are all human begins, and a business is there to support the humans who work for it, not the other way around.
Everything I thought about owning your own business is true-- you get to do the quality of work you want to do, you can take off at 2 p.m. on a Wednesday to catch a matinee and finish the work on a Sunday without people looking at your strangely for either, and you learn all the time. What I didn't know I'd do was all the support jobs, from office manager to bill collector. You pick up envelopes, you call a client to inform them they are three weeks late in payment, you scan news groups trying to figure out why they heck PDF's won't print.... The big advantage however, of a small business over freelancing is you aren't completely alone. I called the client because Noel didn't want to deal with it anymore, and Noel edited a proposal I was writing when I couldn't see straight anymore. Gabe coaxes the printer to print just when I'm willing to pour coke on it, and I tweak the JavaScript rollovers that are trying to make Gabe insane. We are all there for each other, in a pragmatic unsentimental and immensely comforting way. There are no politics, there are no games and the business is the human beings who work there. period.
A small company is the hardest work I have ever done in my life, and I have never learned so much either-- I have no question I'm a better IA for it, as I understand business issues viscerally. My empathy for a businesses need to survive is at an all time high...
I wouldn't trade this opportunity for anything in the world. It's been scary, frustrating and awakening. These have the best six months of my professional life. I look forward to the future. Thanks, Noel and Gabe!
It's foggy and cold again. While the rest of the northern hemisphere puts on shorts I get the pleasure of wearing a turtleneck. Thank you for letting me have my whine-- for cheese to go with it, scroll down to Apropos of Nothing, where new of the weird seems to have taken over.
It's foggy, and I'm going to trek downtown to register my MG midget. So a light gleanings before I go try to find winter clothes so I can drive a convertible in San Francisco in June... did Mark Twain really say "The coldest winter I ever experienced was a summer in San Francisco"?
Good morning (or afternoon, or evening) I'm back in America. Not much jetlag, just a tendency to be cranky after 8 p.m. and see more sunrises than usual, including a fairly impressive one right now that is rising out of china basin.
Oh, I just put up all the guest gleans in the archive. May their fabulous work live on for eternity!
Today's "Word of the Day" was Argus, so that may be why this issue of gleanings is so IA heavy-- fate!
argus (AHR-guhs) noun
An alert and observant person; a watchful guardian.
[From Greek mythology. After Argus, a giant with 100 eyes who was sent to
watch over Io. He was later killed by Hermes and after his death his eyes
transformed into spots on the peacock's tail.]
It has nothing to do with IA, but for those of you who care...chaumejean.
not really connected; i basically carry my laptop up from the small cottage where there is no phone to the mainhouse to upload/download. so more when I return, on the sixth!
Well kiddos, I'm going to France again end of next week. I've got a slight break between part one and part two of a project, and I'm dashing off for a couple weeks to the Sacramento of France-- thanks right folks, lovely and delightfully dull Dijon.
http://nothing-new.com/travel/France/burgundy/dijon/ (Dijon pictures start after the deviant cow sign)
In Dijon I will see my husband (woo hoo!), gain ten pounds eating butter-based food and contemplate pretty cows. And I may do some writing, hopefully....
My question to you dear readers is what would you like while I'm gone:
A series of guest editors?
Noel?
Me sporadically when I can connect?
Your choice:
http://eleganthack.com/gleanings/archives/00000011.shtml
Oh, I'm also going to Chicago for work from Monday to Wednesday. any advise on fun stuff to do in the eve, or on a Wednesday afternoon? I'm gonna mostly be on my own there, so love to know how a gal should waste her time...
Normally I don't like 3d/360/etc but Expedia.com 360° Tours: In the company of Mona Lisa is pretty cool. Something about 360-- you feel yourself to be in the space in a way a photo doesn't give you.
I got a new elph recently and enjoyed making a 360 degree view of my workspace. I zipped it btw, it's kinda big.
I got my first bit of hate-email today, telling me I seem to have an opinion on everything and they are all inane. I suppose I'll be getting more of these as my site gets more traffic and as I broadcast my opinions and questions into the world. So how do I protect my ego from this. I immediately wanted to say "Hey, sorry how did I offend you? I'll change." Weird! I know I won't, for one thing, and I can't imagine peter writing such a mail.
I can't design my way out of paperbag, so I'm guessing I won't reach this level of attention. Or suffer from the level of attacks zeldman is getting on MetaFilter That's just cold!
There *is* a real human they are crushing and deifying in turn....
Hey all-- I'd like to attend the webby awards party-- I managed to wrangle an invite to the second and third, and would like to make this one. I'm always looking for a chance to wear an evening gown. I promise if you bring me I will compliment your outfit a minimum of three times, say something stupid to at least one nominee, and dance like a crazed weasel. Who can beat that offer? Anyone got a ticket?
Or write me in for the people's choice, and maybe they'll send me a ticket... noel put me in the education category. Doubt I have much chance in personal (me vs. fray... yeah, right) but you never know!
Lance Arthur was one of the first bloggers, one of the first folks to get nekkid online-- in his case in his life serial, through the naked files and through his many beautiful stories. He closes his weblog, "Life Serial" today. Glassdog goes on however (thank GOD).
"Writing about oneself obsessively (as if there is any other kind) becomes boring and trivial after a while. You begin searching for things to write about. You begin trying to make uninteresting things interesting to varying degrees of success and you take everything you write and look at it more critically and decide, more and more often, that it's crap.
Thus, I come to the end, here, of writing about the truth of things"
I said goodbye to Egreetings last night.
Bought by American Greetings, they shut their doors yesterday. The generous former CFO rented out Cafe Du Nord and provided a spread complete with little wild mushroom appetizers and plenty of free flowing liquor. The founders gave speeches and handed out awards to longtimers.
Some people were angry, blaming this mistake or that for ending what was a truly amazing place to work. But others, including myself, were just happy we could have been part of it in a time when you could do insane things and they would work. It was a company that allowed you to grow as fast as you could-- grow as fast as it was growing.
Egreetings took chances on people. I went from shy temp writing marketing copy for the greetings to Information Architect running around quoting Jakob Neilson in hopes of making a great product.
I chatted with a former waiter who ended up heading the production team. It was a little bit company-as-cult, but you know, that can be okay. It's nice to know the product you're making doesn't hurt the environment or cause cancer, and even makes people smile. I remember times when we were up at 2 a.m. screaming about the database or cursing javascript that didn't work, and someone would yell "Hey, it's not brain surgery. We get this wrong, nobody dies."
I also remember many times, riding on a plane or a taxi or anywhere strangers suddenly start talking to you, I would be asked "Where do you work?" and I'd say "Egreetings.com" and they would reply "Oh, I love those! My sister (brother, wife) sent me one and it made my day."
Kinda cool.
I couldn't help but think as I watched the founders, Tony and Fred, up on the stage: that's Noel and Gabe and me up there. Foolhardy and hopeful and trying to get a product we believe in off the ground.
And tonight Carbon IQ is holding its housewarming. Will we grow big? Will we stay small? Will be get bought, as Egreetings did, but a larger older company? Will we quietly go under with no fanfare? I don't know. We're in a strange business, in strange times. But damn I love an adventure.
Good bye Egreetings. Hello Carbon IQ.
Fasten your seatbelt, it's going to be a bumpy ride.
See the party pictures
more party pics, thanks to bob
I deleted a comment today. I'm feeling a touch guilty.
Let me start at the beginning. Some of you may have noticed that the comments section has recently been peppered with mysterious messages from "Michael Sippy" stating such things as "i am everywhere" and "all your blog are belong to me."
I wrote Sippy asking him what was up with him, and he replied
"it's not me. i wrote this:
Okay, cute, of course Sippy would be the first to have his identity hijacked. The another comment showed up on my blog:
"and I'd like you to call me mike. or mikey."This was tiresome. So I pondered-- should I delete these comments? Wouldn't that be-- shudder-- censorship?
Earlier today chatting with Gabe I talked about a large mailing list I'm on, where people were going on and on-- someone had been rude to another person, who then got snippy, and suddenly I had 20 messages in my mail box stating how this person was right or the other was... this argument has now been going on for five days.
I wondered out loud to Gabe why the moderators didn't step in and unsubscribe them. I would. I did. I used to moderate a mailing list, and I would happily unsubscribe someone who was out of line-- anyone who was rude or who used the list for spam. No problem. I just made them go away. I felt a touch guilty at this thought of my early totalitarian ways.
Gabe just laughed.
So I sat in front of the computer tonight seeing another moronic fake comment arrive on the blog. Do I delete? Do I?
and then I remembered the whole point of this site was to filter out all the noise for people who care about what I do-- designing usable humane products. Heck, my mailing list is nothing but a way to help people better the signal to noise ratio. And hell yeah, this mock-sippy stuff was noise.
I'm now a censor.
and I'm feeling a touch guilty about my totalitarian ways.
From: Gleanings
To: the old hood
Subject: Gleanings: Brought to You from the Glamourous Excelsior
I moved over the weekend, thus the period of silence. I'm now a resident of the sleepy excelsior district.
IA MATTERS
Making Tips Work
EYECANDY
I never thought I'd say this, but "cool splash page man"
APROPOS OF NOTHING
What happens when you keep getting instant messages from strangers? Well, you hook it up to an artificial intelligence, of course.
the news storythe webpage
NEWS
from tracy: maybe this will get europe more online.
Internet Access with Nopay
the message seeks a medium (from tomalak)
NewMedia: Ideas As Objects.
Scott McCloud. Yet, even though my profession (cartooning) grew out of paper and ink, I'm not a print loyalist. I'm prepared to switch as soon as print's strengths are improved upon by other technologies, and that threshold is approaching fast.
Useit.Com: From February 1995; The Future of Hypertext
Wired News: How Barbie.com Got All Dolled Up.
Their job began about 10 months ago. Every two weeks, the diverse group of
computer-savvy girls from Los Angeles, New Jersey, and San Francisco received
screenshots through email from Cheskin Research, Mattel's partner in the
project.
FEEDBACK
a friend writes:
> I feel it is my professional obligation to mention that my friend
> the IA put an apple tart recipe in her IA newsletter and forgot
> to mention in the ingredients list that there are apples in it.
it's true. takes 8 or so apples.
the face of evil fell out of a three story window today and was unscathed. Cats are weird.
Nope, I'm in France again, having just returned from Greece on my honeymoon and puttering around Burgundy for a bit before returning to the grand USA to pick a new job. Lots of intriguing oppurtunities out there right now!
I'll put up pictures as soon as possible of Greece and France, but for now picture me here.
(for more past visits, check this out http://www.nothing-new.com/travel)
In any case, I'm mostly online now, though irregularly and my ETA for returning is this thursday. Sigh.
