The Column

Reminder: Include a Motto I haven't written much lately because I've been working late. My motto at work has been "when the going gets tough, the tough get going." I've been using Google Calendar & Gmail since July, 2007. My relationship with those two products is older than my relationship with my university. Gmail and Google Calendar haven't really changed much in the past 7 years. That is, they hadn't changed much until about a month ago when Google unveiled their "Inbox" application and an updated Android Calendar app. They have been updated with new intelligence... and Google's "Material Design". In place of Google Tasks you get "Reminders", that you can set from multiple places. But, it's kinda weird how it works... and it's not at all obvious. Let me explain: You can SET reminders from Google Now, Keep, and Inbox. You can see your set reminders in those three apps and also Google Calendar. Bu...

Motto: Just Cause I love a good notebook. If you have a notebook, you can do anything! Your only limit is your imagination! ...and ability ...and available real-estate per page ...and available number of pages ...and level of education ...and level inspiration ...and the properties of your writing utensil ...and free time with which to fill a notebook ...and the 2-dimensional nature of the format ...and the static nature of the medium Other than that, you can do anything! ...so long as it's either writing or drawing ...the parts of writing or drawing existing within the subset of the parameters defined above Then there's this: Then there's this: The optimist sees the glass half full The pessimist sees the glass half empty The engineer sees the glass is twice as large as is required and/or operating at near 50% its capacity The homeless person sees the glass on the street in front of them, with not much change in it The artist sees the glass as a fascinating su...

Motto: Consumerism at its Finest Whoa! Dude! There's $1500 laying on the ground over here! I'm going to use this in the totally the most responsible way possible. What could I get?* A Mostly Complete Home Gym: $500 - Power Rack $385 - Olympic Plates (bar & clamps included) $300 - Adjustable Dumbbells $150 - Adjustable Bench $96 - Mats ($24 per set x 4 sets) $69 - Mirror... why are mirrors so hard to find online? An Apple Setup: $1499 - 13" 256 GB Macbook Pro A Different Apple Setup: $1499 - 21.5" iMac Another Different Apple Setup: $649 - Unlocked iPhone 6 $499 - iPad Air (or iPad Mini with more storage) $349 - Apple Watch I could keep going with combinations. The Mac Mini is also $499 - you could use it in place of the iPad Air. A Google Setup from this Generation: $650 - Nexus 6 $499 - Nexus 9 $249 - Moto 360 $99 - Nexus Player A Google Setup from the Last Generation: $380 - Toshiba Chromebook (this is actu...

Motto: Google Fit, Not Quite Fit for Duty (HEADLINES, SON) This entire update is about Google fit. If you don't care, I suggest you skip it. I love Google Fit. It sits in the crux of things I really like. Seriously, if you threw some sort of Marvel superhero in there somehow I might explode. It shows amazing potential, but I think Google is doing a horrible job with the release. Google Fit is an aggregation platform/app for all of the health & fitness data from the various diet, workout, sleep apps available on the Play Store. It will shine when it aggregates all of that data. However. Right now, this is all you can get to integrate with Google Fit: Strava (Beta) - a running/bicycling app MayMyRun - a running/bicycling app Runtastic - a running app Runkeeper - a running app That's it... I think. I say "I think" because there is NO WAY TO SEARCH FOR APPS INTEGRATED WITH GOOGLE FIT. They have NOT aggregated them in the Google Fit app. Th...

Motto: Putting the "I" in "Happiness" I'm going to write a bit about a subject I normally avoid writing about (because I think it's awkward to read about) - my wife. Melissa and I met a little over 5 years ago. Melissa and I got married 6 months ago. We've lived together ever since. It's been a dream. It's been better than I could have hoped for. I knew, intellectually, that living with the love of your life would be a recipe for genuine and continual happiness - but I didn't know what that would actually feel like . It's the highlight of my day when I wake up in the morning, to see her there. It's the highlight of my day when we meet again after work. Making dinner, playing games, spending time together, are all the highlight of my day. When I go to bed each night, she's there - and it's the highlight of my night. You might notice that my day is pretty much covered in highlighter at this point. That's what it...

Motto: Whoever said "You can never go back" clearly didn't put in the effort Melissa and I are in Lawrence in preparation for her brother's marching band competition. We decided to come a bit early and hang out in the place we met. Things are different. All the sudden nothing is the same and I'm old and that's scary. All these young kids with their compact disc players and their radio cellular telephones. They have no respect for themselves or the society I once knew. We are in the new public library. They tore the old one down about a year after we left. Then they built this beautiful, modern, public workspace in its place. I hate to admit I'm not much of a reader. I consider that fact one of the flaws of my character. But I adore libraries. Or, should I say, I adore the idea of libraries. Publicly available information, knowledge, and entertainment, all for free. The library is the internet before the internet existed. Unfortunately, most pub...