October 11, 2011

• Ever since we realized that instant noodles are a great way to get through lots of vegetables from our community-supported agriculture box, I haven’t made a regular salad. It’s all about the Nongshim udon piled high with shredded rapini and other leafy greens, sliced onions and radishes, and (if we haven’t used up our egg quota yet) one or two soft-boiled eggs. Ramen love is rampant on the net. Patricia of Baon Ko Bento writes about stir-fried instant ramen. Gizmodo(!) shares suggestions on things you can add to ramen, Serious Eats shares ramen hacks, and Seattle Weekly gives you ideas for every meal of the day. I haven’t tried the other recipes yet, but I’m tempted to. (Hat-tip to Lifehacker for the other links.)
• Fluent in 3 Months shares how a personal assistant can make travelling much easier. Wouldn’t it be great to have someone sort out local arrangements for you? For our trip to the Philippines, everything was sorted out by my family (my sister’s awesome at planning trips), but I might take advantage of this idea if we travel anywhere else.
• Matthew Cornell shares 24 productivity experiments he tried. I’m fascinated by the way people measure and improve their lives. Thoughts on his experiments:
  • Two-by-two charting: I should try this. Tasks? Interests?
  • Daily planning: Might be good for getting back into the hang of using Org as a planner, not just as a notebook.
  • Estimated versus actual completion times: I’m getting pretty good at this when it comes to work. Maybe I’ll extend it to personal tasks, too.
  • Task input/output: That’s a nifty idea. Work is fine (burndown charts, etc). I wonder how I can track that in my personal life, too.
  • E-mail: I’ve gotten much more responsive when it comes to social e-mail. I think it was a matter of setting aside 15 minutes each day to manage my personal mailbox.

  If you like these kinds of experiments, check out Quantified Self. There are meetup groups around the world – great for show and tell, and great for inspiration.

• Tracy Kenny (Talecatcher) shares stories about home-schooling and co-schooling. J- goes to school, but that doesn’t mean learning stops there. We help her with homework, we sneak learning into everyday conversations, and we host study groups so she and her friends can get extra practice with math or other subjects.
• Cate Huston shares her talk on being yourself on the Internet. From time to time, people ask me about personal brands and blogging. I tell people to focus on being themselves and becoming better. Cate does too, but she illustrates her talk with XKCD comics, so I think the end result is funnier.

Lots of interesting posts turn up in my feedreader. I’m thinking of sharing highlights weekly so that I nudge myself to go back and review them, see what I’ve done with the information, and share the ideas with you. Working through my backlog!