Pennaquod—The Pen Blog Searcher

I don't profess to be much of an expert on fancy analog writing tools, but I do enjoy drooling over them now and again. I typically rely on internet friends like Brad Dowdy and Patrick Rhone for information and tips about such things.

Pennaquod, a Google search tool put together by Ian Hedley, allows you to search over fifty (!) of these pen blogs at once. If you've ever wanted to know about particular fountain pens or notebooks or even typewriters, bookmark this super-handy site for later.

Fair warning: that site is a gateway into some deep, deep rabbit holes for even the most minor of pen nerds. Tread lightly.

For a More Ordered Life, Organize Like a Chef

Dwayne Lipuma of the Culinary Institute of America, while being interviewed for an NPR piece:

“The world is a giant gerbil wheel right now. I think if we just became a little bit more organized, a little bit more mise-en-place, understand what we really need and only do what we really need, I think we'll have more time for what's important.

You'll be able to sit down at the table with your kids and actually cook a meal. Get up a little bit earlier so you could breathe. You want to greet the day.”

The timing of coming across this article is funny to me, because there's an article about mise en place and other such concepts sitting in my drafts folder at this very moment. I should really finish it sometime. I think it's going to be a good 'un.

In the meantime, you can read more about mise en place here.

Let's Talk About Margins

Craig Mod writes about the power and character of well-designed books (bold emphasis mine):

“On the other hand, cheap, rough paper with a beautifully set textblock hanging just so on the page makes those in the know, smile (and those who don’t, feel welcome). It says: We may not have had the money to print on better paper, but man, we give a shit. Giving a shit does not require capital, simply attention and humility and diligence. Giving a shit is the best feeling you can imbue craft with. Giving a shit in book design manifests in many ways, but it manifests perhaps most in the margins.”

"Don’t write email that people can respond to."

NPR Creative Director Liz Danzico, being interviewed by web magazine Technical.ly:

“As far as Inbox Zero, I’ve tried a few things, and even now I use a modified GTD approach where I transfer all to-do-like email content into a to-do app. But basically those all pale in comparison to this simple approach:

Don’t write email that people can respond to.

If you ask questions in an email, people will respond. If you don’t answer their questions, they’ll ask again. If you write charming email, they will want more. Don’t do those things. Write an email that is impossible to respond to. Answer every question. Tie up every loose end. Write a complete and completely un-respondable email.”

I like her style. (h/t Patrick Rhone)

The Future of Iced Coffee

Alexis Madrigal, writing for The Atlantic, got a behind-the-scenes look at the manufacturing process for Blue Bottle Coffee's New Orleans iced coffee cartons. As an iced coffee fanatic myself, it's fascinating to see how they're trying to tackle the problem of mass-production now that they've mastered the recipe.

One particularly interesting fact in the article: Blue Bottle's sterilization process requires machines that generate six times the amount of atmospheric pressure as one would find at the bottom of the Mariana Trench—you know, the one from that movie—which itself is 1,000 times more intense than what we experience here aboveground.

Talk about hardcore.

Crave

Chase Reeves, writing for The Sparkline:

“I think our buddhist friends would say something to the tune of, “all cravings will eat you up from the inside out.” Maybe they’re right.

But I have cravings.

[...]

I see [Robin Williams] sweating and manic and quick and sharp and brilliant and dynamic and feeding, feeding, feeding on the relationship with the audience… and I see a fable about myself, a hole in the center, a vacuum, always on, sucking, searching, hungry… for this moment, laughter, friends, me in the center of it… not wanting the moment to end.

The things I create come from there. That hole, that insecurity is an engine of creation.”

I love this piece. Sometimes I forget that Chase is just as great a writer as he is a web designer. For more stuff like this be sure to check out his personal blog, Ice to the Brim.

The Clues to a Great Story

Andrew Stanton of Pixar, during a 2012 TED Talk in which he shares some of the storytelling secrets he's learned over the years (timestamps included):

[6:22] “Storytelling without dialogue. It's the purest form of cinematic storytelling. It's the most inclusive approach you can take. It confirmed something I really had a hunch on, is that the audience actually wants to work for their meal. They just don't want to know that they're doing that. That's your job as a storyteller, is to hide the fact that you're making them work for their meal. We're born problem solvers. We're compelled to deduce and to deduct, because that's what we do in real life. It's this well-organized absence of information that draws us in.”

[12:19] “And it just went to prove that storytelling has *guidelines*, not hard, fast rules.”

[16:27] “And that's what I think the magic ingredient is, the secret sauce, is can you invoke wonder. Wonder is honest, it's completely innocent. It can't be artificially evoked. For me, there's no greater ability than the gift of another human being giving you that feeling -- to hold them still just for a brief moment in their day and have them surrender to wonder.”

If there's anyone I trust when it comes to guidelines for good storytelling, it's the director of Finding Nemo and WALL•E—two of my all-time favorite films. Definitely set aside twenty minutes to watch this video.

How to be Polite

Paul Ford:

“Sometimes I’ll get a call or email from someone five years after the last contact and I’ll think, oh right, I hated that person. But they would never have known, of course. Let’s see if I still hate them. Very often I find that I don’t. Or that I hated them for a dumb reason. Or that they were having a bad day.

People silently struggle from all kinds of terrible things. They suffer from depression, ambition, substance abuse, and pretension. They suffer from family tragedy, Ivy-League educations, and self-loathing. They suffer from failing marriages, physical pain, and publishing. The good thing about politeness is that you can treat these people exactly the same. And then wait to see what happens. You don’t have to have an opinion. You don’t need to make a judgment. I know that doesn’t sound like liberation, because we live and work in an opinion-based economy. But it is. Not having an opinion means not having an obligation. And not being obligated is one of the sweetest of life’s riches.”

After this past week, where most of the news stories I've read portray people treating each other horribly in one way or another, I think a little refresher on politeness is exactly what the world needs.

Robin Williams (1951-2014)

“You're only given a little spark of madness. And if you lose that...you're nothing.”
~ Robin Williams

I've often looked down my nose at people who get overly worked up in the wake of a celebrity's death. All too often, we place famous people on pedestals they don't deserve merely because of their fame or fortune.

This one is different.

This morning, Robin Williams was found dead of an apparent suicide. He was 63. An incredibly sad loss.

His death will touch the hearts of many, because he was more than just a comedian or an actor. He was an artist and a master of his craft, never one to hold back or shy away from taking risks. He was an integral part of our cultural fabric, someone who made us laugh and cry and laugh all over again. He used his success to help those in need. He impacted more lives than we can ever know.

The world was a better place for his talents, and it just won't be the same without him.

Rest in peace, Robin.

Relay FM

Brand-spanking-new podcast network/syndicate/collective (take your pick) started by my buddies Myke Hurley and Stephen Hackett. Shows they used to do on 5by5 have been renamed and rebooted—The Prompt is now Connected; CMD+Space is now Inquisitive; etc. If you'd like to know more, Myke wrote about the changes here.

I'm looking forward to what Relay FM has in store. Congratulations to Myke and Stephen (and everyone else involved) on the launch!