How To Have Great Ideas
December 29, 2007
How To Have Great Ideas
by: Steve Gillman
Want to have great ideas? You could try waiting to see if they pop into your head someday, and they honestly might. However, if you want a more systematic method you can use today, here it is in three simple steps:
1. Get knowledge in the area in which you want the ideas.
2. Use idea-generating techniques.
3. Choose the best ideas from the results.
Great Ideas Start With Knowledge
You wouldn’t expect to come up with a new theory of relativity if you had no knowledge in physics or mathematics. You need some degree of knowledge in the area in which you want new ideas. For truly great ideas, it helps to have a great deal of knowledge.
To create a new transportation device, for example, you would want general knowledge in that field, as well as more specific knowledge. This might include knowing a little about all the current modes of transportation. You might add to that a list of things that have been tried and failed, and a list of all the things that people want in their transportation.
Great Ideas From Techniques
The Music Industry and Its Lack of Talent
December 29, 2007
So it has come to this… what we see overrides what we hear. What we see now influences HOW we hear. And what we see drowns out all that is heard to the point that we are virtually deaf.
Be it the pop music forced down our throats by the incessant rambling of the local radio station, or the sexy video bombarding our television on MTV, all is lost. Or at least misplaced somewhere deep within our own psyche.
Since when has what is being seen suddenly dictated what is being heard? This cannot be the reality of it all, yet it has become all too clear that in fact this is the only reality: sex and image comes before content and talent.
No one shall ever hear the likes of classic rock and roll again, as the music industry is overrun with cookie-cutter sex pistols whose waistline is the most important thing, not the talent held within that waist. For some time now, music has not been music, but a corporate image force fed to its “fans” with commercial weight absent of anything worth hearing, and overloaded with what may be worth seeing.
Becoming A Successful Author: The Price!
December 28, 2007
So you want to be a successful author? You want to be up there with Brown, Archer, King, but what price are you prepared to pay? You might be lucky and your first book could be an overnight success but the chances are you’ll be hacking it for years before success knocks.
If you decided to become a lawyer, an accountant, a bricklayer, or even to start an ‘ordinary’ business then you would be prepared to make sacrifices, to invest in the future. Why expect it to be different??
The amount of effort you put into your apprenticeship will dictate how successful you will be as a fully fledged tradesman, a successful author!
Are you prepared to spend a year putting a novel together to have it rejected by not one, not two, not three but four publishers? Are you prepared to take the novel sit down and do a major rewrite! If you are then you might, just might, be more successful second time around.
Harder still are your prepared to accept that the book just doesn’t hack it and bin it!
There are very few real overnight successes: role up your sleeves and do some hard graft, learn the trade. Then you’ll succeed.
Successful Dog Training
December 28, 2007
Dog Training
So, we’ve got a new best friend that needs some dog training. No different than when we were kids. A lot of patience, love, and even some long suffering by we pet parents makes for a successful dog training experience.
Put you new friend at ease and let them know you love them as they do you before starting any routines. That may take a little time in terms of days or even months in some cases. If you little friend has previous life history before it got to you we’re not sure what sort of an agenda our new little buddy has brought with it.
When we got “Charlie” he was a brand new puppy so we didn’t have to be concerned with prior treatment and relationships. Sound a little familiar? Not much different than we people, eh! We need to be understood and loved before we’re ready to be receptive to new information and information. Making changes isn’t easy and changing behavioral patterns is even more difficult. Ask the dieters!
Secret of Light and Fluffy Biscuits and Pancakes
December 28, 2007
Would you like to lose some weight — in your baking, that is? This one secret ingredient (that you likely already have in your kitchen) is not only inexpensive and healthy, it’ll also add a bit of “cloud” to your biscuits and pancakes!
And that ingredient is … Oatmeal!
Yep, I know what you’re thinking … just give me a moment and trust me on this.
For instance, to make super light pancakes, I’ll use normal, non-instant, oatmeal. I’ll prepare a 1 to 1 1/2 serving size portion, usually in the microwave.
Next, add your normal pancake ingredients to the oatmeal. I normally add the milk first to cool down the oatmeal (don’t want the eggs to cook!). You may notice that the batter is a little frothy — especially if you let it sit a bit. That’s oatmeals extra viscosity coming into play.
Cook the pancakes just like you normally do. They’ll look the same and taste the same (no oatmeal taste). However, they’ll rise up nice, light, and fluffy!
To make super light biscuits, you’ll alter your normal biscuit recipt just a tiny bit. Prepare the oatmeal as usual — but, since the prepared oatmeal is fairly liquid, it’ll make your biscuit dough into a batter … IF you add the normal amount of milk!
Pet Loss: Should You Clone Your Cat?
December 28, 2007
Clone a Cat, Go To Jail
…or at least pay a fine. That’s the goal of animal welfare activists who announced recently that they are seeking state and federal restrictions on the small but growing pet-cloning industry.
The effort has been spearheaded by the American Anti-Vivisection Society [AAVS] (in suburban Philadelphia), and takes aim at companies such as Genetic Savings and Clone Inc., the California company that began to fill orders for cloned cats last year. The clones - which have sold for $50,000 each - are genetic duplicates of a customer’s deceased pet and represent the leading edge of an emerging sector that advocates predict could eventually reap billions of dollars for corporate cloners. The movie, the 6th Day , starring the erstwhile governator, Arnold Schwarzenegger, features pet cloning businesses in a shopping mall during its opening sequences. It may soon be the case that life imitates art in this respect and pet cloning franchises may start popping up in common shopping venues. But not if the AAVS have their way.
Tools Of The Trade
December 27, 2007
Tools Of The Trade
by: Maddy Cranley
Knitting in its simplest form is often described as the looping of a string around two sticks. When faced with multi-color patterning, intricate stitches or detailed graphs, this seemingly easy craft becomes a more complex activity that can benefit from an innovative tool or two. Right from the start when the ideas for a new knitting project abound, there are aids to guide you in choices of yarn and color. Color wheels and color selectors, using proven principles of color theory, can steer you through establishing a pleasing color combination of two or many colors. Even though you may pick the perfect geranium pink to match that perfect leaf green, you still must find commercially available yarns of compatible weights in those very colors. Many yarn retailers offer, at a reasonable cost, sample cards of available yarns in their full color range. Much like selecting paint chips at the hardware store, you are able to see at a glance what colors are available in a particular yarn and how they interact with other colors of that yarn type.
A Teak Chair - Create a Livable Outdoor Space with One
December 27, 2007
When creating a comfortable, usable outdoor space, nothing could me more inviting and warm than furnishing that space with natural products such as wood. Often, though, there are problems associated with wood furnishings. Wood is susceptible to the elements and can splinter and degrade if not cared for properly. That’s why many people choose teak chairs and teak furniture for their outdoor spaces.
Teak, a hard strong durable yellowish-brown wood, grows in the region of Southeast Asia, mainly in Java, Indonesia, and is harvested from the surrounding forests and teak plantations by the locals and the Indonesian government. The wood of the teak tree is naturally resistant to insects, warping, splintering and the elements, which makes it an ideal wood for creating chairs and other outdoor furnishings.
Many people choose teak over other natural materials because it requires no sealing, varnishing or finishing, and it only gets better as it weathers. A teak chair is able to withstand the elements for decades; retain its beauty, durability and smooth texture; and, over the course of time, weather to a gorgeous silvery color.
Grow Your Ideas Without Letting Words Grow Like Weeds
December 27, 2007
Q: How do I expand on an idea without getting too wordy?
A. Before you begin counting words, focus on holding the reader’s interest.
(1) Writing as fast as possible, write up your idea, in expanded form, as if you were writing an email to a good friend. Don’t edit or censor yet.
(2) Stop! Take a break — at least fifteen minutes. Have a cup of coffee, take the dog around the block, spend quality time with the cat.
(3) Return to your article and go on the attack. Replace abstract thoughts with word pictures or anecdotes.
For example, this morning I wanted to encourage readers undergoing midlife crisis to be wary of costly career tests and assessments.
First, I wrote, “Some assessments are not especially scientific or valid. Astrology can be just as useful — and a lot cheaper.” Okay, but ho-hum.
I changed this sentence to, “At midlife, the tests invariably demonstrate that you’re very, very good at what you are doing. Many assessments lack scientific validity — they’re no more accurate than a quiz you’d take in a popular magazine.”
And I added a narrative example, a composite of three true stories:
Stone Beds [A Poem and an Advance]
December 27, 2007
Stone Beds
[Pompeii’s surge]
Advance: after the great eruption of Pompeii’s nearby volcano, Vesuvius, some two-thousand years ago in the heyday of the Roman Empire, what was left of the city were mostly ashes of stone from an unleashing furnace; it is hard to imagine what the people went through (none, not one person survived). I can only guess from the looks of the city today, and in its early excavations, its people were baked alive or asleep, like pottery. In many cases, beds were turned into stones. I have been to Italy twice, and Pompeii, most be the most blazing archeological sites in the world.
For those not familiar with Pompeii, (the city, for there was also a General in the Roman Army, called Pompeii, whom gave his name to the city), for those folks, let me clarify: just the name stimulates deep slurs if not down right nightmarish emotions.
Pompeii is located by the Bay of Neapolis. The time of the eruption, was A.D. 79. Pompeii, was a resort city, as you might think of Los Vegas. It was the Roman Empires richest city, with luxurious villas, and all seemed to live a most enjoyable lifestyle. This city reminds me of the Titanic, and Sodom and Gomorra. Yes, Pompeii was a most corrupt and violent city, or town-let, as some would have it.
