Steve Jobs: Connecting the Dots

"Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."


- Steve Jobs at the Stanford 2005 Commencement speech 


Steve dropped out of college and dropped in classes that seemed impractical at the time.  One class he took was calligraphy.  This is where he learned about the subtle intricacies of Serif and Sans Serif type-face.  Fast forward 10 years.  While developing the Mac, Steve decided to incorporate what he had learned in the calligraphy class. The type-face you see before you in this blog is a result of Steve Jobs dropping out at Reed College and taking some seemingly impractical calligraphy class. Looking forward while taking that calligraphy class, Steve could not fathom that what he was learning would later be a ubiquitous part of these things called blogs.  Looking back, Steve is able to clearly connect the dots from being a  college drop out, to the present time where the serif and sans-serif type-face are as ever-present as the stars in the sky.


From where I currently stand, I can look back and see how the dots connect, but absolutely not in such a revolutionary and dramatic manner as  Steve Jobs' dots.  I can see how some of my minor achievements have been a result of events in the past. At the present though, I am a stagnated body of water accumulating waste.  Perhaps someday I will be able to connect the dots from this stagnant point in time to another point in time of goodness. All I know is that I need to dredge the waste  from this stagnant body of water.  If I allow the muck to build up for too long, I'll look back and will connect the dots from my currently horrible life to another horrible life.  I seem to lack dots of much significance and am trudging through life as a zombie.  It would be sad to have one dot for this prolonged chapter in my life with another dot representing the death and a loooooooooooong line connecting the two dots.

Adieu Coco

"All I ask of you, especially young people … is one thing — please don’t be cynical. I hate cynicism. It’s my least favorite quality, and it doesn’t lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen. I’m telling you, amazing things will happen."

- Coco - Conan O'Brien


I've pretty much been a cynic all my life.  My cynicism, I believe, is partly inborn and partly due to my hectic environment growing up.  Never mind the details of the environment that caused my cynicism, from this day forward, I will endeavor to become less of a cynic.  I'm often going way beyond seeing the glass as half empty, and seeing it made of lead, chipped, and filled with raw sewage waste. Drinking from the half empty glass then causes my lip to bleed profusely, and the raw sewage then causes my cut to become infected leading to a flesh eating virus to kill me.  No more of that though.  It's time for me to quell the pangs of cynicism and to engender a more positive outlook on life.  I've been imprisoned for way to long by my cynicism, and today is the day that I am a free man.


Yes there are rotten people in the world, and yes there is a lot of figurative and literal chemical sludge in the world; nevertheless, there is a lot of good too.  I just need to recalibrate my mind to focus in on the positive aspects of life.


Anyhow, Conan, thanks for the nearly 2 decades of humor and inspiration!  I've been watching your show since the beginning.  I must admit, I thought the show was going to flounder shortly when you first did the Late Night Show.  But what did I know, I was only 10 years old.  Over the years, I gained a great appreciation for your comedic genius and your gift of being a great interviewer.  All good things must come to an end, but I suspect this is only the beginning.  Adieu Coco.

Real Estate Time Machine or Hate to Burst your Bubble

By Bertha Coombs

Reporter

CNBC

updated 12:12 p.m. HT, Thurs., April 7, 2005

He’s a roofer and she owns a hair salon, and now Paul and Caren Matera are applying their entrepreneurial skills to New York’s red-hot housing market.

After attending a $3,000 real estate seminar, last July the Materas bought a little bungalow on Long Island. They sold it two months later and made a 50 percent profit. Since then, the couple has taken equity from their own home and invested in a half dozen properties now worth over $1 million — much of it pre-construction properties in red hot Florida developments...

Hard statistics are tough to come by, but one in six purchasers surveyed by the California Association of Realtors in 2004 said they were purchasing a home as an investment or for tax purposes — that’s a record 16.2 percent.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7405028/

________________________________________

VH1 needs to do a real estate “Where are they Now” show that showcases people who got caught up in the real estate frenzy of the mid-aughts and have lost lots of money after the real estate bubble popped.  I am truly curious to what happened this entrepreneurial couple and others.  Did these flippers become floppers who are flapping to stay afloat?  Did they sell at the right time and rent at the peak?  Where are they now?

The Blog Entry about Nothing

Yada yada yada.  Wah wah wah.  I'm feeling uninspired with nothing to write about.  I've been in a mental smoggy haze these past few years.  Freud would be speechless about my mind, he'd be without speech about my mind.  The chapter of this mental smoggy haze phase of my life has been dull.  I've been all over the place from San Francisco to Amsterdam, but I carried my empty dull mind with me during my expeditions.  Carrying this mind dulled what could have been a vibrant technicolor experience into a limited 4 color CGA blandness. Now here I am, in the place I was born and raise with my empty mind without much about to write about.  Perhaps technology is partly to blame.  Google does nearly all the thinking for me and is like an external brain substituting for my actual brain.  I don't have to memorize much, as I can always use Google to help me to remember who the prime minister of Australia is, or what the US constitution amendments are.  I don't have to think much about politics, philosophy, religion, ethics, or whatever, I can just passively and mindlessly read people's responses in forums or some other person's blog while I shut out any critical thought of my own.  And if I try to look for a refutation against what feels wrong, I can use Google to find articles to refute it.  Or if I am looking for info to support a position, I can find confirmation on Google. Whenever I have a question or curiosity about anything, I  have an overwhelming number of information at my disposal on the internet.  Perhaps I'm experiencing technological information overload?  Perhaps the DSM-V should add this as a psychological disorder.  Perhaps I should take a permanent break from the computer, start reading books ,and start writing my own ideas instead of this skimming high amounts of information.  My level of thinking is becoming progressively shallow and dull  causing me to become a useless brain-dead piece of jellyfish.  I wish myself luck on my journey to becoming mentally inspired.  Is this blog entry even a portrayal of reality?  I'll find the answer on Google.

The Sky is Falling

Yes folks, the sky is falling! Here is some evidence that we'll be crushed like cans soon:

More bank failures expected in 2010
Recession to persist this year, says World Bank
Second earthquake rocks Haiti
L.A. coast slammed by tornado-like storm that flips car, floods streets, strands motorists
etc...

Or is it?

Surveys show small firms optimistic
Worst of recession said to be over
Starbucks U.S. sales signal return to growth
Banks See a Leveling Off in Bad Consumer Loans


There are infinite ways to report the infinite amount of events around the world. The events the news media decide to choose to report on and how they report it can set the tone of the world. I did have one hell of a time trying to find positive news articles to link, while finding negative news articles was quite easy. I suppose negative news articles are more compelling for the audience. It's easy to stir up certain emotions with careful usage of words. What about our internal news media created by our brain? Does it match reality? We create stories about the our co-workers, friends, and events in our lives, how true are these stories? Is there anyway to avoid bias? Will the truth set us free? Are qualitative truths even possible? Is that an oxymoron?