Clean Up in February

Continuing with attempt to organize. Many e-mails purged - they have outlived the need to hang on to them - and so there there is less to wade through.

Daily overload comes so easily.

Going from good to great. It sounds kind of presumptuous. Just not making a mess sounds pretty good most days. I do enjoy trying to help others grow and learn, it's wonderful when it works.

Continuing to listen to Jim Collins. Here are micro snippets from his recent monograph Good to Great and the Social Sectors: Whys Business Thinking Is Not the Answer -

"During my first year on the Stanford faculty in 1988, I sought out professor John Gardner for guidance on how I might become a better teacher. Gardner, former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, founder of Common Cause, and author of the classic text Self-Renewal, stung me with a comment that changed my life.

"It occurs to me, Jim, that you spend too much time trying to be interesting,” he said. “Why don’t you invest more time being interested.” "

...

"The pivot point in Good to Great is the Hedgehog Concept. The essence of a Hedgehog Concept is to attain piercing clarity about how to produce the best long-term results, and then exercising the relentless discipline to say, 'No thank you' to opportunities that fail the hedgehog test."

I think maybe I need to understand a bit more about hedgehogs...

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Strolling on the edge of Visual Basic, able to create but very small programs that take a lot of time to write. It can be much faster to solve a problem in Perl, but VB is easier to give to others. How to help others fish vs. feeding them?

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Some e-guitar today - Lincoln Brewster's "All to You" - he sounds so much like Steve Ray Vaughn on some of the tunes. We get to do some of these in a couple of weeks, so I really need to work on them!

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Made it to the 'Groundhog Day' annual celebration complete with bands and some people who I only ever see there but they look familiar now. Treat to listen to Marlee MacLeod and the other local musicians. Headed over to pick up Rose, who wants the computer now. Have a good evening.