John Turner

Coolest site I’ve seen in a long time: ClickShirt. It’s cool on multiple levels. First, the site design is clever and intuitive, making it easy to use. Second, it was done with OpenLaszlo which looks like the rich web application environment I’ve been trying to find for years. Third, it’s a front end to CafePress, which means the author is making money off of every shirt without having to actually deal with the hassles of running a t-shirt business. Very smart all around. The guy behind it (Bret Victor) also designed two synths I like very much, the Ion and Micron from Alesis. Nice work!

I haven’t been playing much poker lately. When I have played, it has been in heads-up tournaments, mostly because they seem to move faster and I get impatient. What I also did was read “The Professor, the Banker, and the Suicide King: Inside the Richest Poker Game of All Time”. It really changed my perspective on the poker world. Until I read the book, I had thought that the superstars you see and hear about, like Howard Lederer, Ted Forrest, Doyle Brunson and his son Todd, Jennifer Harmann, Barry Greenstein, etc. all had some sort of magical knack for never losing at poker. The book points out, though, that every one of the poker greats you see and hear about has 1) worked their butts off for years to get where they are today, and 2) had times in their lives and in their poker careers when they were flat broke, or worse, in debt to someone else because they lost at poker. I realize now that I shouldn’t feel so bad that I am not regularly doing better in tournaments after a year of playing off and on at the amateur level. The important thing is to keep playing, keep learning, and work harder to make better poker decisions while remembering that it is about the long run, not the short run.

I went to see “300″ yesterday. It was pretty good. Not as good as the hype, but pretty good. Another movie I saw over the weekend was “The Holiday” on DVD. The movie was pretty good, but for me the highlight was seeing the house that Cameron Diaz’s character lived in. My entire house is basically the size of that house’s living room, but I gotta say the decorating really grabbed me. I loved the neutral walls, dark wooden floors, and natural toned rugs and furniture with splashes of different colors. It looked really calm and soothing…I think I’ll try something similar in my own house.

I got a big boost on my home studio acoustic treatment plans the other day from the guys at Ready Acoustics. They offer a free consultation service…I had my doubts, but decided to give it a try. I sent them a JPEG export of my SketchUp file, [Read more →]

Whew…haven’t posted in awhile. Been busy. Big projects are heating up at work (you wouldn’t think that would be true, given the news headlines, but it is what it is) and the weather is warming up here, which means I’ve been gearing up for projects outside. A work friend sent me this link the other day. It is an analysis of the cost of owning a house vs. renting. There’s a lot of info there, pretty dense, but the guy makes a convincing argument. I sent him an email, though, and pointed out that his analysis doesn’t apply in some areas of the country, especially someplace like Michigan, which has the worst economy in the entire country. That isn’t a good thing, obviously, but what it does do is offer people who are savvy with their money some pretty good deals. And not just on houses, either. The point: in some areas of the country, it actually makes sense to own rather than rent, assuming your lifestyle fits. If you’re one of those people that travels all the time, or you don’t want to do any maintenance or improvement, you’re better off renting regardless.

Just watched “Stranger than Fiction” on DVD (thanks, Netflix!). All I can say is “wow”. What a wonderful, brilliant movie. It was exceptional on so many levels, it really can’t be described. Highly recommended…if you have the opportunity to see it, do so! I’m going to be adding it to my “Top Ten Movies of All Time” list, I think!