Jacob Grier

Though I’m not a coder, I’m always interested in what the guys at the 37 Signals blog have to say. A couple of their recent posts deal with their philosophies of employment. Here, this quote stands out for me:

I am perfectly willing to acknowledge that not all of us excel at the same things, but I’m coming to believe more and more firmly that this whole “typical person” entity is a myth. I’ve never met a typical person. There are only people who are passionate about what they do, and people who aren’t. When the latter become the former, they become “atypical”, because suddenly they are self-motivated, insightful, excited, optimistic, and happy.

Another entry explains the workplace experiments they’ve been running, including four day workweeks, funding the development of employees’ outside passions, and discretionary spending accounts.

Oddly enough, the posts remind me of what I miss about working full-time in coffee. Though the pay and the prestige are both lower than I what I enjoy now, the flexible hours, unrationed vacation days, and enthusiasm from management for their workers’ outside interests allowed much more room for personal growth. The passion for coffee that excites many of us baristi makes us more interesting people as a result. PR? Not so much.

My tamper grows dusty on the shelf. It longs to feel those 30 lbs. of pressure.

Debi points my attention to the SnūzNLūz, an April Fools’ Day alarm clock from ThinkGeek:

The SnūzNLūz uses the very complex psychological phenomemon known as ‘HATRED’. Basically it’s human nature to wish harm upon your enemies. Similarly, it’s human nature not to give your enemies gobs of cash so that they can grow big and dominate the world with their totally wrong, stupid and invalid point of view. ThinkGeek realized that. That’s why everytime you hit the snooze button, the SnūzNLūz will donate a specified amount of your real money to a non-profit you hate. The problem of sleeping in is solved.

Sound familiar? I like the new wrinkle about donating money to a hated enemy instead of to a beloved charity or wasting it in a paper shredder, but I think I had them beat on this one.

And yes, I’d definitely buy one if it were a real product.

This has got to stop.

Should you go to culinary school? Should you pay for your kid to go? To get a taste of life in the restaurant industry, Dana at the Tasting Menu says:

Along with information about various schools and stuff like how to gain experience before getting there, I offer this piece of advice. Have them clean the kitchen at night for a month strait. No days off, no watching TV before, or taking a phone call. Have them clean the dishes, wash the counters, sweep the floor, take the towels to the laundry.

Make them this deal. If they can commit to one month of cleaning your kitchen, then you’ll consider helping to pay the steep tuition at one of the nations many expensive private culinary schools. Be it the fault of the Food Network, or the rise of celebrity chefs, teens are choosing culinary school more and more. Culinary school is an expensive choice, and to ensure your child is aware, put them to work cleaning.

Full post here.

I try to be a person of good taste, but cars are my biggest failing. I actually like my Aztek… from the inside. The outside, I admit, is a monstrosity. Every once in a while if I catch it at just the right angle and squint my eyes a little bit, I think to myself, “That looks like one sleek, shiny, powerful rhinoceros.” Then my eyes refocus and I realize that, no, it really is just a monstrosity.

Oh, but what could have been! A recent Car Connection article names “ten concept cars Detroit should have built.” Amazingly, the Aztek is on the list. Not the Aztek that made production and became an instant punchline for the auto industry, but the much more stylish prototype:

That’s a respectable vehicle. Yet without the humor value offered by the production model, I don’t think I would have found it nearly as fun to drive.

After a long absence, my friend Chad Wilcox is back with a new blog, a new URL, and a new job. Check out the new Quiet Declarations.

Also, because three blogs just isn’t enough, I’ve started guest blogging on a fourth. I’m now writing for aBetterEarth.org, the environmental policy website of the Institute for Humane Studies. If you’re tired of my food, coffee, and smoking ban posts, maybe this site will be a good change.

The RSS feed listed on the site is incorrect. This is the link that works.

Gifts for furries.

Your handy site of the day is BillMonk.com, an application for keeping track of shared bills or loans among friends. Add on as many debts as you want and when it’s time to settle up, BillMonk spits out the amounts everyone owes each other. The interface is admirably simple and the service integrates with Facebook and text messaging.

I got my roommates to sign up last night and am already glad I did. Travel partners, friends eating out , and stingy daters will also find it useful.

[Via BoingBoing. Earlier post on credit card roulette here.]

Last week Homestar Runner turned ten years old!

Not familiar? This is a good place to start. The Wikipedia entry is also very informative.

With the plug-in not working, we’ll have to do this manually. Here’s what I’ve been bookmarking this week…

Perhaps my limoncello didn’t appeal to you. How about weeniecello? Personally, I’d rather consume the vodka infused hot dogs than the hot dog infused vodka.

Speaking of alcohol, government continues to make it harder to drink. In Chicago, bottle service — groups of customers buying a bottle of liquor for the table instead of ordering one drink at a time — is now considered illegal. And the TSA’s liquid ban is bad news for wine tourism.

Some good news for people like me: a new study finds that while moderate and light coffee consumption could increase one’s risk for heart attack, heavy coffee drinkers seem to face no additional risk. So drink more coffee! Heck, put an espresso machine in your car if you have to!

While on the subject of coffee, what’s up with this Craigslist ad seeking a “male barista?” Is it a dumb joke about how a barista can be a man despite sounding like a feminine noun (it isn’t), or are they really seeking only men for the job?

For the economists in the audience, Tyler Cowen talks about comparative advantage. And do tall people earn more because they’re smarter?

Movie buffs, enjoy this compilation of instances of the Wilhelm Scream. And for music, here’s a collection of Beatles covers.

Lighting a park with heliostats looks like a cool idea.

These six horrifying parasites are interesting, but the faint of heart probably won’t want to click.

Finally, something erotic and safe for work… stone porn!

[Update 8/27/06: Hooray! The plug-in is working again. Apparently del.icio.us changed its API and I needed an updated version to make things compatible. If any WordPress users want to add the plug-in to their site, find the newest version here.]

After a lamented departure, Mungowit’s End is back for 2006.

Back when I first started this weblog with such an immodest URL I cautioned myself against letting the site drop into the narcissism pit. Today we ignore that advice completely and take the plunge…

1) First, from my friend in S.F., here’s me imagined as a South Park character. Double-fisting the coffee and the beer is especially appropriate given the blog’s subject matter of late.

2) Second, here’s what I would look like as an East Asian man and as a woman (scary). These come courtesy of David Barzelay, who had way too much fun with the Perception Laboratory’s Face Transformer. It’s a neat application to try out if you’ve got some time to kill or have been considering drastic plastic surgery.

3) Finally, for no good reason at all I’ve added a Frappr map to the sidebar. Waste some time at work and add yourself with this new Google Maps application.

The Prospect and Foreign Policy are inviting readers to vote for who they think are the top public intellectuals. The magazines have narrowed it down to 100, from which five can be chosen. My selections (in no particular order):

1) Richard Dawkins
2) Hernando De Soto
3) Lawrence Lessig
4) Martha Nussbaum
5) Richard Posner

They also invite one write-in vote. I was tempted to go with Douglass North, but being already long on economists I submitted Antonio Damasio instead.

Your picks?

[Yet another hat tip to The Morning News.]

Just because I hate Comcast right now. And because it’s hilarious. From Magic Mafia.

Bar Power — Via Adrienne, Ban the Ban volunteers are canvassing D.C. bars tomorrow night to rally the opposition to the smoking ban and make patrons’ and employees’ voices heard. If you support freedom, if you think bar owners should be able to decide for themselves whether or not to allow smoking in their establishments, or if you just want to flirt with libertarians, stop by one of the locations listed and sign a postcard that will be sent to the city council.

[Update 7/11/05: Adrienne posts her account of the event.]

Morgan Spurlock Watch — Radley’s started up a new weblog to debunk the many misleading or poorly researched claims of Morgan Spurlock. Any blog that links to the Cato Institute and Five Guys hamburgers must be good, yeah? Read it through RSS to avoid the daily glimpse of the Spurlock burgernipple pic.

Checking my webstats just now, I learned that a photo of my dog is reposted for some reason on this French discussion forum (middle of page three). My French isn’t good enough to figure out why, but it has something to with Paris losing the Olympics, Brad Pitt, and cafe-philo. Any French speakers (Sarah?) care to explain what the heck’s going on here?

[Update 7/7/05: OMG Sarah solves the mystery LOL
“Yeah, that page is mostly slang French text message language, but I got exposed to that via my fifth graders.

It really doesn’t have much to do with Brad Pitt or the Olympics or cafe philo.”]

At about this time a year ago I was assisting at an IHS seminar in Seattle and contemplating whether I was going to continue working full time in “the movement” or do something different like working in a coffee shop. Happily, I chose the latter, but at the time all sorts of employment possibilities were occurring to me. The Sanyo Blimp happened to be in town that same week and was a frequent sight in the sky. “How does one become a blimp pilot?” I wondered. It seems like a cool job, but nobody ever talks about it. The question kept popping into my mind intermittently over the past year.

Don’t get excited, this isn’t the announcement of the new job I mysteriously alluded to a few days ago. I’m not dressing up like an animal, and I’m not flying a giant balloon. But when I found out Luke had a new blog where he answers people’s random questions, I decided to see what he could find out about blimps. He came through quickly and has all the information you need right here, including the essential reason you’re better off being an astronaut.

Also, here’s some guy’s photo of a blimp situated perfectly over the Space Needle. I picture the craft about to land on it, getting a puncture wound, and whizzing off in loops around the city like a balloon with a pinhole in it. That sounds fun. That’s also why I’m better off not being a blimp pilot.