Cat alarm clock

Sorry for the blog silence — have been quite busy! So in the meantime, here is a new-to-me little animation of a cat alarm clock, which is eerily close to reality for us. (Steve woke up with a start one morning with a cut lip and an innocent-looking cat on the bed.)

Reading: Confessions of a Tax Collector, Buying Your First Home, Jon Katz, Ruth Reichl, and Alexander McCall Smith

Finished reading: Apparently the time I’ve been “saving” with applying The 4 Hour Workweek principles has been spent reading. Oh, wait — it’s also been the World Series, so I’ve been reading a lot in front of the TV instead of doing something else with Steve… Confessions of a Tax Collector by Richard Yancey – [...]

Weekly Update: Feeling great

Great week! Health/fitness: Weigh myself daily – Walk 30 minutes every day – This is turning into a general “exercise daily” goal. I’ve walked, biked errands, or gone to the gym every day this week. Keep track of blood sugar and diet – Work: Complete 3/6 small biz client projects – One project completed! The [...]

What to discuss when you’re expecting

My husband and I went through pre-marital counseling with a couple from our church before we got married. There were lots of books available with questions and topics to discuss before tying the knot, helpful tools to get you talking about important things and expectations so you have less unpleasant surprises after marriage. I made [...]

Reading: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

Finished Reading: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver – I wasn’t really “into” Kingsolver’s books that I’ve read before (The Poisonwood Bible, The Bean Trees) but I saw this in the bookstore and was very intrigued. I’m a sucker for books that have to do with food. Luckily the book was available through my library [...]

The 4 Hour Workweek: Information Dieting

In a brief Chapter 6 of The 4 Hour Workweek, Tim Ferriss encourages a low-information diet. He himself doesn’t watch the news or read the paper, and limits his industry/work-related reading significantly. If that sounds extreme to you, or even irresponsible, I’d suggest skimming this chapter before throwing his ideas out the window; personally, I [...]

The 4 Hour Workweek: Questions and Actions about Time Management

At the end of chapter 5 (The End of Time Management) of The 4 Hour Workweek, Tim Ferriss provides a list of Questions and Actions to help you define 1) a short to-do list and 2) a not-to-do list. Some of these questions and suggestions help to shed some light on what applying the 80/20 [...]

Weekly Update: Reflection and Reset

This was a good week for reflection. I revamped my goals and did a bit of bigger-picture thinking with work as I read through The 4 Hour Workweek. Based on my revamped goals, here’s how my week has been going: Health/fitness: Weigh myself daily – Walk 30 minutes every day – Hooray! Well, to be [...]

The 4 Hour Workweek: Set short deadlines

Another principle discussed in chapter 5 (The End of Time Management) of The 4 Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss is Parkinson’s Law: A task will fill up the time allotted for its completion. Tim puts it this way: If I give you 24 hours to complete a project, the time pressure forces you to focus [...]

The 4 Hour Workweek: 80/20 Analysis

One of the applications from The 4 Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss is to do a regular 80/20 analysis (Chapter 5: The End of Time Management). According to Pareto’s principle, 80% of results come from 20% of the efforts. In business-speak, 80% of your income comes from 20% of your clients. The ratio can vary [...]