B-List

1. Constructive Procrastination

A couple of articles from the vault, plus a personal observation on
the subject ...

* "The Importance of Creative Procrastination"
  <http://www.powazek.com/2006/05/000589.html>
"Give yourself that loose time to be creative, or you'll never get
 anything done."

* "Good and Bad Procrastination"
  <http://www.paulgraham.com/procrastination.html>
"Most people who write about procrastination write about how to cure
 it. But this is, strictly speaking, impossible. There are an infinite
 number of things you could be doing. No matter what you work on,
 you're not working on everything else. So the question is not how to
 avoid procrastination, but how to procrastinate well."

I learnt the wonders of positive procrastination at Uni.  I would often
leave the writing of essays to the last weekend before due date.  Don't
get me wrong - I would start researching early and collect lots of
material on the topic.  I would prepare an outline pretty early too.
But I wouldn't start writing much until everything "gelled" in my head.
Actually, a better analogy would be the crystallisation process.   You
get bigger and better crystals if you don't rush the process.  So, I
was waiting for the structure of the essay to "crystallise" in my mind.
I still try yo do that when I write computer programs nowadays, if I
get the chance :)


2. "Brain Scans Reveal Why Meditation Works"
  <http://www.livescience.com/health/070629_naming_emotions.html>
"Brain scans show that putting negative emotions into words calms the
 brain's emotion center"


3. "Serious Study: Immaturity Levels Rising"
  <http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2006/06/23/immature_hum.html>
"The adage 'like a kid at heart' may be truer than we think, since new
 research is showing that grown-ups are more immature than ever.
 Specifically, it seems a growing number of people are retaining the
 behaviors and attitudes associated with youth. As a consequence, many
 older people simply never achieve mental adulthood, according to a
 leading expert on evolutionary psychiatry."


4. "Learning, or, Learning How To Learn"
  <http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000895.html>
"The value of education isn't in the specific material you learn --
 it's in learning how to learn."


5. "Why we blink without noticing"
  <http://www.livescience.com/health/050725_blink.html>
"Scientists have figured out why we rarely notice our own blinking. Our
 brains simply miss it, they say."


6. "Beauty is in the eye of your friends"
  <http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn10966>
"A new study suggests that, in fact, women will look more favourably
 on the men that other women find attractive."


7. "Study: Internet partly to blame for your lack of close friends"
  <http://www.networkworld.com/news/2006/062306-internet-friends.html>
"Increased use of the Internet, along with the number of hours people
 are spending at work, are factors contributing to a drastic decline
 in the number of close friends that Americans have."