I Read by Richard Peck

So I'm probably the only person in the world whose not seen this before. Shared by an art teacher in our district this back-to-school week for staff.

Why do you read?

I Read by Richard Peck

I read because one
 life isn’t enough, and 
in the pages of a book I can be anybody;

I read because the 
words that build 
the story become mine, 
to build my life;

I read not for happy
 endings but for new
 beginnings; I’m just
 beginning myself, and 
I wouldn’t mind a map;

I read because I have
 friends who don’t, and
 young though they are,
 they’re beginning to
 run out of material;

I read because every
 journey begins at 
the library, and it’s
 time for me to start 
packing;

I read because one
 of these days I’m going
 to get out of this
 town, and I’m going to
 go everywhere and meet
 everyone, and I want
 to be ready.”

–Richard Peck, author
, Zihuatanejo, Mexico, 
1990

Become a GoogleCalendar PowerUser

Last March, I listed a dozen things a Gmail power user could do. As much as the calendar program in GoogleApps is used in our district, I'm thinking we need a list of "power user skills" for that application now.

How many of these have YOU mastered?

1. Schedule your life: Create a new calendar event.
2. I'm so lonesome I could cry: Invite others to meetings, send meeting announcements, and make attendees required or optional.
3. It's been so much fun, let's do this every week!: Add repeating events to your calendar.
4. Don't let the world know you are robbing banks: Control the privacy setting of individual events.
5. I'll have my people get in touch with your people: Give others the power to update your calendar.
6. Oh, crap! Was that today?: Set reminders of events.
7. Don't waste bytes: Use notes to create meeting agendas and save minutes.
8. How's February 2010 for you?: Find free times to schedule meetings among individuals.
9. Keep track of the kids's sports schedule: Create a new calendar for a specific purpose.
10. What is your boss REALLY up to?: Viewing others' calendars.
11. I love the magic triangle: Quick to access calendar settings, turning views off and on.
12. Oops, forgot to make that one private: Control the default privacy setting of your calendars.

And for the REAL power users:

1. Show the world your life: Embedding a calendar in a website.
2. Please find a good time to see me: Using the appointment scheduler.
3. Sorry, I am away from my desk: Get your calendar on your smartphone
4. Know when to howl by seeing "phases of the moon": Add "interesting" calendars
5. Play Dr. Frankenstein: Use Google Calendar Labs gadgets.
6. Getting others to do your work more efficiently: Find helpful guides for administrative assistants.

Other abilities that should be added?

Image source

Killing the cash cow

It's tough dropping old presentations from my oeeuvre. They are like old shoes - comfortable, familiar, reliable, and still of value since I update each talk every time I give it. But I euthanized a few this weekend*.

Guy Kawasaki makes sense when he advises:

Kill the cash cows. This is the only acceptable perspective for both intrapreneurs and their upper management. Cash cows are wonderful—but they should be milked and killed, not sustained until—no pun intended—the cows come home. Truly brave companies understand that if they don’t kill their cash cows, two guys/gals in a garage will do it for them. Macintosh killed the Apple II: Do you think Apple would be around today if it tried to “protect” the Apple II cash cow ad infinitum? The true purpose of cash cows is to fund new calves.

He's right, but boy o boy it's hard to kill your cow if you've named her Bossie. Or The Indispensable Librarian or The Technology? Skills Everyone Needs. No one would believe just how much fun it's been giving these talks and how lovely it is to bask in the glow of the head-swelling comments that follow.

But old Indispensable has been around since about 1996 and Tech? Skills for almost that long. There is probably not one slide or statistic in either presentation today that was a part of the original talk, but I need to re-fresh my own thinking, my own mission, and my own discomfort level. I would estimate that since I started speaking for beer money professionally in the mid-90s I've given over 1200 talks and workshops to over 160 organizations. I still get nervous before each talk, for sure, but am I nervous enough?

My areas of interest, my levels of expertise, my experiences, and even some of my basic philosophies change each year. Shouldn't my presentations and workshops? Shouldn't what we all teach grow, be pruned and change direction every year?  If we aren't stretching ourselves, are we truly stretching others?

And what's the fun in going on only the safe rides anyway?

*I'd forgotten how difficult it is to get things done with a 16 month old around the house! First time Grandpa and Grandma had the boy overnight all by himself. He's very, very busy.