Jeff Keen

It’s things like this that I have to read periodically to make sure my life doesn’t get overttaken by the digital world.

Seeing the total solar eclipse was the most amazing natural wonder I’ve ever laid my eyes upon. I understand why people travel around the world watching eclipses, and I’m pretty tempted to take a trip to Chile for the next one.

30 years ago today, my parents decided to take a gamble and pull the ejector seat on our lives in South Africa for a better future in the USA 🇺🇲(and it worked out). Here’s Roger and me in 1987, seamlessly fitting into the culture: instant Twins fans and about to eat at our second favorite American restaurant, Burger King.

And also, as was pointed out to me on Facebook: I’m wearing very American sandals.

Our most favorite restaurant was McDonalds, which wasn’t in SA during apartheid, so it was extra novel. The South African McDonald’s knockoff, “MacMunch”, was not an acceptable substitute.

These are some comedy gems.

This is my favorite TED talk ever. I love the message of this so much.

“We hate to do it, but we have to follow procedure”

Nothing infuriates me more than the blind substitution of rule following in place of common sense and logic.

[rules] like these are insurance policies against disaster. And they prevent disaster. But what they ensure in its place is mediocrity.

You need a “Shultz Hour”.

The science of the mind is clear about this point. Our brains can be in either “task-positive” or “task-negative” mode, but not both at once. Our brain benefits from spending time in each state.

Task-positive mode allows us to accomplish something in the moment. Task-negative mode is more colloquially known as daydreaming, and, as Daniel J. Levitin of McGill University has written, it “is responsible for our moments of greatest creativity and insight, when we’re able to solve problems that previously seemed unsolvable.”

Shoutout to anyone who’s been on the losing end of the following conversation, that likely happened at uber countless times.

🤴: We came up with an ethically questionable idea that will help us increase profits.

👱‍♀️: We shouldn’t do that. That is ethically questionable.

🤴: It’s going to make us more money.

👱‍♀️: But we’d be doing a shitty thing. It’s a shitty thing to do.

🤴: So much more money, though.

👱‍♀️: But it’s bad. Don’t we care about the peopl—

🤴: Do you like getting paid? This is a business! We have to make [more and more and more and more and more] money.

Where’s the line? Where are the companies that willingly take a hit financially because it’s the right thing to do? Where’s the app that values the human experience as much as their bottom line?

Lets hold them up, because I’m sure they’re under-appreciated, and they should be applauded for taking the harder road.

Lamar Smith is a real douche canoe, it turns out. I was a little checked out of local/regional politics before this year, but now I’m on the case.

Who knew that it was so easy to get a hold of Lamar Smith’s office on the phone? Who knew I was living in a crazy gerrymandered district with this evil douche supposedly representing me?

Climate change denier, sponsor of big anti-privacy bills, in the pocket of Trump & Co, and the dude won’t even show up to a townhall because he knows his constituents have some things to say. This guy has to go.

This was a great tribute.