I spent much of last weekend in airport terminals and on planes, traveling to and from Los Angeles. One of my travel buddies talked to the gate agent about changing our seats. The transaction went well, and my friend thanked her for being so helpful. “We try,” the gate agent answered. “We really do always try to make our customers happy. And when they’re cooperative and friendly about it, it makes a difference.” Read the rest of this entry »

Thanks to Richard Swenson’s book, A Minute of Margin, the recent death of my i-phone and the fact that it’s December, a month that has the capacity to upend my calendar, complexity is on my mind. Read the rest of this entry »

My i-phone started dying last week. Maybe I should have recognized its feeble cries for help, the apps that looked as though they were trying to open only to fade back to a confused menu screen. First it was Google. Then it was Instagram. Then Reader. One by one its apps were closing their eyes to me. Then two nights ago, with a newly charged battery coursing through its electronic veins, it powered itself down for good. Read the rest of this entry »

Procrastination. Enter it in the little window adorned with a “g” at the top of your browser, and find, among other things, the following reasons why we procrastinate: Read the rest of this entry »

They’ve wrapped a water wing round the black spool used to hold nylon rope. It’s the little girl’s bait to catch her seven-year-old brother, a very large fish. Under a big blue sky in the round pool of a house we’re borrowing, they make the sing-song sounds of summer, their high voices bouncing off pool water to canal to house next door. Read the rest of this entry »