Yeah so I am having an interesting little day here; at 4:00AM decided *not* to ride the Solvang Double, and to work on a special project instead.  I have been re-reading Atlas Shrugged and the philosophy of creation and value and personal worth rings so true to me.  Riding a double is an act of creation and value - a defiance of limitation, a personal statement of capability - but it is ephemeral, captured only in my mind and perhaps my blog.  I opted to create something more permanent, even if I only advance slightly along a long path to my goal.

Googling for the picture at right, I discovered that Atlas Shrugged is considered the second most influential book of all time, behind the Bible.

For the first time I have highlighted *two* posts; the ongoing for a teen: iPad vs Macbook survey, in which Macbook is winning a landslide 76% to 14% (please vote if you haven't already), and the seeking web prototype designer plea, in which I am desperately seeking someone to help prototype some workflows (please let me know if you know someone).  Ah, the power of blogging!

Hey guess what I did, while creating this post?  I won an eBay auction!  For the first time in many moons I used eBay to buy something; as a gadget hound I am a relatively frequent seller of last generation devices, but an infrequent buyer.  Today I decided to replace something I lost exactly a year ago, my *original* Amazon Kindle, given me as a gift by Shirley just before taking a trip to Brazil.  As I was reading my Kindle 2 in bed this morning I determined to replace my Kindle 1, and through the magic of eBay, I could and did.  Yay. 

I had forgotten that heart-pounding feeling in the last minutes, waiting to see if you'll win, and the exultation when you do (and the disappointment when you don't).  Auctions are cool.

Was it really a month ago that I celebrated the one year anniversary of getting hit by a car? 

So, what's *your* LinkedIn number?  Yeah, I know, you were an early adopter, one of LinkedIn's first 100,000 members, and to celebrate their 100,000,000th member you got an email from Reid Hoffman thanking you.  Mine is 1708 :) 

[Update: aha I'm an innovator.  Apparently the first 1,000,000 members got an email, but the first 100,000 got a different one.  Too bad they didn't single out the first 10,000 :) ]

From blog reader Mike: Color, the Parody.  Excellent.  As I commented to him, you know there's a bubble when you can't tell the parodies from the real plans.  This one seems absurd (although with $41M in the bank, they can circle the drain for a long time...) 

From my friend Josh: It’s Tracking Your Every Move and You May Not Even Know.  Yikes.  As I think about it, your phone is like an RFID chip for your cell company.  Good thing I don't have [much] to hide :) 

I don't link Gene Expression as often as I did or should, but here's a good one: Dawkins on Kin Selection.  Raw common sense, applied in an uncommon way. 

The world's best designed newspaper, "I".  Newspaper?  Newspaper?  Huh, I remember them...  My comment on the design - sure, cool. 

This is the atomic explosion that did not occur while I was selecting Jalopnik's seven least favorite Dodge Neon drivers.  A reminder of why I stay subscribed to TTAC.  Their signal to noise is low, but the signal peaks are amazing! 

This is amazing: a Google Earth mashup of nuclear reactor information from all over the world.  The information now at our browser's fingertips is unbelievable. 

I thought this was interesting: Search is Google's castle, everything else is a moat.  A great explanation of why they make ambitious software products like Android and Chrome available free.  (Not to mention - Google Earth!)  Also indicates that when Google makes your castle their moat, you are in trouble.  Do you suppose they'll start giving away cars?  Maybe just car operating systems... 

Bill Gurley: The Freight Train that is Android. 

Five things Facebook should fix immediately.  To which I would add a sixth: bring back thumbnails for links! 

Wow, cool, an electric plane.  What will they think of next?  I want one! 

Interesting that it is so small, kind of an electric sport plane.  Reminds me of the Tesla.  Perhaps this is the right entry point for electric powered vehicles, start small and fast and light, and move upstream.  Someday we'll have electric trucks and electric 747s.

Did you know, the iPad does more.  This from a 14-year old web designer pounds the nail directly through the wood.  As he says 'bam'.  (At least he didn't say 'boom'!)  Notice the order he lists the essential apps, Facebook, YouTube, email, web browsing.  Typing Word documents does not appear in his list, but I guess using Google Docs could be somewhere under "web browsing".  I think you guys are all wrong about the iPad vs Macbook thing.  I'm going to try blogging from my iPad, using my bluetooth keyboard.  Stay tuned :)