As I try to clear the nagging debate out of my mind over whether the movie Jaws is a horror film or not, I am fortunate to have had more cerebral encounters over the past week.

But were those cerebral encounters optimal? – New to me is ultradian rhythms although I don’t quite fully understand them yet. Apparently these are a level lower than circadian rhythms, where we have cycles throughout the day, and need “rest” in between them. I put this at the top of this week’s list as I need to re-read this (again) and try to find where my peaks and troughs are throughout the day.

Silly Spammers – I couldn’t help but laugh when I got spam email for a spelling check system that opened like this, “...it looks like you have a couple spelling errors on your website such as the word "Blart".” Clearly whatever algorithm this system uses is unaware of the movie that was filmed at my favorite mall in the Boston area, not to mention the grammatical error of putting the period outside of the quote at the end of a sentence. Interesting that their system went back over a year to find a spelling “error.”

Little House Lore – When my family took a road trip out west through Minnesota and South Dakota a few years ago, we saw markers and sites related to the book series Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder. We didn’t stop any as they were out of the way, plus I had heard there was a lot of questions as to the historical accuracy in the series. This week I came across this article that gets into some of the details of Wilder’s stories, including one notable character that was actually a mashup of several people. There was no mention if Charles Ingalls hair was flowing as portrayed by Michael Landon.

Back in a Bash – It’s great that in-person networking events are coming back, and one I am looking forward to is Tech Bash, which will be held at Badger State Brewing in Green Bay, WI on November 15. There’s a vibrant tech scene there, and it’s fueled by their Chamber of Commerce. It should prove to be a lively event.

Ask Him Anything, Really – My friend and doppelganger Mike Gastin has started an “ask me anything” video series, where people send him questions related to branding and marketing, among other topics, and he answers them. One I particularly liked is on how to get new clients for your business. In addition to being informative, his videos are also very well produced. Maybe I should ask him how he does it?

Different country, somewhat similar technology – I have been fortunate to work with some amazing technologists over my career, both close to home and around the world. One of them is from Bulgaria, and this week he shared with me this article about how Bulgaria became a technology leader. I love these kind of stories as it’s great to learn of international parallels to what I was working with and on at different points of my career.

Maybe she is new to the planet? – A woman from New York is suing breakfast food behemoth Kellogg’s over the fact that there are few strawberries in their Strawberry Pop-Tarts. As I read this, I said to myself, “you mean there’s actually real strawberries in a strawberry Pop-Tart?” And here I always thought it was a genetically engineered processed sugar piece of food that is oh, so tasty yet bad for you; did you think that too? Maybe New York is where her spaceship recently landed, as I thought this was universal common knowledge.

Trick or Treat and Camp – Last weekend at High Cliff State Park, which is at the top of Lake Winnebago by me here in Dairyland, they resumed the annual tradition of people camping in cooler weather and having Trick-or-Treating, where the campers go all out to decorate their campsite. It was a jackpot for the kiddos as they filled their bags with candy, however I was more impressed with the “adult” treats of homebrewed beer and a wide assortment of Jell-o shots! The picture above was one of the many elaborate setups on a camp site. After this, having the kiddos go around the neighborhood this Sunday will likely be a disappointment.

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This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

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