Bruce Sterling has a great Tumblr. Still tumblin’. Seems like there’s some good white space … or blue space … on the ironic side.

Every driver should own and use the Rand McNally Motor Carriers’ Road Atlas. Get the one with the laminated pages so when you spill your coffee you can wipe it off. It’s the best fifty-nine dollars you’ll ever spend. Forget about online systems, and don’t rely on the voice. It can be useful as a backup, but your primary guide needs to be a map. You need to visualize the route in your mind. Willie Joyce told me that since they started using GPS, drivers get lost or confused three times more than when they used road maps.

From The Long Haul: A Trucker’s Tales of Life on the Road” by Finn Murphy

5 or 6 years ago I bought a USB mic so that I could start a podcast with Ian.

We didn’t start a podcast. Though we’ve almost started talking about it  several times. That must count for something.

Tonight I recorded with that mic for the third time with the illustrious Adam Pierno for his podcast, The Strategy Inside Everything. 

We mostly talked about how the strategy track at the Brandcenter works. And a little bit about my career.

Also, I learned that my house is loud. Humming and buzzing and general room noise that I never noticed until I was listening through headphones.

And … my god, I have some vocal tics to contend with.

It’ll be out in a couple weeks.

There is no shortage of people writing about how to be creative. That is one of the curses of the internet. People who devote their creative process to creating about creative processes. It’s a strange infinite loop. Medium must be 80% posts about creativity hacks that are trying to drive newsletter subscriptions.

Austin Kleon writes about creativity, but there’s something different about what he does. It feels less thirsty. It doesn’t feel like content. It doesn’t ask for anything. It doesn’t feel like writing that is desperate to be considered important.

But when I read it, I feel like I want to make stuff. It’s inspiring in the same way that seeing a great band makes me want to go home and bang on my drumkit.

This isn’t a review of his new book. I’ve only read the first 30 pages, so I can’t write about it as a complete work. But that it drove me to open a notebook to write, and then to open a blank file to write some more, speaks volumes about what he makes.