Halloween Spooky Fun and Crafts

September 1, 2023 1 minute read

It’s coming up on October 31st again which means it’s time for our household to start building out our Halloween decorations. We enjoy Halloween in our neighborhood. There’s quite a few kids on our street and we get into the spirit.

Now when I say get into the spirit, I mean that through the lens of a child. There are plenty of houses that go for the scary theme. For us, it’s more a matter of spooky. The other houses can be Universal Horror Nights, we want to be Disney’s spooky time and aim for the feel of the Haunted Mansion at Disney… spooky and not scary. It should be a little scary for the little tots, but not so scary that they can’t come and get their candy.

Last year we did a pretty great theme based around toxic waste and mutant candy corns.

We love the fact that you can pretty much make all of this stuff yourselves with UV paint, plater of paris, Home Depot runs, as well as some simple motors to drive the animatronics.

We also do a custom window animations that we love to make and is something that requires the design and skills of both my wife and myself.

This year we’re going to do something a little different, still the same kind of goody atmostphere, but something that’s a little more involved from the animatronics and staging.

I Don’t Know What I’m Doing - Upgrades & Arcades

October 31, 2019 less than 1 minute read

Let’s check out some new hardware I’ve purchased over the past couple months. A new power supply, monitor, some memory upgrades. All rad.

I also give a visit to Funspot in New Hampshire, home to a huge collection of arcade ga

If you like the channel, please consider supporting me on Patreon Special Thanks to: Casey Craddock Alan Narup

Commodore4ever Power supply
TFW8b PenUltimate+ Cartridge
dorktronic COMMODORE VIC-20 SELECTABLE RAM EXPANSION + RESET

Music Referral

Never Easy - Mattie Maquire
Give Me a Chance - The Basic Game
Teenage Color - Falcon Dives

Never Underestimate the Power of Excel to Do Things It Shouldn’t

July 5, 2019 less than 1 minute read

An oldie, but a goodie.

Maybe your voice assistant needn’t do it all Permalink

June 10, 2019 less than 1 minute read

I love my Echo Spot, but there’s only a few things I regularly do with it via voice commands. It mostly boils down to controlling my smart lamps, playing music, and adding stuff to my shopping lists. Super convenient for these things, but with others I struggle to remember what I’m supposed to say to make something happen or if I even have a skill that does something.

There’s a huge rush to push things onto voice assistants since Amazon makes it particularly easy to do. I think it’s much like having a splash page on a website, just because you can do it does it mean you should?

Currently, services arenas are rushing to jump on the VUI bandwagon — from education to healthcare to banks. But can and should everything be supported by voice?

Procrastination is an emotional problem Permalink

June 1, 2019 less than 1 minute read

As someone who battles “procrastination” I can get behind this. There can be a lot of moral judgement from others around proctrastination. Most offered solutions seem to be about willpower, time management or task management. Most of these solutions aren’t solutions at all, particularly when others see you as someone who gets things a lot of stuff done, but deep down you really know about all the stuff you’re putting off.

One small pilot study found very low procrastination scores among experienced meditators, suggesting that doing absolutely nothing might be the best way to get everything done.

The Difference Between Leaders And Managers Permalink

June 1, 2019 less than 1 minute read

I’ve run across a lot of these articles lately, but it never hurts to get these great ideas reinforced again :)

Regardless of your title, you should strive to build connections with your employees and help them develop and grow. Take an active role in leading your team and don’t manage from the corner office. Help them out when a deadline is looming to show them that you’re invested in their success.

If You’re Too Busy for These 7 Things, You Need to Change the Way You Lead Permalink

May 30, 2019 less than 1 minute read

The opening couple of sentences nail it. There’s a lot to getting things done, but one of the most powerful items is realizing that that project you’re working on doesn’t magically get finished by your own sheer will or direction. There’s opinions to measure, feedback to listen to and people to mentor.

If you’ve been told you’re “leadership material,” it may be due to these seven leadership practices. However, more often than not, people in positions of authority don’t value the people-side of the business.

Frankly, they often defer “leadership development” to the lower ranks because they’re too busy to care about raising their own capacity to transform the workplace and serve the needs of their employees.

How to attract good luck: 4 secrets backed by research Permalink

May 30, 2019 less than 1 minute read

I read a study long ago that had a similar outcome, people who were seen as “lucky” were mostly just open to seeing opportunities and positive outcomes.

And that optimism gives lucky people more “grit.” When you think things will work out, you persevere. And when you’re resilient, you give possibilities more time to work out in your favor.

Skeptics might be shaking their heads right now: But we all know people who aren’t just optimistic — they’re utterly deluded. Are you saying we should lie to ourselves?

Um… kinda. Turns out that while pessimists do see the world more accurately, optimists are more likely to be lucky because those delusions push them toward opportunities.

How to Teach Yourself to Do Hard Things Permalink

May 29, 2019 less than 1 minute read

I’ll be picking up the book this article sources, “Fully General System For Learning To Do Hard Things” by David MacIver. To a small degree I’ve always done this as I learn and try new things. I really like the idea of finding an analog to the hard thing that you already do and slowly changing it, mastering it and iterating on it until you’ve mastered that hard thing.

So it’s not a guarantee but rather a structured plan to follow if you’re not sure how to start mastering the hard. He offers two approaches—one process if you already know what success looks like and one process if the definition of “success” is more subjective. In both cases, you’ll follow these steps:

DIY smart mirror Permalink

May 29, 2019 less than 1 minute read

I’ve been looking to build one of these as a project. I love the idea of it… there’s a ton of potential in the concept for an awesome product.

Smart mirrors have been around awhile, and the most prominent version comes from Michael Teeuw. The idea is pretty simple; you’ll build a frame and box. Inside the box, you’ll place one-way glass (often seen on TV in police dramas), a monitor, a Raspberry Pi, and the cables necessary to power your setup. Michael and other contributors have created an open-source Magic Mirror platform you can install. Once installed, you can customize it to show your calendar, weather, news, and more. Installing the software is easy—it requires just one line of code.