My Word with Douglas E. Welch

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Little Blue Penguins (Eudyptula minor) – Korora (Maori), Royal Albatross Centre, Dunedin, New Zealand

Blue penguins come ashore and head uphill to their burrows at the Royal Albatross Centre in Dunedin, New Zealand.

Blue Penguin (Eudyptula minor) on Wikipedia

This protected nesting site hosts penguin burrows over its hillside expanse. The penguins come ashore each evening in sets of 3-6 and climb the beach and hillside to reach their burrows.

The Royal Albatross Centre (also host to the only mainland nesting site for the Royal Albatross) hosts tours each evening to their penguin observation platform to witness this daily event.

Royal Albatross Centre

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Little Blue Penguins (Eudyptula minor) – Korora (Maori), Royal Albatross Centre, Dunedin, New Zealand

Blue penguins come ashore and head uphill to their burrows at the Royal Albatross Centre in Dunedin, New Zealand.

Blue Penguin (Eudyptula minor) on Wikipedia

This protected nesting site hosts penguin burrows over its hillside expanse. The penguins come ashore each evening in sets of 3-6 and climb the beach and hillside to reach their burrows.

The Royal Albatross Centre (also host to the only mainland nesting site for the Royal Albatross) hosts tours each evening to their penguin observation platform to witness this daily event.

Royal Albatross Centre

* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out!

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Little Blue Penguin (Eudyptula minor) – Korora (Maori), Royal Albatross Centre, Dunedin, New Zealand

A small blue penguin finds its burrow and its mate at the Royal Albatross Centre in Dunedin, New Zealand.

Blue Penguin (Eudyptula minor) on Wikipedia

This protected nesting site hosts penguin burrows over its hillside expanse. The penguins come ashore each evening in sets of 3-6 and climb the beach and hillside to reach their burrows.

The Royal Albatross Centre (also host to the only mainland nesting site for the Royal Albatross) hosts tours each evening to their penguin observation platform to witness this daily event.

Royal Albatross Centre

* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out!

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On our recent (August 2017) trip to New Zealand, we made a special point of visiting Stansborough LTD, maker of fine woolen fabrics used in the costumes for The Chronicles of Narnia, The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

This is slow motion video of one of their turn-of-the-century looms at work. What you can’t hear and feel is the vibration of the floor and the slamming of the shuttles from one side of the machine to the other. This is truly a beast of another age.

If you are in Wellington, New Zealand, I highly recommend you visit and take their tour. It is like stepping back into an earlier age.

Stansborough LTD Web Site

Creating artisan woollen treasures

Introducing the Stansborough collection of sustainable designer woollen textiles.

​100% New Zealand, pure, natural and chemical free.
Cocoon yourself in timeless, environmentally friendly heirloom treasures.

Breathable textiles that warm and protect, made with passion and integrity

Luxurious blankets, throws, rugs, babywear, accessories and Licensed Movie Costuming, traditionally created by artisan craftsmen, on historic 1890’s looms.

* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
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A quick timelapse shot on the Wellington Cable Car in Wellington, New Zealand during our recent trip.

Wellington Cable Car Info

* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
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A short video at Makara Beach, Wellington, New Zealand in Winter from our trip August 24, 2017-September 1, 2017.

Location of Makara Beach

Music: “Private Reflection” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) under Create Commons License

* A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs
** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out!

Charles Duhigg on Self-Motivation, Mental Models, and Getting Stuff Done – The Upgrade by Lifehacker

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If anyone knows the difference between being busy and being productive it’s Charles Duhigg. The Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for the New York Times and author of The Power of Habit has made a name for himself plumbing the science of productivity, and this week he’s joining us on the podcast.

Charles is, by any measure, a very productive person—he wrote a bestseller while working full-time and raising a family. And even though success begat success, he started to feel like he was treading water and didn’t want to come home every day after work to spend another five hours answering emails.

So he started calling researchers who study productivity as well as very productive people he admired to learn why some people manage to do so much while others struggle to reach the inbox zero promised land. Those phone calls and conversations are what led to his second book, Smarter Better Faster.

In today’s show we talk about many of the key principles Charles detailed in his book, including how pilots used ‘mental models’ to land a severely damaged airplane, how the worst automotive manufacturing plant in the country turned itself around when new owners gave the workers more control, and what it means to be truly productive.

Maths in the Early Islamic World
Released Feb 16, 2017

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the flourishing of maths in the early Islamic world, as thinkers from across the region developed ideas in places such as Baghdad’s House of Wisdom. Among them were the Persians Omar Khayyam, who worked on equations, and Al-Khwarizmi, latinised as Algoritmi and pictured above, who is credited as one of the fathers of algebra, and the Jewish scholar Al-Samawal, who converted to Islam and worked on mathematical induction. As well as the new ideas, there were many advances drawing on Indian, Babylonian and Greek work and, thanks to the recording or reworking by mathematicians in the Islamic world, that broad range of earlier maths was passed on to western Europe for further study.

With Colva Roney-Dougal
Reader in Pure Mathematics at the University of St Andrews

Peter Pormann
Professor of Classics & Graeco-Arabic Studies at the University of Manchester And

Jim Al-Khalili
Professor of Physics at the University of Surrey

Producer: Simon Tillotson.

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Storm Timelapse, Los Angeles, California, February 17, 2017 [Video] (2:30)

Timelapse of Tuesday’s Storm as it passed through my Los Angeles Garden

Music: “Angel Share” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) under Creative Commons License