Recent thoughts
How to start 3D modelling Giraffes
- This week, I thought about buying a course to learn to use Blender for 3D modelling.1
- I stopped myself. Building something yourself - whether a business or a 3D giraffe - is a much faster way to learn than reading about it. As "The Inner Game of Tennis" says, great baseball players don't become great by reading about playing baseball.
- After two sessions of 3D modelling, I feel pretty comfortable modelling flat edged structures. Here are the first 3D models that I built using Blender this week:
- Another really cool thing is that I can 3D print anything that I make. There are many 3D printers at MakerSpace (Link to MakerSpace). And 3D printers are now cheap. I printed the below sheep (which I didn't make, and whose name is 'Cameron') using a EUR 130 printer:
Building 'Nomad Money' (my new product) in 2 weeks
- I have been building Nomad Money for the past two weeks. Nomad Money can currently connect to around 2,100 banks in 31 counties. I plan to be able to launch it by the end of Friday.
- Product problem: By having multiple bank accounts, personal and company, and in different countries, I have been losing track of my money. This is off-putting.
- Nomad Money solves this problem by showing me all of my bank accounts and transactions in one place. This overview updates every 4 minutes, shows whatever currency I want, and uses the most recent daily exchange rates.
- So, I am building Nomad Money for myself. But I imagine that other nomads/people living abroad would find it helpful.
Music = Vibrating air molecules to express emotions
- Here are some simplified descriptions of academic fields. If you fancy, ask a friend to describe the below subjects in a single sentence. What they say might indicate how they see the world.
History = Records of human examples
Literature = Stories that we have created
Maths = The relationships between ideas and objects
Physics = How matter around us behaves
Chemistry = How to change some matter around us
Biology = Living things around us
Geology = How rocks form and break
Music = Vibrating air molecules to express emotions
Law = Rules that humans make
Medicine = Human body repair
Dentistry = Human teeth repair
Economics = How groups and individual humans act with resources
Art = How to communicate and store emotion
Philosophy = Word games and lifestyle tips
Drama = Creating stories by pretending to do things
Computer science = Controlling information flows
Engineering = How to build things
- Trying to reduce a discipline to a sentence loses a lot of information. But, describing the fields in a sentence makes them seem stranger and even more interesting.
- The arbitrary boundaries of subjects are also clear. For example, where does physics end and engineering begin? And law contains a lot of story telling. Why should others be able to punish you for breaking rules that you didn't know?
A merry, transactional Christmas
- I think that gift giving is a wonderful thing. However, a gift must have an element of surprise. If you know what the gift is - perhaps you have provided well-wishing relatives with a list of specific gifts that you would like - the gift becomes a transaction.
- This happened to me yesterday. After frantically searching online to find objects that someone could buy me, I produced a list. My favourite item was the "FreeStyle Libre 3 Continuous Blood Glucose Monitoring System". (I don't have diabetes. But, I would like to see how my blood sugar changes in real-time).
- Owing to problems securing the Libre 3, a well-meaning family member asked me to buy the Christmas gift for myself. After buying it, her plan is for me to pass the gift to her. She will then wrap up the gift, and place it under the Christmas tree for me to open. As As you realise, I probably won't be particularly surprised by this gift on Christmas day.
- I am very grateful that anyone wants to do something nice for me. But, I want to rethink the gift request process. As a general principle, too much guidance stops people using their creativity. In contrast, letting someone use their discretion can produce much more interesting - and surprising - results.
Outro
- The momentum of a streak is powerful. I exceeded my goal of writing 25 newsletters last week.
- I plan to do something different within the next few weeks. My current idea involves writing less, and speaking more.
- I hope that you have a great Christmas, filled with many non-transactional gifts.
Tom :)
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