Avon HS Lip Dub

A totally impressive, inspiring, uplifting video by a bunch of HS kids who just rock it!  America Strong!

Justifying what you think

For a moment, you can fall into the trap of interpreting this blog title in a sort of chronological sequence.  First comes the justification - the theory, evidence, reason for thinking a particular way; then comes the thought part.  Who would be so foolish to start with the thought and end up with the justification.  But I think that is exactly what people do.

I've caught myself.  An idea pops into my head.  Usually uninvited, unanticipated and without warning.  I believe that is the clearest evidence of my adult ADHD.  I can't stop them.

But later, as I mull over the idea, I seem to find all kinds of exciting, self-affirming, confidence inspiring justifications for it.  Recently, it finally dawned on my just how backward that is.

Rationally, we should all have ideas that are based in truth, or at least facts.  But it seems to me that more often than not we have an idea pop into our head and we try as hard as we can to justify it.  Exactly backwards, but I think that protects our self image somehow.  How smart could I claim to be if bad ideas popped into my head.  I'm brilliant!  I must have only good ideas!

Of course, that's stupid.  Random ideas are probably randomly good and bad.  So I need to recognize that abandoning many of them is necessary if I'm not going to waste my time attempting to resuscitate ideas that should have been dead on arrival.

STEM: Necessary but insufficient

I love Sir Ken Robinson's approach to education.  In this talk titled: How To Change Education from the Ground Up he indicates that STEM is a necessary but insufficient component in the bundle of knowledge we desire to pass along to our children.

His epic TED Talk: How Schools Kill Creativity has been viewed over 25M times!  Right up there with Lady Gaga!

L. S. Starrett - Mechanical Entrepreneur

I fancy myself a Mechanical Engineer + Entrepreneur.  This country has been blessed with many MEEs since our founding.  Any list would leave many out.  But just so you know the type of person I'm talking about here are a few: Deere, Whitney, McCormick, Singer, Otis, and so many more.  Their names have become household words and labels for the machines they invented that changed the world.

Yesterday I acquainted myself with another MEE: Laroy Starrett - inventor of measuring devices, without which, the manufacture and quality control of nearly any industrial product would not be possible.

The Starrett website is a treasure trove of information about precision measuring and offers many free resources...several of which (like the Metric and Decimal Equivalent Cards and Tools and Rules Booklets) I hope to employ at our upcoming MechanicsCamp hosted on March 1, 2014 at ConnerPrairie Interactive History Park.

My wife is amazed that I could be so fascinated with rulers and conversion charts and calipers and micrometers.  I guess it comes down to my desire to know things - and measuring things is just a part of that.  With today's measuring tools you can (and some people to) make a career out of it.

Perhaps the most fascinating part of Laroy Starrett's story is how he had to overcome so many struggles to establish his tools and his company as the leading innovator in that space.  Doubt, disloyalty, financial trouble and hard times were just as much a part of his story and his accomplishments.

Two items from Bulletin 1216: The Starrett Story are most notable.  The first is a quote attributed to: Thomas Caryle (1795-1881)

“Man is a tool-using animal. Weak in

himself and of small stature, he stands

on a basis of some half square foot,

has to straddleout his legs lest the

very winds supplant him. Neverless,

he can use tools, devise tools; with

these the granite mountain melts into

light dust before him; seas are his

smooth highway, wind and fire his

unwearying steeds. Nowhere do you

find him without tools. Without tools he

is nothing, with tools he is all.”

The second is a quote from Starrett himself that defines his purpose as an entrepreneur:

“I have believed that I could do no greater good than help create a

business that would give people employment 
and a chance to earn an honest living.”

Few things have impressed me the way this video did

Adam Magyar - Stainless, 42 Street (excerpt) from Adam Magyar on Vimeo.

Life and Donuts

This is worth top-posting. Other good stuff is a page or two down.

Envy and Fear are the two deadliest sins

The President speaks all the time.  I watch little TV and listen to random bits of radio.  I'm afraid to say my consumption of real news is no better than vegetables.

But I do read Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize winning economist and solid thinker.  So when he recommended that a recent speech by the President on income inequality was note worthy I looked for it.  It turned out to be very good.

I am worried about income inequality.  I believe the chasm of hope it creates between two peoples who occupy the same country is dangerous.  This speech lays out where we are and a little about what we need to do.  Nothing will change until a major event requires power to shift.  And I'm afraid that will be near revolution in its impact and destruction.  The combination of Fear (that a family's children won't succeed) and Envy (that other children's prosperity will be unfairly earned,) is a powerful force for upheaval in a society.  

I'm sure others have studied this trajectory and know a lot more than me about the outcomes and risk.  I'm just an observer.  But I don't like what I see and it makes me afraid.

Time is relative

Another Rotary Invocation - November 2013

When Greg Albright sent me an email last week reminding me about this week's duty to present another invocation I was a little surprised.  I had intended to pass it off to another member because I was involved with a CEO-Net event in Carmel on the same day . . . and I had just given an invocation.  I was stumped for a subject.

The end of Daylight Saving Time last weekend gave me the idea to talk about time.

Ever since I was a boy I’ve been fascinated with time. 

Back then, science could tell time to the millionth of a second.  Now, we keep it to better than a trillionth.  For comparison, light travels about one foot in one nanosecond – one billionth of a second.  GPS and the Internet can’t work if clocks are wrong by just a few of them.  We’ve gone from telling time by the change in the colors of the seasons to telling time by the change in the color of light that reaches us from the stars. 

Most of us live minute to minute.  By comparison an impossibly vast amount of time – if you’re a computer.  It’s all relative.  Einstein, the expert of relativity, noted the time you spend with a pretty girl is relatively short when compared to the time you spend sitting on a hot stove – though both time periods may be the same. 

Everyone wants to save time – but there is no hoarding it.  Time is the great equalizer.  Everyone has less than they need, but according to Chief Red Jacket, of the Six Nations of New York, everyone has all there is.

Time and tide wait for no man. 

I see time pass in the birthdays of my grandchildren.  I wonder if they realize those ‘endless days’ til Christmas, til Spring, til birthdays, til whatever will someday pass like ice melts in hot tea.  Look away and it’s gone. 

How to make time slow?  I’ve found one way: live today.  The setting of appointments and anniversaries is particularly problematic.  Like the time between them is ‘fly over country.’ Lacking an excuse to pay attention, time filled with work, we compress away those spaces like ‘filler,’ and lose the time to anticipation.

Oliver Wendell Homes, the astute early 20th century Supreme Court Justice said: ‘I do despise making the most of one’s time.  Half of the pleasure of life consists of the opportunities one has neglected.’  ‘Life is What Happens To You While You’re Busy Making Other Plans,’ wrote a more contemporary artist of our language, John Lennon. 

Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity* 

Dr. Seuss said: “How did it get so late so soon? It's night before it's afternoon. December is here before it's June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?”

* Henry Van Dyke

3D Printing Book Report

I was asked by TechPoint to present a brief 'book report' on 3D printing 10/17 at their Tech Thursday event for October.  It was a lot of fun and the audience was really engaged.  I gave a similar presentation to the Indianapolis Public Library 10/24.  The goal for both is to tell the big story about how 3D printing is changing manufacturing and represents an opportunity for 'clever kids' to stake out a career with new skills that will span generations.  I call it: ST3M: Science, Technology, 3D Printing and Math!



From the TechPoint blog (which makes me sound really smart :)

• You can turn your dreams into parts now, which is really cool. It comes with some caveats; these new tools have new rules.

• What used to be an assembly of many different parts is now a single 3D part. The quality control and inventory implications alone are enough to justify this technology. You don't have to make as many different parts, you don't have to measure them, you don't have to keep them in stock, you don't have to assemble them and measure them again, and you don't have QC guys floating around. So there are a lot of positive impacts aside from the geometry of 3D printing.

• 3D printing is not just for rapid prototyping anymore, we're making parts that are being used in actual products.

• Autocad is so 90s. That way of thinking doesn't work anymore and we have to be able to represent objects that have depth in order to stay competitive and innovative.

• 3D printing is a "scratch your own itch" medium. You can now make just one of something instead of needing all of the infrastructure that it used to take just to make one.

• Subtractive manufacturing vs. additive manufacturing: In the old way, we used to whittle away material. Today, we can give you any shape you want and you are only paying for the actual molecules of the part and no waste.

• Everybody should stop what they are doing and go download free software like Sketchup or 123D or similar tools.  They are easy ways to learn and draw in 3D. 

An open letter to Indiana's 6th District Representative Luke Messer...

I learned today that Federal employees furloughed by the shutdown will now be paid retroactively.  That seems to take all the pressure off of Congress to act quickly to bring this mess to a close.  

I believe the Republicans have acted irresponsibly and un-patriotically.  Not only has your behavior jeopardized the standing of the United States in the world and caused significant harm to millions of citizens, but it is insulting to Federal workers and damaging to their morale and retention.

Despite the Republican talking points, you can't deny this debate is about a law passed by Congress, endorsed by the electorate (given the President's re-election on the issue) and upheld by the Supreme Court.  Why can't you just amend the law if you think it's broken?  Why can't you simply run for re-election yourself on the basis of your disagreement?  I believe the Republican charge that the ACA will irreversibly damage our country is speculative - but the damage done to our country by the shutdown and partisan politics practiced mainly by Republicans is certain.

The words of your colleague Marlin Stutzman are embarrassingly revealing.  The Republicans don't know what they want besides the destruction of the Obama administration.

This is a clear result of too much money in politics - Congressmen must pander to increasingly polarized constituencies continuously to retain their offices.  And gerrymandering has created districts that can be dominated by one party - and pushed farther and farther to extremes.

At least this debacle may present teachable moments in Government classes.  Hopefully a generation of young people will take their patriotism more seriously than most of the members in Congress and place the good of the country ahead of their selfish ambitions for more power.

Sincerely,

Kim Brand
Greenfield

Is it the truth?

The Invocation schedule got shifted around and so they asked me to do another one sooner than normal.  This is a subject I've been thinking about for a while; seemed like it would be a good time to develop the idea.  Our guest speaker on the the day I'll deliver the invocation is Karen Crotchfelt, President & Publisher, Star Media.  A newspaper attempts to deliver the truth every day - or should.

Rotary Invocation

September 10, 2013

Is it the Truth?  When we were children we were taught to always tell the truth.  The truth must have been simpler then.  As if the choice between telling the truth and telling a lie was a task suited to the naiveté of a child.  The bible doesn’t assume the reader is much more sophisticated and it simply commands us not to lie.  The truth is apparently far more difficult to tell.

The truth is subject to interpretation.  That much is obvious.  How can so many news outlets tell the truth but tell different stories?  So the truth is actually a product of facts and perspective.  What happens when even the facts are in doubt?  The truth becomes a very flexible thing indeed.

Rotary relationships depend on the truth.  And we ask ourselves at every meeting will the things we think, say and do be guided by it.  The success of our club depends on it.  And our hundred year legacy would only be possible because of it.

But now our nation is challenged to know the truth about so many issues.  The War in Syria, Equality of Opportunity, Privacy of Personal Information, Climate Science, Economic Policy.  The sides in these debates hold the truth as their keystone asset.  But how can that be?  How can we know the truth?  Knowing the truth must be much harder than we were led to believe.  Maybe we were lied to about the truth?

Will the truth set you free?  Maybe.  Will the truth lead to world peace?  Probably not.  There are just too many versions of it.  The most we can hope for is that men and women of good will can move beyond the belief that only their truth matters and constantly ask the question: Is it the truth? even of their own beliefs.  That is why the question bears repeating.

Great resources for this invocation: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-second-noble-truth/201205/the-truth-will-not-set-you-free

http://www.ted.com/talks/kathryn_schulz_on_being_wrong.html

Another Rotary Invocation - May 2013

I just turned 60 last week.  By any measure, a milestone.  Several friends and relatives didn’t make it this far.  My 40th high school reunion included time for memorials, my brother died at 55.  May is the month of Memorial Day.  The thought of passing out of this life has become more personal lately.

Many people I know, and me included, live their lives in Drive.  At 100 miles per hour we boast.  May is also the month for racing.  Presumably we’re all heading somewhere better than where we are.  Moving away from here (which is somehow not good enough) and going there, which is full of promise.  The expressions: ”He’s going places,” “He’ll go far,” and “She’ll get somewhere someday” have an almost magical attractive sound to them.  Like here is nowhere you’d want to be.

So just for today, just for this Rotary Club meeting, I’d like you to find another gear to be in: Park.  Sit a spell. Cool your jets.  Smell the roses.  These too are old sayings with equally valid advice, that from my more mature perspective, sound just as magical to me now.  I actually remember Parking as a teenager quite fondly.

It is far safer to enjoy the scenery when you are in Park.  It is far easier to talk and listen and think when you aren’t running.   You can’t put more gas in the car unless you stop every once in a while.

My hope for you today and every day is that for all the time you spend in Drive you reserve some time for Park.   Or, as the lyrics from Simon and Garfunkel’s ‘59th Street Bridge Song’ advise:

Slow down, you move too fast.
You got to make the morning last.
Just kicking down the cobble stones.
Looking for fun and feelin' groovy.

Message to Dan Coats, Sen (R) Indiana

Dear Sen Coats,

I learned today that you may filibuster legislation that regards imposing new restrictions on the sale of guns.  I am in favor of reasonable limits on the sale of guns; for example criminal background checks, waiting periods, demonstration of proficiency, mental aptitude, etc.

Please allow a vote on this legislation to proceed to the floor of the Senate.  I believe our nation deserves a vote on this critical issue.

Also: the pull-down list under 'Subject' didn't include Gun Control.  I selected 'Health Care' as a last resort because in my view when people die it is a Health Care issue.

People are fat in this country because of the abundance of cheap food at more outlets, at more times of day, that satisfies every appetite with maximum convenience.  I believe deaths due to guns may be explained the same way.  Make guns more available and more people die - make guns less available and fewer will die.

Thank you,

Kim Brand

Startup advice delivered by Pillow Logistics

One of the great things about being involved with the Business Ownership Initiative and Julie Grice, our executive director, is the great contacts I make.  Wednesday night I sat down with George Pillow, founder of Pillow Logistics.  An Indianapolis business success story.

After a couple+ beers I don't trust my memory to recall everything he said, but here is the gist of it - like getting an MBA in a bar (which happened to be The Columbia Club!)

Accounting.  You must understand numbers.  On your feet in front of a customer and with your accountant, bankers, employees and alone when you are thinking about what to do next.

Networking.  You must constantly make connections and seek relationships that can spread your message.

Marketing/Communications/Sales.  You must learned how to speak with everyone from the board room to the shipping dock.  The first impression you make is what you say and how you say it so don't blow it.

Friendship.  You must adopt a curiosity about people and friendliness that deepens the relationships you share.  While I was sitting with George he made a point of greeting every person in the room by name.  Dale Carnegie said: "There is nothing so sweet as the sound of a person's name to them."  In a competitive world of noise and distraction you need more friends to amplify your results.

George acknowledged the help of many mentors.  Among them Mickey Maurer, Cambridge Capital Partners and Jean Wojtowicz in particular.  He also the critical importance of the small business loan provided by Lynx Capital to get him started.

Finally, despite his success, George remains humble.  He said there is always something to learn, thanks to be paid to someone who helped and gratitude acknowledged for the community which makes personal success possible.  Most of all George told me, he credits his mother for the guidance and counsel that got him through the hardest times.

We all start small - and if we grow up tall it's most likely due to the care and nurturing of our first friend: our Mother.  George said that his Mother was his best friend.

I wrote a CV a while ago that quoted Rousseu and tried to capture the reality that I'm not that smart the way many people think of smart.  I'm not dumb either in the same way.  Like this blog's subtitle describes: People are Polynomials.

So I ran across this great video by Neil deGrasse Tyson that explains how each person is unique, has a mix of talents and should celebrate that.  He says: the world would be a better place if people focused on their talents and not try to fit the mold or fulfill the job descriptions imposed on them by others.

This is also the message of 'The Element," a wonderful book by Sir Ken Robinson that takes up the same subject.  Finding, and being 'in,' your element is the most important mission you have in life.

Another Indianapolis Rotary Club Invocation, delivered 10/16/2012

My son was married about a week ago.  As a matter of some coincidence, they chose to be married at the Speakeasy - a place connected to our speaker's businessincubator.  I hope it works as well for young couples as it does for young businesses.

The occasion of their marriage offered me time to reflect on love.  Of all the emotions it is the most difficult to explain.  The Apostle Paul wrote: "For there are these three things that endure: Faith, Hope and Love, but the greatest of these is Love."

I've set many goals in my life and achieved some success, but the achievement of which I am most proud is being married for 37 years.  A life of love shared with my wife.

Our love has changed through the years - the Greeks were the first to determined there were four types of love.  And I believe you can find all of them on display here today at Rotary:

Affection: We meet every week, sharing greetings, genuinely interested in listening to each other and doing business on the square.  You may not think this is love but of the four kinds it is the most natural and widely experienced.  An affection for nature, a cause, and a curiosity is love.  What soul could thrive apart from that?

Friendship: The old saying: "Make new friends, cherish the old.  One is silver the other gold" isn't an old saying here.  It's a part of our four way test; a pledge we make not to Rotary . . . but to each other.  Friendship is Chicken Soup for your soul. When you greet each other today consider it an opportunity to create a friendship that could last a lifetime.

Romance: Part nature but to this engineer's mind mostly mystery.  Easier to witness than explain; in full view at my son's wedding and - at my wedding and at your wedding.  Romance allows you to fall in love but land on clouds.  Romance is rewarded with caring, acceptance and fulfillment - so why don't we have more of it?

Charity: We gather today under a banner of service above self.  Unselfish love focused on bettering the world - but at the same time - ourselves.  Anne Frank said: “No one has ever become poor by giving.”

So be more in love today...practice all the different kinds: Affection, Friendship, Romance and Charity.  There probably isn't enough love in the world so commit yourself to making more of it today.

From Frank Zappa via Gregg Keesling:

Do what you wanna

Do what you will

Just don’t mess up your neighbor’s thrill

And as you pay the bill

Kindly leave a little tip

And help the next poor sucker on his one way trip

Why [great] newspapers must survive

It struck me today why newspapers must survive and it was a bit surprising.  (Isn't it wonderful when you can be surprised by your own ideas?  As if they came from another person!)

Browsing the pages of the NY Times it occurred to me the exposure to information in a newspaper is nearly random.  I know the Times has a liberal bias.  I know the 'Book Review' section is about books.  So the exposure may not be truly random.  But the discoveries on each page are somewhat unpredictable and the field so wide that I find myself stumbling into new matter every time.  It is almost like a voyage of discovery into uncharted territories.  Like Darwin trolling the inlets of the Galápagos Islands.

Perhaps this simply discloses my sheltered, naive and uninformed existence.  But the Internet has made search so effective and efficient that it is hard to stumble across information unintentionally today.  Every key word your look for is in the results.  But what if other ideas, tangentially related or unrelated, in the general area or far flung, are interesting too?  How do you expose yourself to that?

Whether intentionally or not, newspapers are the way to do that.  Maybe they shouldn't be called newspapers anymore.  News is something the Internet can deliver faster and cheaper.  Maybe they should be called Random Information Delivery Vehicles or Curated Collections of Loosely Aggregated Facts and Opinions.  Those monikers don't exactly flow from the tongue ;)

In any regard, Newspapers should spoil us with surprises and keep us curious about random facts and figures, stories and insights and delicious details that aren't immediately useful for a long time.

Thanks!

As reported on the IN Secretary of State's website, my candidacy for IN House District #53 resulted in 23% of the electorate voting for me!  That's a real bite out of the total votes cast 22778.  

My opponent would have otherwise run unopposed.  He is a good man and does a good job for our district.  BUT: the monogamy of ideas presented in a one party system is unhealthy for Indiana.  Nature loves experiments and diversity.  So should out political system.

I was impressed by the impotence of big budget political campaigns at the national level.  Billions of dollars could have been so much more productively spent.

Stay tuned to these pages for my plans concerning upcoming elections . . . THANKS AGAIN FOR YOUR SUPPORT!

My new favorite author: Steven Strogatz.  He joins a select few who have written books that I want to be buried with. (In case you are curious: Taleb, Kahneman, Mlodinow . . . maybe a few more.) What an amazing title:

The Calculus of Friendship: What a Teacher and a Student Learned about Life while Corresponding about Math