Take Heart, Have Courage

More raw sermon notes, from the iPod:

Sermon "courage":



Take heart. A God-size dream is bigger than you and your resources 

Courage is to proceed despite fear.

1. Courage is not waiting for fear to go away.

Wherever there is uncertainty there will always be a need for leaders 

2. Anyone can be courageous 

What would you do if you aren't afraid? (from Who Moved My Cheese

3. Courage is not innate but developed

Progress requires courage 

4. Courage is feeling fear but choosing to act anyway.

Have the courage to listen and obey God

If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his 
years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no 
burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he. For he cometh in with 
vanity, and departeth in darkness, and his name shall be covered with darkness. 
Moreover he hath not seen the sun, nor known any thing: this hath more rest than 
the other. Yea, though he live a thousand years twice told, yet hath he seen no 
good: do not all go to one place? (Ecclesiastes 6:3-6 KJV)

There is no security in that which is no longer meaningful.

For Men Only: How To Never Lose Another Umbrella

Wait.

Make sure your lady is OUT of the room.

Or better yet, out of the house. Are you all set? Good. I'll make it short, 

in case she sneaks back in, because you were so eager to get her out, that you

 overdid it by giving her your credit card and car keys. Here it is... Get a pink umbrella. Get

 a tote-sized, bright, monochrome pink (that's pink only, for you art majors) umbrella. I've 

had  mine for seven years, or something. Ain't no shame fellas. Ain't no shame. I've left it at work, 

on the bus, in restaurants, at Fenway Park, at my mama house...and it's always gotten back to 

me , before I've gotten too far. Once you get yours... Men will be too embarrassed to steal it. 

Women 

will want 

to see 

the look of 

horror on your 

face when they 

return it and 

then compliment 

you about being 

secure in your 

manhood.

Kids won't 

want it, 

because kids 

don't want 

what they 

already have 

or that you're 

too eager to 

give to them, 

such as chores, 

consequences, 

advice, and 

Amoxicillin.

And after all 

this time, I've 

finally figured 

out to fix my 

umbrella when 

the canopy 

separates 

from the tips.

If you want 

to know how, 

let me know

...if you dare. :)

Would You Buy, and Wear A Smart-watch Daily?

phonearena.com

I haven't worn a dumb-watch (reads much better than "non-smart-watch") since 2000. The use-cases for smart-watches in general haven't yet been clearly defined.

I carry and use multiple mobile devices and laptops, daily. I own five lovely dumb-watches; one which has served as my alarm clock for years. I still don't wear dumb-watches. I love dumb-watches. I always have. I always will. I just don't like wearing them.

Why? If you have a dumb-watch on your wrist, you're most likely to check the time way more often than you absolutely need to. You can't resist because a different time is always going to be presented to you whenever you check. There's no way to easily stop that habit with a dumb-watch, than to...not wear the dumb-watch. That's fine. That's what dumb-watches do best: present you something different every second of your life.

I will happily wear those rubber bracelets; the likes of which were pioneered by the Livestrong Foundation. The rubber bracelet currently on my wrist is about style and personal branding; a kind of removable tattoo. Still, I'm very interested in the iWatch. Although, any smart-watch would have to have at least these four characteristics, to compel me to wear it daily:

• A fashion accessory that is customizable to my personal style and branding. If the watch died, I'd still be compelled to wear it until I could get it fixed or could get a replacement
• A state-of-the-art, customizable, push-notification (alert) system that reduces my time on all other devices and apps I use, including the time and inconvenience of to pulling them out or/and loading them up and connecting to use them
• It doesn't constantly have to be paired to another device to be useful and enjoyable

You Know You're A Geek...

...when a co-worker sends you this over chat:

...and then you laugh your ass off.

What Would You Do With A Million Dollars?

photobucks.com

If you are ever short of conversation, that question will light it up every time. Notice people's eyes light up as they ponder or prepare to answer the question? Then you gets a variety of answers, in no particular order:

• Pay off bills
• Buy mama a house (deserves a bullet point of its own for its ubiquity)
• Quit job
• Donate 
• Travel
• Buy a ____________
• Buy some _________
• Pay for ___________
• Get a ____________

The above is by no means an exhaustive list. 

Here's some of what I've learned over the twenty years I've been asking people the question.

• People love being asked that question
• A lot of people aren't clear on what they'd like to do next after some the typical answers
• Few people realize (at least in the US) that depending on how you get the million dollars, it rarely gets to your pocket as a million dollars (read: taxes)
• Your bad habits * $1,000,000.00 that you didn't work for = mo' money, mo' problems (as Biggie Smalls would rap)
• You don't really (really) know how you'd respond to a lot of money out of nowhere, until you have to manage a lot of money out of nowhere
• Push people (gently of course) further on this question long enough, and they discover their true dreams and passions can be pursued without the million dollars

I'm lucky. I simply stuck my million dollars to my wall. It's probably better for both of us...since money isn't real. But that's another blog post.

Telling Kids The Truth

Arthur Fordham c1902

So a few nights ago I'm reading Little Red Riding Hood to my kids; one in a line of many, many earlier versions. I get to that part where the wolf eats grandma....when my four-year-old son, still learning to read, interrupts, "don't you mean she hid in the closet?" I'm dumbfounded for a second, and then I remember vaguely that later versions of this famed story involve grandma and a closet.

I could do what most American parents I know would like do, and move the story right along for the sake of my audience and be mortified that such a politically-incorrect version of the book made its way into our sacred library. God knows I was tempted. Especially since my three-year-old nephew was also present. However, I've made it a policy to tell my kids the truth in a manner they will comprehend so matter how risqué the question.

"Noooo," I finally replied. "The wolf ate grandma." My index finger tracing below the words. My daughter, an excellent reader, nodded in agreement. When he protested that the version he knew about from TV involved a closet, I went on to explain that in the original version, the wolf actually ate grandma. I then explained to the kids, in their language, that sometimes there are different versions of a story to match the changing times in the world and how people feel about things.

Parenting in America today, and life in general, isn't like what it was when the original Little Red Riding Hood was printed. So there's this valid tendency to want to protect our children at all costs.
I believe we can do this by telling our children the truth, at a level and manner that they can comprehend, even if not fully. It's a muscle we as parents and all who care for and love children, have to exercise for it to become part of our conditioning. I wasn't so smooth my first time with my pal Curious George, but I had to start somewhere too.

I'm glad for my choice because next, the wolf (I totally forgot) eats Little Red too! Finally, the woodsman kills the wolf (oh dear) with his ax, freeing both grandma and Little Red (whew). I could hear my parental alarms blaring as I read, but I kept repeating to myself, you and millions of children once read (or were read) the same story, and the world didn't end.

Better a truth that fosters a difficult but necessary conversation, and path to a critical understanding of the world, than a lie that slowly but eventually erodes trust.

What We're Working On at Zumbi Mobile Solutions - 2013

Mobile Development:

Our sophomore iOS app (our first, DTCcater^TM was released last fall), MotrAide^TM, currently in development, is slated for a second beta release this Fall. With this project, I was able to indulge my love of maps using the Google Maps API. Although, Apple being (well) Apple, threw me a curve ball with the disappearance of Google Maps with the release of iOS 6. You all know by now how well that turned out.

The death of Apple has once again been greatly exaggerated though. Despite the media pundits chagrin with Apple, and Apple's slightly lower market share compared to the beginning of this year, I'm still quite bullish on Apple. In fact, I'm saving my lunch money for the iWatch, whenever that comes out. Besides, Google Glass would be redundant for me, as I refuse to wear contacts.

I still hear the siren calls of Android, Window Mobile, and Blackberry, and in that order. However, it's important to, "say no to a thousand things," to quote Steve Job, in order to focus for optimum results and success. Still, I couldn't resist and I'm now running Windows 8 on a beat up, left for dead, what used to be called tablet PC, laptop. Plus, I'm currently taking the Android SDK via Eclipse for a test drive.

Kindle Publishing:

After rethinking our approach to our second Kindle ebook  project, and shuffling completing priorities, the revised project is on our road-map for Winter 2013.

Enterprise Technical Support

Demand continues to increase for skilled technical support services for enterprise systems. As these system become more distributed, complex, and dependent on third party platforms, the ability to adapt as quickly as possible to the needs of organizations and their customers, while leveraging our core competences is even more important.