Leave It Behind > Brian Bailey

5 Feeds

Anytime you have to go without something, you have the chance to discover what it really means to you. Most of the time, you learn that you've been taking something or someone for granted, as when you're away from your spouse or children. Other times you find out that something you thought was indispensable to your everyday life is less so, such as television or the world wide web.

Having limited internet access for the past week has led me to question the value of blogs. Not blogs in general, for writing and reading blogs is a significant part of my life, but the number of blogs I read.

I currently subscribe to just over 100 feeds. Many of you see that number and are dumbfounded as to how anyone could read more than 20 blogs at a time. A small number of you see that number and wonder how I can survive without the 100, 200, 500, or 1,000 other feeds you're reading!

After the third day without my fix (it is, without a doubt, an addiction) I started to ask myself what was I really missing? I still felt intelligent and creative. Dinner table conversations were still endlessly fascinating (well, those weren't my family's exact words, but you get the idea). When we found a cafe with free wireless, I knew I'd have a few minutes to catch up. Which feeds would I read in my limited time? And why do I need the others?

I finally settled on five. What if I could only subscribe to five blogs? My newsreader of choice, NetNewsWire, allows you to flag items to read later. This is like browsing through 150 articles a day and creating your own magazine out of the 10-15 you want to read. I've been watching my sorted list of saved items recently and found that they were consistently from the same sources. I spent some time thinking about it and came up with these.

My 5 Essential Blogs

1. Scobleizer
2. Scripting News
3. Signal vs. Noise
4. Political Wire
5. Creating Passionate Users

Now, these are my personal choices only and not a general "Everyone Should Read These Five Blogs!" proclamation. And, of course, it eliminates many excellent blogs that I benefit from every day.

But these are the five that bring me the most consistent value and entertainment. Each site meets Scoble's rule for what makes the best bloggers - they are passionate and authoritative.

Will my subscription list soon reach five? No. There are too many other voices I don't want to miss. My list is going to continue to shrink, however. In the last week, it has gone from 108 to 75 and is falling fast. I'm going to have to pass on the good, and focus my time on the great.

If you could only read 5 blogs, what would they be?

Bono

I finished my first piece of vacation reading yesterday,  Bono: in conversation with Michka Assayas. The book is essentially a 320-page interview of U2's lead singer by a French journalist. If you have the slightest interest in U2 and Bono, I think you would find it highly entertaining. If you're a fan, I don't think you'll be able to put it down.

The book tells much of Bono's life story, with a great deal of introspection about his childhood and his parents. There is also a lot of material about the band and its members. The majority of the book focuses on his faith and activism. All of it is fascinating.

There is so much interesting material that I'll probably incorporate it in a number of different posts, but here is a good place to start:

Coolness might help in your negotiation with people through the world, maybe, but it is impossible to meet God with sunglasses on. It is impossible to meet God without abandon, without exposing yourself, being raw.

Hidden Dunes

During our Destin vacation, we are staying at the Hidden Dunes Resort. We spent many hours researching and talking to people about the best place to stay, but it is truly a blessing that we find ourselves here; I can't imagine a better location.

Hidden Dunes offers condos, villas, and standard hotel rooms. It is located just east of the main Destin strip and seems somewhat secluded in comparison. The entire property is incredibly well run and immaculately maintained. You really do forget about the rest of the world once you drive through the gate, but the world (as in shopping, movies, and restaurants) is only 5-15 minutes away when needed. One of the nicest things is they only allow residents and guests to enter and the beach is private as well.

We somehow managed to choose a fantastic condo. They do a great job of making each residence seem very secluded, with quiet paths and gorgeous, thick vegetation. Lori gives more details on her blog.

Negatives? Like most places, there is a steep charge for the use of chairs and umbrellas on the beach, as well as the excellent tennis courts. Some of the rooms have access to an outside provider's wireless network, but ours does not. I've generally come to the conclusion that that counts as a positive rather than a negative, however.

Oh, and it's a difficult left turn out of the property to reach places to spend money. That's my definitive list of negatives.

The Hidden Dunes staff is very helpful and friendly. I reported a faucet leak and someone was fixing it before I made it back to our room! Highly recommended!

What About Bob?

Last night, we watched the absolute best vacation movie, What About Bob? This is one of my favorite movies of all-time and such a perfect movie to watch on vacation. It is great fun when your children are old enough to enjoy some of your favorite films. Ben thought it was hilarious.

Leo: Please call me Dr. Marvin.

Bob: But at the office, you said I could call you Leo.

Leo: That was at the office. In my home, I'd like you to call me Dr. Marvin.

So many funny moments. What are your favorite vacations movies?

Off Day

Here is my first profound insight from our vacation.

Why do we have days off from work? To have, stay with me here, a day off from work!

Why is this so hard? Why do so many of us insist on working on days where we are literally being paid to do nothing?

Off days serve at least 3 purposes:

1. Relaxation and renewal
2. Fresh ideas and new perspectives
3. Freedom for your team and from your team

Do you trust the people you work with? If you were unreachable for the next week, would everything run smoothly? For most of us, we never have to face that question because it is nearly impossible to be unreachable. We drove 800 miles yesterday across five states and my Blackberry never lost contact once.

It is critical that your team has your trust and respect and one way you can show that is by letting go. They must have the space to make decisions, make mistakes, and be creative without your help (positive) or interference (negative).  If you want to grow leaders, you have to give people room to grow.

I almost called the office two different times today. It sounds so simple and innocent, after I all, these people are my friends and I just want to say hello and see how things are going. In reality, though, it is a subtle form of micro-management. They need freedom from me, and I need freedom from work.

The World in Words

We listened to two audio books on our twelve hour drive today. Lori does a fantastic job of finding stories that all three of us enjoy.

The Daydreamer was first. This was a fun, British book on a boy who has so much more going on in his head that you would imagine looking at him. In one chapter, he switches bodies with the family cat for a day, a common topic of discussion in our house. It was a good book to start with, fairly light and short.

We only listened to the first two chapters of our second book, but we are already loving it. Inkheart is about a man and his daughter, and the mysterious adventure they share. The father is a "Book Doctor", or binder, who has shared his book obsession with his daughter. There have already been a number of great lines dedicated to their shared love of books, but my favorite so far is this:

Books have to be heavy because the whole world's inside them.

Each of them pack 10-12 books whenever they go on a trip, something I can relate to having just packed and unpacked a vehicle full of them. If you share our unrestrained glee upon returning from the library with armfuls of books, you understand.

Destination Destin

Early tomorrow, the Baileys filled the Element with our sand n' surf collection and left for Destin, Florida! Each summer we try to take at least one lengthy family vacation and this year we chose the beaches of north Florida. Up to this point, Ben's best beach experience was in Galveston on the Texas coast, which he loved but lacked some of the essentials, like soft sand and clear blue water.

Destin is a 12-hour drive away, which seems like a simple day trip after our Rocky Mountains vacation last summer. This is our first family trip in the Element and we can't wait to enjoy the extra room, comfortable seats, and super convenient auxiliary jack, which will be perfect for our iPod filled with audio books.

Updates may be sporadic and of limited interest, so your patience is appreciated!

More Data

Have a blog? Looking for detailed statistics? There's a lot of buzz about StatCounter right now. Has anyone used this free tool? I am mostly satisfied with MyBlogLog and Feedburner, but StatCounter offers even more information for the numbers obsessed.

Bulk Pickup

My fine town offers a very convenient service - bulk pickup. Every other week, in addition to normal trash pickup, they send another truck by to get items that won't fit in your trash can, such as brush, bags of leaves, and boxes.

For the past few weeks, we've had a treadmill that we've been trying to decide what to do with. Believe it or not, this was not a dusty, under-used treadmill, but a thoroughly worn out one. Over the past 7 years, we actually wore a hole in the belt and the engine was basically defunct. It was clearly time for it to go, but where? What do you do with a treadmill?

For the first couple of weeks, I honestly couldn't think of any good options, because I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that the trash company would never take a treadmill. As I was driving home one night, though, I saw the curbside evidence throughout the neighborhood that bulk pickup day was just around the corner. The thought slowly crossed my mind, "Maybe they would take a treadmill!" That was followed seconds later with, "Never going to happen my friend." **

The next morning, I finally gave in. I called the trash company and asked, "Would you pick-up a treadmill?"

"Sure," they said.

"Like a real treadmill? Over 5 feet long? Heavy? Lots of metal?"

"No problem."

I couldn't believe it. This was great news! I moved it out of our house and down to the curb (wheels are cool). But as I stood looking at it, so proud of this solution, the thought hit me - this looks awful. Can you imagine driving through a neighborhood and someone has a treadmill sitting by the curb? How embarrassing. I actually thought about moving it back until the last possible minute, so most of our neighbors wouldn't see it, but it was too much work.

When I came home later that day, it was gone! All that was left was the green grass next to the curb. If you timed it right, you never would have seen it at all.

And that's when it hit me.

This bulk pickup thing is exactly what it feels like when you've messed up. Not just a little mess up, but something you'd never want to say out loud. Have you ever done something and you thought, "There's no way God can forgive me for this. I mean, this isn't just your run-of-the-mill slip-up. This is big time. If my neighbors knew about it, I could never look them in the eye again."

And you go on for weeks and weeks, wondering what to do with this thing you're carrying around with you, sure that you're past the point of no return. And finally, one day, you give up and say, "God, can you forgive me?"

And He says, "Sure."

And you say, "But did you hear what it is? This is big...heavy...a real mess."

"No problem."

And it's gone, as if it was never there.

** Bonus points to the reader who recognizes the pop culture reference.

Porous is Good

In case you missed it, Hugh at GapingVoid posted a great summary on the power of blogs within an organization.

So how do you keep misalignment from happening?

The answer lies in "x", the membrane that separates A from B. The more porous the membrane, the easier it is for conversations between A and B, the internal and external, to happen. The easier for the conversations on both side of membrane "x" to adjust to the other, to become like the other.

Don't miss the entire post to get the full picture. Hugh even includes a helpful visual aid as well.