The Cranking Widgets Blog

The Twitter Drinking Game

Let me be honest with you – last week’s drinking game (in honor of Friday Fun) that dealt with the television show House, M.D. was, frankly, a dud. I did my best, but it kind of sucked. So, I’m here to redeem myself with a little pre-Friday Friday Fun. That said, let’s [...]

Your GTD System Isn’t the Problem

Since starting my current job about 7 months ago, I’ve garnered something of a reputation for being “the organized guy”. A couple of the higher-ranking people there had attempted to embrace GTD (with varying degrees of success) and were ecstatic to have somebody on-board who could attempt to convert the rank and file. [...]

Free Software: Two Minute Timer for OS X

Better late than never, I suppose
Many, many moons ago I wrote a tiny little two minute timer application for Windows as a free alternative to the $10 offering from the David Allen Company. I got more than a few emails asking for a Mac version. Well, ask and you shall receive!
This [...]

The House, M.D. Drinking Game

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Some of you may remember the moderately popular Law & Order Drinking Game from a few months back. Sitting around with my wife coming up with marginally esoteric (yet regular enough [...]

So, You’re Not Using Jott?

I spend a good deal of time in the car every day. Not as much as some, but it’s typically somewhere around 90 minutes round trip on a given work day. And being one of those people whose brain is pretty much always going, I tend to have many thoughts and ideas during [...]

365 (or so) Merlin Mannerisms

Everybody’s favorite productivity eccentric has agreed to have a whole slew of quotes published as a “Quote of the Day” calendar for 2008!
Not to sound like a fanboy, but I find Merlin to be an immensely entertaining guy, as I’m sure many of you do as well. Not to be encumbered by traditional thinking [...]

Celebrating Cranking Widgets’ First Birthday

Sure doesn’t seem like it, but today marks the one year anniversary of the first post on this here blog. Wow.
I must admit, this blog is doing better than I would’ve imagined way back then. We’re doing a respectable 3K+ subscribers and roughly a thousand pageviews per day. And while that’s child’s [...]

How to Talk to a Toddler

I’ll be honest – before I became a parent, I had a hell of a time interacting with small children. Kids who were still in the midst of learning to talk, but had learned a few words and used them frequently (and, not surprisingly, sometimes incorrectly). Tell me if this situation sounds familiar…
You [...]

Why the Amazon Kindle is Going to Completely Rule

The tech community has been all riled up of late with regard to Amazon’s new electronic reading device, the Kindle. Chances are, you’ve heard of it and probably developed an opinion about it.
From everything I’ve read on blogs and news sites and heard on podcasts, people seem to fall into one of [...]

How to Drink Like a High Roller in Vegas Without Going Broke

Being born and raised in southern California has its benefits. I can be at some of the most beautiful beaches in the country in less than an hour by car. I can also (during winter) spend a couple of hours on the road and be in just the right spot for some pretty [...]