The science behind hangovers

I wondered why the smart advice the Bed & Breakfast owner gave me in early 1990’s about always drinking a lot of water when one was drinking a lot of other things was really working. Likewise, I also wondered why these hangover headaches felt so different (and unpleasant)

Here comes the answer: a small video from National Geographics explains (amongst other things) that to clean up the blood the liver takes the water where it can find it easily: the brain. This then shrinks the brain that then "detaches" from the skull. Ouch!

Check out the 3’20” mark.

How to avoid LinkedIn to use your information in it commercials without you knowing you allowed it?

Without attracting too much publicity, LinkedIn has updated their privacy conditions this summer.

Without any action from your side, LinkedIn is now permitted to use you name and picture in any of their advertisements.

The following simple actions can be taken to regain control over your image:

1. Place the cursor on your name at the top right corner of the screen. From the small
   pull down menu that appears, select "settings"
2. Then click "Account" on the left/bottom
3. In the column next to Account, select the option "Manage Social Advertising"
4. Finally un-tick the box "LinkedIn may use my name and photo in social advertising"
5. Save

Ballast: A Tool for Finding Work-Life Balance – Sabina Nawaz and John P. Williamson – Harvard Business Review

Ballast: A Tool for Finding Work-Life Balance – Sabina Nawaz and John P. Williamson – Harvard Business Review.

An interesting analogy between the needed balast for a boat and the one needed for a well balances life.

Using 1 mouse and keyboard across computers

When working from home I often prefer to us my desktop to my work laptop: faster (i7!), larger screen, etc. However it lacks my work files and access to corpnet (well unless I RAS in, but who wants to do this when you have direct access on your work laptop).

Until recently I was therefore often plugging an extra keyboard, mouse and the VGA cable of my large screen to my laptop: dual screen, comfort of a real keyboard and mouse. Seems almost perfect isn’t it? Well yes, except that I need to have an extra set of keyboard + mouse gathering dust on my desk most of the time, and my laptop is really not that fast so this can be very frustrating at time.

Here comes “Mouse without borders”. This simple free app developed by Microsoft developers on their free time allows you to move your mouse seamlessly across computers are if they were one with multi-screens. Use also one keyboard and even copy-paste computer to computer as if they were the same one. The only thing you need is for all the computers to be on the same network! I love it! Expecially now that I’ve been stuck working at home for 3 days because of snow in the Northwest.

Check it for yourself:

• More on Mouse without borders: http://blogs.technet.com/b/next/archive/2011/09/09/microsoft-garage-download-mouse-without-borders.aspx
• Download the app: http://aka.ms/MouseWithOutBorders

Tip for Getting More Organized: Don’t – Michael Schrage – Harvard Business Review

Tip for Getting More Organized: Don’t – Michael Schrage – Harvard Business Review.

Interesting research but I don’t buy it.

It misses several points:

• People have different personalities. Some like sorting, some like searching. There is no one size fits all
• This only focuses on short term. What if you are looking for something after 3 months? 6 months?
• This ignores the aspect of running multiple projects in parallel. I know I always have a folder in Outlook with all my current top projects (most of the time 5 to 7 of them) and being able to go to this folder and, if needed fo a seach in it, helps a lot.

Bottom line: you can’t simplify something like organization habits with one little study like this. Context and personality are too importants parameters to be able to reach a conclusion with such a narrowly focused study.

Interesting point of view on how social media could develop in the coming year(s): http://ping.fm/fc3h8

What makes people sucessful

What makes people successful: another set of good concepts (aligned with other guru’s concepts).

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/02/nine_things_successful_people.html

A direct and potentially sobering account on leadership

A direct and potentially sobering account of what it means to be a leader. Still up to it? http://htxt.it/hcRC

Interesting article on personal development.

Interesting article on personal development. How to reconciliate this with “dream big because it’s not more expensive than dearming small” from Colin Powell?

 http://gmj.gallup.com/content/150485/Setting-Major-Development-Goals-Work.aspx?utm_source=email&utm_medium=112011&utm_content=titlelink&utm_campaign=newsletter

Even an oil-moguls funded study confirms global warming is a fact

Even an oil-moguls funded study confirms global warming is a fact, not an opinion: http://htxt.it/9Q5B