Over the break, I had a chance to read an interesting book about corporate double-speak.  Although I try my best to avoid using words that obscure meaning in my own communications, this book brought to light a few words that I could avoid using and made me laugh about some of the writing that I have to plow through every day.

Examples of these kinds of terms are: frictionless, change agent, core competency, Push the envelope…  Push the envelope?  How hard is that, considering an envelope weighs less than an ounce!  Here is a sample from the glossary of terms at the end of the book:

Mission critical  The James Bond variant of “critical path,” but with the built-in excitement that comes with knowing that what you and many others thought was a stupid project is actually a mission, albeit still a stupid one.

The authors set out to collect a large amount of data on words that are most often abused to fill space without actually saying anything, or worse, obscuring bad news.  Have you suffered at the hands of those who won’t just say what they mean?

Writing a blog is kind of like exercise – unless you keep it up for 6 weeks consistently, it does not become a habit.  Forming new habits is certainly do-able, but depending on what else you have going on, some things may have to change.  In my case, making time for one new habit means not doing something else. 

So, I shall try to put aside 30 minutes a day to write a blog post, and not worry about what the post is about.  Every day, I learn something new which is worth sharing.  Worth sharing with who though?  I’ll assume that my current readership is zero – given that I haven’t posted in about 9 months.  So, for each post I’ll state how long since the last comment, as a proxy for readership ;-)

Yesterday, I went in search of a solution to make our kitchen floor a bit softer.  Bamboo Hardwoods in Seattle had the solution I was looking for, bamboo mats that cover a stone floor, and make them really comfortable to walk on, while at the same time being easy to clean. 

The next problem was how to affix them to the floor so they wouldn’t skid when you walk on them.  There are a number of adhesives, but most of them are difficult to remove afterwards when you want to see the floor again.  One person suggested I use carpet tape. But there was an even better option – double sided stick-it tape.  (I tried to find a link to the product I bought, but alas both Home Depot and Lowes .com suck when you are trying to find something like this)  Now we have comfortable bamboo flooring in the kitchen!  Good stuff…

It has been too long, but much has happened.  I'm excited to connect with old friends at the Web 2.0 Expo in SF this week.  If you are going to be there, please add a comment.

-Cheers-

Latest cool thing:  Sony Ericsson Z770i Phone

This might be a useful technique used in other variations to make a point with your audience in an upcoming presentation. Have you seen this used before?