Andre Alforque

Dear Alexis, The past year you have experienced an immense amount of mental growth. From speech to emotions, you have been inundated with many difficult situations. For me, it's a harsh reminder of the black-and-white views of my own past, and the difficulty (near impossibility) to instigate change in people. On the optimistic side: as parents we learn and employ varying tactics to help you gain empathy, and for you to learn to keep an open mind in this seemingly unfair world set against your joy and happiness.  Regardless of how you act/react, I always love you. At times you have bent me beyond my personal breaking point. Looking back it's difficult to understand the exact factors both within and outside my control leading to that point. But because it's you, I must find ways to deal with it and move on. There's no giving up. I must have pliability both with my memory and my emotions. Despite the absurdity of your stubbornness and your demands, we still need to...

To Senator Dick Durbin, Senator Mark Kirk, and Representative Mike Quigley, In light of US Attorney General investigations into Chicago PD, I want to know what is being done to protect both the rights of citizens and the lives of our law enforcement personnel? How do we balance the 1% of criminals ruining the every day lives of the 99%? It's understanding that this is a difficult question but changes must be made towards progress in the United States. As a constituent I urge that we work in small strides towards the ultimate goal of eliminating private ownership of firearms. RE: http://artandeverythingafter.com/i-fit-the-description/ Similar incident happened to a friend that was riding a motorcycle. What's worse: his incident included a helicopter with night sun, and a taste of pavement as an officer dug a knee into his back to detain him. As they left the officer muttered, "you fit the description of someone fleeing police on a Ninja motorcycle." He was riding...

Quick book review:  http://amzn.com/038534645X This book inspires me to be a better Scrum Master for the team. It provides solid advice to incrementally improve not only our team performance but also my personal skills. Biggest takeaways: Work as a team in an honest, safe environment. Find weaknesses of the process to solve missed deadlines, poor performance, or large amounts of technical debt. Always improve or evolve, never be complacent with status quo. Pros: Great anecdotes regarding Scrum origins, and also successful transformations from waterfall into Scrum. Sutherland discusses common struggles of implementation, and prescribes fairly simple cures. Cons: Overly optimistic view with little to no stumbling once Scrum is in place. Very few concrete demonstrations of blocker removal in a software development environment. Large assumption that Scrum implemented across entire organization.

It's difficult to reflect on the past year. Many aspects remain in flux. I minimized my belongings by releasing all cycling equipment. I left Tribune Company into an unknown world of contracting. I picked up golf, again. I acquired technology that exponentially improved productivity and quality. Yet with all these changes I feel more distant from family and friends, and more disconnected from reality.

As an amateur photographer, why are there so few pictures of my daughter? The simple answer is time.

Parenting has a way of motivating (scaring) you into openness and learning: growth. Even with the head start of nieces and a nephew, there are aspects of parenting never discussed that emerge; mainly: the relationship with your partner. While the barrage of emotions is not new, the mad pace at which these emotions arrive felt like being a child all over again. Especially since we both were dealing with situations completely foreign. My biggest misconception? The amount of control I would have over any situation. All it takes is one fever to feel immensely powerless and useless. For panic to take over. For target fixation to narrow my view on only one symptom: the temperature reading. And even little decisions have me reeling because of their novelty. When do we change diaper size? What solid foods should we feed her? Which stroller should we buy? What should she wear today? Does she need heavier layers of clothing? Will she be too hot? Where can I get diapers and wipes the cheapest...

- Assess influence - 1%, 5%, 10%... - complete UT Project Charter - set expectations - learning experience - hypothesize personas - traits - behaviors - goals - Recruit - build rapport - determine likeness to personas - Interview - continue rapport - discover - Analysis - Brainwriting (written, silent) not brainstorming (vocal) - grouping - QUICKLY CURB TALK AND IDEAS ABOUT SOLUTIONS - Presentation - tell a story - back the story up with data Influences Google's Usability Lab Usability Testing. Oh, The Things You Can Learn . By Jared Spool Usability Guidelines UIE Variants UIE Dissect Failures Farnam Street Blog: Mental Models Dana Chisnell interview by Tomer Sharon Richard Feynman interview Mike Elgan: Group Think Kills Creativity various other sources