Lifes A Banquet

Fleet of foot

Very funny biography.

Robin Bennett has a funny take on everything - having a dog with him becoming an icebreaker.
Its funny that Bennett's 2 main rules related to answering restroom calls was not what he followed when he was about six years old.
"We were still allowed to have a deep personal relationship with tarmac"
"liberally creosoted once  a year"
Arran sweater



Teasmade and Alarm clock
"our address in conversations was shifted down the road"
In the later part, you learn how the author started the sandwich business, translation business.
Business is compared to writing.
How comic's sense f timing can help in closing the sale.
simmer to boil metaphor of closing the sale.

Don't Break The Chain: 125 Charts To Help You Form New Habits and Get Things Done! 

Jerry Seinfeld has a chain habit of marking X each day after a goal and then he doesnt want to break that chain. This method can be used to not just start new habits but break down some bad habits.
When your app congratulates you on 7 day activity, it is doing the chaining and the logging for you. My exercise trigger for holidays is few hours after breakfast or before bed. I have the video chosen and I hate to close tabs without resolving them - which is reading/watching/following along. Find your likes and dislikes and use them to your advantage.

This allows Kipchoge to string together weeks and weeks of consistent training.

The Essential South Indian Cookbook: A Culinary Journey Into South Indian Cuisine and Culture 

I didnt know that you could make bisi bhele baath powder ahead of time.
Onion and Mint Pakoda sounds invigorating.
Havent heard of poppy seed kheer.

Hackel's influence on Gaudi

Art Forms in Nature: The Prints of Ernst Haeckel

Catherine Mccormack in The art of Looking Up posits that Haeckel with his "Matter is ingtegrated in thought rather than Life" influenced Antonio Gaudi's style.

The Art of Looking Up

Probably it is not easy to visit all these beautiful places in person, but one can wonder at the beauty in the world, gazing at these detailed pictures. It is almost like you can touch them and imagine being surrounded by a frieze, stain glass painting.

How poetic - the meaning of looking up and what it means to humanity - ceiling originf from caelum - sky or heaven. Next time you see surrounded open space, see the sky in it. Reminds me of the sky ceiling in Caesar Palace,Vegas. (illusory sky - quadratura from another painting)

                                         Courtesy: flickr

Salvador Dali, Palace of the Wind

Gender aspect of the forgotten women painters.

You find out about the details of the painting, the challenges faced by the painters when it came to for exa - depicting 'living water'.

'weight bearing columns modelled on the hyperbolic paraboloids of tree trunks and their branches' of Sagrada Familia. Do the trees have that pattern, so they can hold the sky?

This book opens your eyes to ceiling sin many other parts of the world - Turkey, Japan.
Didnt know that Gustav Klimt did a ceiling painting.
What better place than a library to have a ceiling painting? Sweden Metrostations.
Toluca Botanical Gardens are amazing.
You might have seen Chihuly's ceiling in Bellagio.
Mocarabes honeycomb work like stalactites and stalagmites of cave.
Havent heard of badal mahal before.

Quadro riportato

And now, you can start 'looking up to this book'.

Strong Is the New Beautiful: Embrace Your Natural Beauty, Eat Clean, and Harness Your Power

"When you commit to getting strong, you agree to go on an incredible journey that will transform you" - Lindsey Vonn

Meeting your idols can forge your future. For Lindsey Vonn, it was Picabo Street.
Vonn is lucky to have a family who recommended using her pay advance for a coach.

I like Vonn's approach to olympic medal of combing both her extreme previosuly failed approaches of taking it too easy or going too agressive.

Vonn's realization that she was trying harder and harder to get to the same place reminded me of my 2 year weight loss struggle.
The first 30 pages is a poignant story of Vonn's up and downs both in her professional skiing carer and personal life.
Have you ever balanced on a swiss ball?


Lindsey Vonn Workout playlist
scissor jumps
Tuck jumps with dumbbell
Shoulder press on a swiss ball, leg lifted
Leg curls on swiss ball
supermans with dumbbell

The Keto Guido Cookbook: Delicious Recipes to Get Healthy and Look Great

Shaved Asparagus salad with egg
All the bowls look so Zen.
Greek vegetable briam  looks awesome
Mug cake with almond flour and cocont flour
Nice picture of all ingredients of Chocolate fudge in a bowl
Vanilla cream pudding
Coconut mousse

The James and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection

Christies to offer art collection of James and Marilynn Alsdorf

On any given hike

My Heart belongs to the Peaks

How would you like hiking along the bisses? Can you imagine glacial water being used for irrigation. Alps cliff hiking.
And while there, how about some Alpine cooking?

Things That Art: A Graphic Menagerie of Enchanting Curiosity (ethnoGRAPHIC)

Each page is a graphical list of a kind.

You could take it as a challenge, to see what you would add
Things that have spots - Labrador, Braille page
Things that are not a hippo is a sort of a poem of all things hippo past.
Some introductory essays.
You see various framing and page composition styles.
Left to you, I think you would group them in different ways.
Its like the Leisure powm by W.H.Davies, a reminder to look at patterns in the deluge of things we do/feel/touch/see everyday.

Amazing Keto Casseroles

Something about a casserole is wholesome and inclusive.

Ketochillada

Many varieties of chicken casserole.

Very few ingredients.

Breakdown of calories, protein, fat, carbs.

Low Hanging Good life Habit

Good Life Habits: A Short Guide To 10 Simple Life Habits For Everyday Fulfillment

Of the many good life habits that will help you lead a happy life, working out is one of them with immense benefits.
In the past couple of days, due to weakness from sore throat, I couldnt workout and missed it a lot. Back to form, not totally, but I was able to do 30 min full body workout with weights. Its always fun knowing the names of the moves you do in various exercises. If you do Insanity workout by shaun T, you will be familiar with the stretch where you bend your body forawad and then back up. It is a standing cat cow stretch.
I always find it amazing that the fitness instructors can smile and talk while they are doing the exercises. With an inspiring fighter like Jill Brown, you would find that working out at your home, in comfort is a low hanging fruit.

Learning a new language

Fluent Forever: How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It

In Life reimagined, author Barbara Haggerty says, "There is no obvious reason that a mouse should be called souris in French". As a word/literature/language lover, I wondered if Latin would solve the problem. Going to roots, makes words more familiar.

How to Make It Stick

Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning 

"More complex and durable learning come from self-testing, introducing certain difficulties in practice, waiting to re-study new material until a little forgetting has set in, and interleaving the practice of one skill or topic with another." - Peter Brown and authors

Are you expressing the core of who you are?

"The people who seem happiest are the people who feel like they're able to express aspects of themselves that feel vital to them, that make them feel alive. It's not any particular path you have to take, its being able to express the core of who you are" - Robert J Waldinger