If

f you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!


via Tim Ferris’ 5-bullet Friday

Beanie knitting

Tubular cast-on 2×2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXKXPbM3BSE

Measure yarn tail: I only need about 2.5 times of 1/3 of the stitches.
Cast-on a multiple of 4 without a knot (with 6.5mm needles). First stitch is always a purl, which means that you end with a knit stitch. Ending the first row is tricky, make sure to watch the video. It involves twisting the work clockwise to secure the stitch.

First tubular row:
Slip first stitch purl-wise with yarn in front (also tricky, please watch the video). Then bring yarn back and knit the knit stitch through back loop. This only needs to be done on the first tubular row. She recommends that the last knit stitch be knit through the front loop, but I think I prefer through the back loop.

Join in a circle with all the cast-on stitches facing the inside of the circle and the working yarn on the right needle.

The first stitch is now a purl stitch. So work only the purl stitches with yarn in front of the needle and slip the knit stitches purl-wise with yarn behind. Make sure to tighten the working yarn for the first few stitches (very important). Simply slip the last knit stitch with the yarn behind. This is the end of the second tubular row.

Switch “right needle” to 6.75mm needles. Watch the video to see how she switches the stitches especially how to return the purl stitch to the needle (timestamp 17:00mins). Switch the stitches by inserting the right needle from left to right onto the second stitch of the left needle. She returns the purl stitch by slipping the left needle from right to left, kinda “untwisting” it, it was twisted during the switch. And only the switched knit stitch is knit through the back loop.

Mental models

Mental models

6. Velocity
Velocity is not equivalent to speed; the two are sometimes confused. Velocity is speed plus vector: how fast something gets somewhere. An object that moves two steps forward and then two steps back has moved at a certain speed but shows no velocity. The addition of the vector, that critical distinction, is what we should consider in practical life..

Re-reading

Sick in bed and (oh well) getting a chance to reread some books, courtesy of libby. Some books need to be re-read over and over again:

Naval’s Almanack

4000 weeks

Consolations of Philosophy

The minimalists

Incognito

Whining

Mostly a half-arse reader. I don’t read from cover to cover or even bother with books at all. I just go to goodreads, get to the juicy quotes and consider it done. Here are some from Silvia Hartmann.

“It is the hardest thing of all, the one thing that will show if you have the one true courage. To know that you have failed, that your best efforts have been defeated, to not be able to stand it, to not be able to go on and yet to go on nonetheless.” 

“One should not confuse creativity with whining.”

But I might be looking for yet another quote.