Archive for the Filling the Void Category

Gentle on nature, hard on Jedi. (More great Eco-Boba pics here.)

Boba Fett was always my favorite Star Wars character.

Here’s your chance to emulate him and become a bounty hunter. Prizes go to the bold.

According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), more than 125 million cell phones are thrown away each year, which amounts to about 65,000 tons of waste. That’s just in the US.

I have four old phones sitting in a drawer because I want to recycle them but… well, it’s damn inconvenient. Most people are green only when it is more convenient, cheaper, or faster than the alternatives, plain and simple.

But what if recycling a phone were as easy as “throwing it out” in a public mailbox?

The Solution - Hunt Them Down

How do we convince companies, like LG or AT&T, to make good behavior convenient, helping us and the planet? Simple. Call them on it. Literally.

Here are the steps and bounty… Read More

Napping after lunch at the new Vang Lam preschool in Vietnam. So cute a lumberjack would cry.

Remember LitLiberation, the social media educational experiment I ran with bloggers not long ago?

With zero financing or hard costs, this new model ended up raising more than $250,000 in less than a month, more than Stephen Colbert, TechCrunch, and Engadget combined during that same period.

Hundreds and thousands of you participated and spread the word, helping thousands of children in fundamental life-altering ways.

Here is one fun new example: our first school in Vietnam has been completed and is now full of pre-schoolers! … Read More

Bestselling author David Bach used to use Flonase, Alegra D, and Singulair. He used Advair for almost ten years before he made one change that eliminated all of these medications.

He moved into a The Solaire, a green-optimized building in NYC.

Going green is something we all know we should do, but somehow most of us never quite get around to it, unless an accident or experiment shows us clear personal benefits. David moved into The Solaire for the location, for example, not the green effect.

But what if you could help the world by being self-interested? Self-interest and contribution need not be mutually exclusive, after all.

It can be done… Read More

In Sonoma: Kevin Rose and my attempt at an artsy wine photo.

Thick legs, full body, good structure. Sounds to me like a bad Match.com description. But no, it’s a cabernet sauvignon. Huh?

Alas, maybe wine just isn’t for a lad who grew up on Long Island with a rat tail.

Then again, as the soon-to-be wine demigod Gary Vaynerchuk sayeth: “Most people in the wine business are douche bags.”

Sad but true. So how do you appreciate wine without turning up your polo collar and becoming someone worthy of a slap in the face? I just came back from a weekend in Sonoma, and here are 7 tips I learned to follow after bumbling through wine for a few years in Nor-Cal… Read More

The goal is NOT inactivity. (Photo: the super smart and sexy Pinar Ozger)

Perhaps the most common question I’m asked is “what do you do all day?”

I was recently interviewed by J.D. Roth on his popular personal finance blog, and one of his readers wrote in with the following:

“I would like to know as best he can give, what Tim’s average NON-mini-retirement day entails.”

Here was my answer:

My days almost never look the same. I ask my assistants to avoid phone calls on Mondays and Fridays, in case I want to take a long weekend on either end, and I almost always allocate Mondays for general preparation and prioritizing for the week, then any administrative tasks that I need to handle (paperwork for accountants, lawyers, etc.).

I put very few things in my calendar, as I do not believe most people can do more than four hours of productive work per day at maximum, and I loathe multi-tasking. For example, my day tomorrow [Tim: this was about 14 days ago] looks like this, with items in my calendar preceded by an asterisk (*):

Read More

Michael Ellsberg invented a singles event called Eye Gazing, which took off like an addiction in NYC (“NY’s hottest dating trend” according to Elle) and has been featured in media around the world, ranging from CNN to The Guardian and others.

It is similar to speed dating but different in one fundamental respect—no speaking is permitted.

It involves looking into the eyes of each partner for 2-3 minutes at a time. If you go to such an event, as I did for the first time last Tuesday night, it becomes clear how uncomfortable most people are doing this. I don’t think it’s necessarily the best way to meet your match (and it can attract some strange people, especially in SF), but it’s a very telling social experiment.

For the next two days, test gazing into the eyes of others—whether people you pass on the street or conversational partners—until they break contact.

Here are three tips… Read More

Theobroma—“Food of the Gods”

Two weeks ago, I decided I wanted to be the real Charlie in the Chocolate Factory.

Two reasons: 1) because it seemed like fun, like when I decided to play with monkeys not long ago, and 2) because I wanted to learn the little-known art of eating and choosing chocolate, which I could then share with you. It’s a simple way to seriously upgrade your Valentine’s experience.

Since I use Scharffen Berger gourmet chocolate for most of my truffle making (70% cacao), I tracked down their most famous chocolate maker, Brad Kintzer, and convinced him to take me behind the scenes for a tasting.

Below are four video clips that explore everything from pairing with scotch and the taste trail of dark chocolate to the importance of blending cocoa beans for the perfect chocolate… Read More

V-Day street cred.

No girl for Valentine’s Day? No worries. Problem solved.

Like millions, I’m enjoying National Singles Awareness Day as Lone Ranger this year, and it bothered me at one point. But then I realized…

V-Day isn’t about Y chromosomes. It’s all about sharing the love—period.

Why not show some Fight Club-style feelings for your homies with the testosterone-rich but heart-rending “I Man Crush You” T-shirt or Hoodie? 100% of profits for all products in February go to Camp Sunshine, a retreat for children with life-threatening illnesses… Read More

Don’t be a groundhog [yes, I know this is a hedgehog, but I liked the shot]. (Photo: Anxious223)

There are a lot of rich and depressed groundhogs.

This is a critical concept, so let me introduce it with an e-mail I received from a reader and executive at a Fortune 500 company a few hours ago, edited for length:

Tim,
So I was out snowshoeing this morning and found myself completely taken in this moment thinking I was like the Snow Queen from Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale and that I was walking through the Black Forest. And I was there, at least in my mind, which, really, is all that matters. …Here’s how this is relevant to you - the problem most people are going to have with your book is that these people don’t know how to dream. I think your book is like the 2nd in a series… unless you can find moments of the sublime in whatever present moment, and unless you can dream about creating the next one, what does it really matter how much time you free up from work?

Here’s how we make this e-mail hit home for you and get you $720 in the process:

1) On a scale of 1-10, 10 being best, how life-changing or personally fulfilling have the last two weekends been?

3) How confident are you on a scale of 1-10, 10 being best, in your ability to fill 20-40 years of retirement, whether in one stretch or spread out as mini-retirements?

If your answer to 2 is affirmative, here are two worst-case scenarios… Read More

I love fast cars. Enter the Audi R8 supercar. OMFG.

I get a massive amount of e-mail — almost 300 per hour at one point during major media — which is why I outsourced my inbox in the first place to virtual assistants.

Sometimes, though, comes a snort-worthy e-mail — a zinger exciting enough to make me choke and spurt morning coffee out of my nose like a fire-breathing dragon (not recommended).

Here is one of them, received last week, from James Tate of Traction magazine:

“I’ve got a gray six-speed Audi R8 booked from the 28th through the 4th of Feb. and can do any of those dates. Any chance you’ll be in town?”

… Read More