June 20, 2023 - Uglies, Mesmerica, Notion, Canadians

Hello friends! Hope you had a great double holiday weekend. Let's do this!

Nuggets of Information: This Newsletter is Going to the Dogs 

June 20 is National Ugly Dog Day in the United States. Each year, the World's Ugliest Dog contest is held at the Sonoma-Marin Fairgrounds Event Center in Petaluma, California. On their website, they explain the contest “celebrates the imperfections that make all dogs special and unique.”  

Pictured above is 2022’s winner, Mr. Happy Face, a hairless Chinese crested-Chihuahua mix. Who’s a good boy? 

Enrichment: We're Seeing Miss America? 

For Father’s Day, Lisa and the girls surprised me with a trip to the Fernbank Science Center to see James Hood’s Mesmerica 360. As we lay back in our seats in the planetarium, the lights dimmed, and the entire dome filled with incredible images while Hood’s music started playing. Hood is a composer and percussionist, who played drums in The Pretenders, and was the mastermind of the visionary ambient/electronica act Moodswings.  

The 45-minute show was a flowing set of transitions from colorful mandalas to weird fractals to trippy kaleidoscopic images. Hood’s narrations at the beginning and end focused on helping the viewer look inward, reflect, and release themselves into the world he has created.  

From the Mesmerica website: 

Mesmerica is a visual music journey that brings the mesmerizing music of Grammy-nominated composer and percussionist James Hood together with visually-hypnotic, 3D animated art curated from artists around the world, creating an immersive experience designed to transcend time, relax, soothe, and stimulate your mind and senses... 

“I want 'Mesmerica' to inspire you into taking a journey with me inside the mind, to engage your senses and feelings with a miraculous alchemy of sound and light!” 

- James Hood, Show Creator 

As someone who thinks the pre-movie roller coaster that flies through popcorn and sodas is mind-bending, I found Mesmerica 360 utterly fascinating, relaxing, and transformative. It is only in Atlanta one more weekend – so if you can go on Saturday, I encourage you to. It is also playing limited engagements in Texas, California, Florida and Washington. Check out the Mesmerica website for more details.  

Workshop: Where Did I Leave that Second Brain of Mine? 

In the May 16, 2023 issue of Boo’s N.E.W.S., I discussed Tiago Forte’s concept of building a “Second Brain” and the PARA method. I mentioned the tool I use – Notion – and promised to give more information on it. As a newsletter writer, I use Notion as my Second Brain to keep track of ideas, collect information, and organize my writing process. Notion is a powerful tool that allows me to create different types of pages for different projects, whether I'm working on a new issue of my newsletter, planning a project or working on my website.

I have been a OneNote fan for years, and still use it for some basic list and content management. But the power of Notion has caused me to let OneNote gather dust. It is just so powerful and customizable. 

One of the things I find particularly helpful about using Notion as my Second Brain is that I can use it to collect information from a variety of sources. For example, I can gather notes and research from websites, YouTube videos, and other online resources, all in one place. This makes it easy for me to access the information I need when I'm ready to write. This is accomplished via their web clipper – available as both browser and mobile plugins.  

Notion is free to use, with additional capabilities available for a fee. Notion offers a wide range of templates that you can use to get started with your organization and productivity, including templates for project management, note-taking, and personal finance. They even offer AI capabilities, which I’m just starting to play around with. That is a premium feature, at $10 a month, but you can try it 20 times for free.  

If you're interested in trying out Notion, you can sign up for free at notion.so. Once you've created an account, you can start exploring the different features and tools that Notion offers. I’m not an expert yet, but if you start playing around with it, and have questions, let me know! 

Overall, I highly recommend giving Notion a try. It has been a game-changer for my productivity and organization. There are tons of YouTube videos that explain every feature of Notion. In addition to the videos from Tiago Forte, I recommend the “Thomas Frank Explains” channel.  

Selected Content: It’s in the Hole! 

In case you didn’t hear about it, PGA tour pro Nick Taylor won the RBC Canadian Open on Sunday June 11^th. Why is this newsworthy? Well – Nick is from Canada, and the last time a Canadian won this tournament was 69 years ago. But it is how he did it that is truly wonderful. After the end of the round Sunday, Nick and Tommy Fleetwood were tied, and they went on to a sudden-death playoff. They played the 18^th hole – and tied. So they played it again – and tied again. They then played the 9^th hole, and tied yet again. On their fourth playoff hole, back at the 18^th, Nick sinks a 72-foot putt to win – the longest putt he had made in his entire PGA career. I was watching it on TV, and the excitement in the crowd was incredible. Nicely done Nick!