You then wonder, “what did I use to post about?”… Your mind struggles with potential blog posts but nothing seems to be interesting enough to hit the “publish” button…

But then…

You think to yourself, “I know! A list is always an easy way to get a post out! God knows I’ve relied on them before!” So without further ado, here goes… :)

What I’ve been reading:

- The Complete Joy of Homebrewing Third Edition(my new found hobby)

- The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

- Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions(a book about what is referred to as “Behavioral Economics” ~ how Starbucks got people to start buying $4 coffees and other interesting topics about “why”)

- Just starting Anathem(already lost and I’m on the first page)

- Tons of white papers on CRM and it’s benefit in slow economies

What I’ve been doing:

- Working / traveling a lot over the last couple of months

- Volunteered at the Naper Settlement “All Hallows Eve” again (such a fun time!)

- Attended the Apple iPhone Tech Talk in Chicago

- Lost a little “green-ness” that I was known for over the last couple of years. I’m not saying anymore (in public) :)

- Decided to jump into the world of Homebrewing (hence the book selection above). Going to brew my first batch this coming weekend (a Sierra Nevada knock-off)

What I’ve been listening to:

- Ryan Adams – Cardinology

- Fleet Foxes

What I’ve been playing:

- FIFA Soccer 09 (best soccer game I’ve ever played)

- Shaun White Snowboarding (a must have if you have the Wii Fit Balance Board ~ super fun snowboarding game)

- Animal Crossing: City Folk (kind of dissapointed in this title as it’s pretty much a straight port from the Nintendo DS version ~ main benefit is the kids think it’s a cartoon when I’m playing it!) :)

- Posting is gonna be light for the next week or so. We’re going to the land of cheese, brats and beer (three of my favorites). Coincidentally, Rick Klau came up with a cool experiment for a trip the his family is going on next week. He basically created a podcast, but not in the traditional “person talking into a microphone” sense. He asked that anyone that uses del.icio.us “tag” mp3s that he should listen to on the trip with the tag, ricksipod. He then ran the feed that del.icio.us generates through Feedburner to create a “podcast”. You subscribe to the feed and anything tagged with ricksipod is automagically pulled down to your computer/iPod. Very clever and I’ve taken advantage of it. This will be the soundtrack to our trip as well. Thanks, Rick. :) (and by the way, “Soba”, which I mentioned above was one of the songs that is currently in the feed ~ although it wasn’t me who tagged it…)

- I got accepted as a member of AttentionTrust

- I got a lot of new music this week that I’ve been listening to…
= Golden Smog – “Another Fine Day”
= Thom Yorke – “The Eraser”
= Sufjan Stevens – “The Avalanche”
= Band of Horses – “Everything All The Time” (probably my favorite of the bunch, although I’ve had this before ~ just making it “legit”.  You’re welcome, RIAA.)

- Big Brain Academy for the DS has been getting most of my attention lately. With all of these brain games I’ve been playing lately, you’d think I would be uber-smart? :) Now that we have two DS’s in the house, I’m finding that it’s really fun to play head-to-head against Liz. What’s great about the DS is that with the majority of games that I have, you can play against someone but only need one copy of the game. I’m sure we’ll be making a drinking game out of head-to-head Big Brain Academy while up in Wisconsin (although, that kind of seems counter-intuitive?). :)

What I read:
- Lots of blog coverage on e3
- Started The DaVinci Code (again. I still have never finished it.)

What I did:
- Got an invite to something I’m really looking forward to. More info to come once things kick off.
- Removed several references to Technorati tags on marusin.com since they were in too many locations (and they still never work for me?)
- Started working on two other websites that may or may not “go live”. I own too many domain names that I don’t do anything with.

What I listened to:
- Gnarls Barkley, “St. Elsewhere” (Maggie’s favorite disc of the year so far)
- Pearl Jam, “Pearl Jam” (actually not too bad)
- Lots of The Decemberists

What I played:
- Not a whole lot of anything, it was a bit of a crazy week

Apology of the week:
- sorry about the post the other day that sounded like a personal ad… I was having a rough day and was having some sort of deja-vu-ish daydream. :)

Favorite links for the week:
- I already posted it this week, but the discussions going on over at GapersBlock for the most overrated and underrated restaurants in Chicago are full of so much info
- PSAs from “The Office”
- Video of me from Christmas morning several years back… :)

What I listened to:
- The Go! Team, “Thunder, Lightning, Strike”
- Broken Social Scene, “Broken Social Scene”
- Built To Spill, “Goin’ Against Your Mind” (downloaded from iTunes, don’t have link generator handy)

What I realized:
- I love pictures of bicycles inside apartments/living rooms/etc.
- The Office kind of sucked this week (don’t get me wrong ~ it was better than 99.9% of everything else)

What I played:
- Not as much stuff as I would have liked, but I scattered in some Phoenix Wright and Tetris again… Plan to fire up the 360 again this weekend.

What I hope to do next week:
- Still book that flight for Gnomedex
- Ride the scooter since the weather is starting to get warm!