After work, put some sunglasses on, sit in your parked guy near the side of the road and point a hair dryer at passing cars.  See if they slow down.

Page yourself over an intercom at work, but don’t disguise your voice.

The next time someone asks you to do something, ask them if they’d like fries with that.

Put your garbage can on your desk and label it “IN.”

Put decaf in the coffee maker for three weeks.  Once everyone has overcome their coffee addictions, switch to espresso.

If the notes field on all your checks, write “For Smuggling Diamonds.”

Finish all your sentences with “in accordance with the Prophecy.”

Don t use any punctuation

At random times, start skipping instead of walking.

Order a diet water with a serious face whenever you go out to dinner.

The next time you’re at a fast-food drive-through, specify that the order is “to go.”

Sing along at the opera.

Go to a poetry reading and keep asking why the poems don’t rhyme.

Put mosquito netting around your work area and play tropical sounds all day long.

Five days in advance of the next party you’re invited to, tell your friends you can’t attend because you’re not in the mood.

Ask that your friends and co-workers to address you by your wrestling name, Rock Bottom.

The next time you get some cash at the ATM, scream “I won, I won!”

When leaving the zoo, start running toward the parking lot yelling “Run for your lives, they’re loose!”

Tell your children over dinner: “Due to the economy, and I’m really sorry, but we’re going to have to let one of you go.”

Send a link to this page to give someone a smile today.

Popularity: 6% [?]

Books are a big deal to me. Not only do I read for enjoyment, but I find that the bulk of my own self-education and lifelong learning comes from books.

What do books mean to you, and have you read anything great in 2006 that changed your life or made a difference in some aspect of it?

For me, 2006 was a big year that I got back into historical fiction. I especially like good yarns about 20th-century Europe and am a real sucker for anything to do with things that happen to real people during World War II (not the battle stuff, just real, gritty in-your-face life as a citizen during that grizzly era).

So, it was an incredible thrill for me to have discovered William Boyd. While all of his novels aren’t about Europe (one of my favorites is actually A Good Man in Africa, about a mid-level diplomat in an out-of-the-way African country in the early post-colonial period), my favorite Boyd is — Any Human Heart.

If you love great fiction, good story lines, and sweeping 20th century stuff, this is a great place to start. I’ve put Any Human Heart into my Top 5er list.

Over and out,

Michael Werner

Popularity: 14% [?]

I’m a pretty serious, and often intense, reader.

Sometimes I think it’s almost a disease — this fascination with all things books, writing, and publishing.  I’m that guy you see who picks up a magazine (on any topic!) while standing in the checkout line . . . just to have something to read.  I’ll read the backs of laundry pick-up slips while waiting in a drop-off line or the “How To Prepare Your Package for International Shipment” poster while in the post-office queue.

I read fiction (historical fiction, mostly European-related, mysteries, espionage, and literature) and non-fiction (business, how-to, current events) alike.

So, yeah, I read a lot, but I also go in spurts.

I can read three books in three days and then not read anything for a month.

But, when I get the hunger and just gotta have a new book in front of me, I can get pretty desperate.  I’ll walk around the bookstore for an hour or two and, if nothing seems to hit me, I’ll prowl the library . . . if nothing still works, I can get pretty kick-the-dog kind of edgy.

I’d recently been going through one of these can’t-find-a-book-to-save-my-life phases, when an author’s name jumped out at me from the Borders’ bookshelf — the writer is William Boyd and he can, quite simply, write the pants off of just about anyone else.  I’d kind of forgotten about him (having not read any of his stuff for a couple of years), but I almost wet my pants when I realized he has a new book out.

So, really, if you like great fiction — I wouldn’t really classify his stuff as historical fiction, but he does do sweeping across the 20th-century-Euro-themes a lot — grab this guy’s stuff.

His newest book (great, but not my favorite) is Restless, a two-in-one story about a daughter and a mother who’s not all she appears to be.  Great writing, great story line (contemporary and pre-WWII Europe), and just a fine piece of storytelling.

And, if you’re intrigued with this writer, know that his Any Human Heart is definitely a Top5er in my book, and might even be the single best thing I’ve read in the last 10 years.

Not far behind Any Human Heart is The New Confessions, which is also on my Top5er list.

All William Boyd stuff is really worth spending some time with.

Fortunately, I’ve recently (well, what took me so long, I don’t know!) developed a system whereby I stock up with books so that I’ll always have something on the shelf in my times of need.  The shelf is bulging with a pile-o-goodies right now, so I’m a smiling-and-reading fool at the moment.

Popularity: 19% [?]

As the first entry in my Don’t Read This category, I wanted to bring you my latest coffee discovery.

[Note:  Don’t Read This entries have absolutely nothing to do with dream jobs, motivation, or success.  They’re simply my way of designating posts that I find interesting and which you may as well.  If you’re here just for the goods, please ignore this and any future Don’t Read This articles.]

Okay, so back to the find . . .

I’m a coffee freak — mostly in the strong, black, and fresh fashion.  Most of all I’m a coffee-shop fan.  I like to work in coffee shops and watch people.

I do like the Starbucks chain, but only for their espresso drinks — latte, for example.

At home, for my coffee ritual, I’ve just discovered soy milk and now offer you my latest recipe, which I refer to as The Poor Man’s Latte and Damned-Good Substitute for a Bucks:

Step 1.  Fill a mug up with cold chocolate soy milk.  I prefer Silk Light, but substitute whatever soy milk you’re used to.  (If you’re a cow’s milk drinker, I urge you not to turn your nose up at this — I wasn’t much for soy milk either, but then, I hadn’t tried it until just recently.)

Step 2.  Drink about 2/3rds of it — cold.  It’s just too good and you need it to get the saliva glands working properly.

Step 3.  Microwave the remainder for approximately 40 seconds till near boiling (your microwave may vary).

Step 4.  Remove mug from microwave and pour in hot black coffee (I usually go with a 50/50 caffeine, decaf blend) to the brim.

Step 5.  Find a quiet spot, start sippin’, and say yum yum.

By the way, if you’re interested in the success story of Starbucks and the rags-to-riches story of its chief mover-and-shaker, Howard Schultz, you may want to find a copy of Pour Your Heart Into It, a pretty decent yarn and a good study of how to run a retail operation with passion.  Mr. Schultz knows his stuff.

Check ‘er out.

And, if you have a coffee treat you’d like to share, please respond here.

Now going back to my Poor Man’s Latte.

Popularity: 12% [?]