Start the Weekend Right Link Series – Volume #2, Edition #1
5 Things I Wish I Knew Before College, Be Great Daily
One of my younger fraternity alumni started a blog focused on personal development, motivation, and inspiration. He wrote an entry that caught my eye because of its timeliness. With colleges across the nation kicking back into session either this past week or this coming week, I thought that now was the perfect time to share this entry. What are the 5 things that you wish you knew before college?

What If?, Danger & Play
Mike at Danger & Play has some of the best content on the web for men of all ages. This particular entry poses the question – what if? In this short, but thought-provoking read, Mike asks a lot of great “what if” questions. My favorite one was, “What if you live your life with a sense of urgency and purpose?” More people need to live life with a better sense of urgency. The time is now, people!

Great Leadership Isn’t About You, Harvard Business Review
This one is a little bit longer, but it really hits home on one of the core characteristics of great leadership. The article suggests that great leadership is about inspiring your followers to “share your enthusiasm for pursuing a shared ideal, objective, cause, or mission.” Amen! As the title of the article states – great leadership is not about YOU!

The English Major Has Lost Its Way, John William Pope Center
Keeping with the earlier theme of “back to school,” this is an entry about how the English major has lost its way in higher education. My undergraduate degree is in English, but I always knew that English couldn’t be the end of the road. In my graduate studies I opted to get a degree in Public Policy along with two different certifications – one in Public Relations and another in Curriculum Studies. You have to be diversified if you’re an English major. The third to last paragraph of the linked commentary gives a concrete suggestion to improve the English major curriculum, and I agree with the writer.

What’s Wrong With Comcast?, The Atlantic
We all remember listening a few months ago as a customer tried to cancel his service with Comcast and the telephone rep for the cable giant refused to let him do so until the bitter end. It was the very definition of a public relations nightmare for Comcast. In the wake of the call being released, some folks began interviewing current and former Comcast employees to try to figure out what the problem is over there. This article sums up their largest problem – a company that is built on a fragmented structure. Not a good situation to be in. Not good at all.

Building a Better Teacher: An Interview with Elizabeth Green, EdWeek
Normally, I’d stay far away from posting links that direct people to articles on education-based websites. The unfortunate truth is that the public education industry is inundated with extremists and ideologues who are intellectually dishonest and blatantly lie to disgrace the people they assume to be their opposition. And most public school teachers are brainwashed by the propaganda organizations that they call “unions” (particularly here in New Jersey) so it makes having an intelligent conversations virtually impossible. This interview, however, is with an author who wrote a book about which teaching methods work in a charter school in Newark. Incidentally, this charter schools is also one of my clients, so I’m extra interested in their success. In fact, I’m so interested that I’m actually going to buy a physical copy of this book (who buys physical books any more?!) to see what the author has to say.

How Anthony the Developer Lost Over 200 Lbs… In One Year, Nerd Fitness
Sometimes, I’ll spend an hour or so reading through different motivational websites focused on realistic approaches to the world. Many years ago, though, I stopped reading blogs focused on the primary writer’s weight loss journey. Those blogs are a dime a dozen out there, but their abundance doesn’t bother me. I’m bothered by the “if I can do it, YOU can do it!” bullshit that accompanies most of these weight loss journeys. No, idiot. Your readers’ lives are different than your lives. They can’t do exactly what you did because they’re NOT you. A few years ago there was a semi-famous blog written by a guy who lost 125 pounds by counting calories and starting to work out. Big surprise he lost weight, right? And then after he stopped counting calories and working out? He gained 70 pounds back. Now he justifies gaining the weight back as being healthy. Amazing. The article linked here is NOT that website nor is it that guy’s story! This article is from a fun fitness website called Nerd Fitness and it talks about a guy who lost 200 pounds. I’m not suggesting you get inspired from what this guy did because he’s not you. However, looking at the pictures is pretty dramatic and eye-opening.

The Necktie, Doghouse Diaries
One thing I hate about working in an office is that I often have to wear a necktie. I liked the comic that I’m linking here so much that I pinned it to my office wall. Stupid neckties…

‘Six Californias’ Plan May Make 2016 Ballot, USA Today
This article may not be as recent as some of the others linked above, but it is certainly relevant. Particularly in our country, where we’re finally beginning to have a national dialogue about whether a two-party system works best for American and what elements are in place that keep the two-headed monster firmly in control of American politics. The map in this article shows how the state of California could (and should) be broken into six different states.

9 Striking Library Posters from the Great Depression, BOOK RIOT
If you made it down this far, then you already know that I was an English major back in college. You may have surmised from that information that I enjoy reading – which would be correct. One of the book-focused websites that I follow is BOOK RIOT, though not all of their content is focused on book reviews. Take, for example, the entry linked here. This is a post listing nine different library posters from the time of the Great Depression. I don’t know why, but I appreciated these posters – they were fun to look at for a few minutes. I hope you enjoy them!

Personal Life
The biggest event in my personal life this year occurred this past summer when my younger brother broke his neck and nearly killed himself. He broke his neck by overshooting a landing while riding a BMX bike over a jump in a wooded area near his house. My younger brother went over his handlebars and landed directly on his head (with no helmet). In what is honestly a graceful gift from God, he didn’t die in the accident – he didn’t even become a quadriplegic or even a paraplegic. In fact, as of about a month ago he has regained most of his range of motion.

My family shared some pretty mentally draining moments leading up to the series of surgeries that put my younger brother’s neck back together again. I think that my younger brother believes that the rest of us in the family want him to stop riding his bike and give up on the whole pastime of being an amateur BMX rider. That’s not true. What we do hope for, though, is that he understands how each action (and inaction) that he takes has a direct impact not just on himself, but on his family and friends and those who love him. And, hopefully, with that fundamental level of understanding as a base, he might ultimately figure out that as we get older at some point we stop doing the things that thrilled us when we were younger because there are more people relying on us as adults than as children.

Financial & Economic Review
This one’s pretty easy, right? The biggest thing that happened in my financial life in 2013 was finally repaying all of my student loan debt. As I noted in the entry linked above, before my student debt was repaid this past August I was paying an average of $2,500 per month in an effort to accelerate getting rid of these loans. A few weeks ago I was talking to a friend of mine about his student loan debt and I commented to him that I hadn’t really started to reap the accumulative financial benefits of no longer making these payments. In other words, that $2,500 in extra money that I should have been realizing each month didn’t seem to be in my budget. Well, after some quick analysis it turns out that I was depriving and starving other areas of my financial life such that the extra money I should have seen in my account each month had to be immediately spent on other items (ranging from charitable commitments, professional development commitments, a busted laptop, and regular annual costs).

Now that those payments and commitments are complete I expect to see an immediate impact in my monthly budget. In fact, I began to see that impact during the second half of this month. And I’m confident enough in that increase that I’ve already automated certain funds to be extracted from my checking account and placed into my Capital One 360 (formerly ING Direct) account beginning in January 2013. If you know anything about Capital One 360, then you know that you can set up multiple savings accounts within your master savings account. The different accounts that I’ll either begin bolstering or funding for the first time in January 2014 include my master savings account, an account focused on paying the additional taxes that I usually owe each April, another account focused on setting money aside to purchase a home, and an account that is focused on saving up for a down payment whenever I need to buy a new car. One of the things that I’ve learned in life is that you need a reliable set of wheels, so even though I’m driving around a relatively brand new 2012 Ford Escape, I’ve been saving for my next car since I bought this one. Reliable transportation from Point A to Point B is critical.

The Business World
There were two major events in my business world this year. The first was Superstorm Sandy hitting New Jersey in October 2012. And yes, I know that October 2012 took place last year, but the aftermath of the storm had me helping to lead a new effort at my company that took me all over the state promoting my company’s new disaster recovery product.

On a personal, entrepreneurial-level the biggest thing in my world in 2013 was the founding and re-opening of a fraternity apparel company with one of my younger alumni from Monmouth University. We’ve spent the better part of 2013 re-establishing the brand and getting it back into the minds of the 130 chapters of our fraternity around the nation. And in just the last week alone we commissioned a new designer to create two designs for us to kickoff 2014 with a bang. I’ve seen one of those designs and it’s absolutely outstanding. The second one should be completed soon and I expect that it’ll be absolutely outstanding. Also in 2013, we began a very small brand extension by beginning to print high quality apparel for local groups.

Start the Weekend Right Link Series – Volume #1, Edition #6
Christmas Songology Winner: The Best Christmas Song Ever is…, Busted Halo
One of the radio shows that I listen to on The Catholic Channel on Sirius XM is the Busted Halo Show. The show has a companion website that is much broader and covers a larger cross-section of how pop culture interacts with our Roman Catholic faith. Well, they hosted a “Best Christmas Song Ever” contest and I couldn’t agree more with the song they selected and who they chose as the optimal performer for the song.

Is an MBA Bubble Popping?, The Atlantic
Just like the recent media ]negativity around the glut of young lawyers who can’t find a job, it looks like we might be heading for a glut of MBAs out there who aren’t earning what they once might have earned. After working part-time in higher education for the last 7+ years, I can’t say that I disagree with the point that this author is making.

The Library Designed Like a Bookstore, Book Riot
One of the many new, great blogs that I started following this year is Book Riot. They have a lot of great content for folks who love literature like me. One of the articles from the last few weeks that really piqued my interest was this short photo essay about a library in The Netherlands that was built to look and feel like a bookstore. Check it out – it’s pretty cool!

An Epidemic Of Thirsty Men Is Making It Harder To Get Laid, Roosh V
If there’s one thing that pisses me off about modern man it’s that many of them are systemically weak. In other words, there are guys out there who put their manhood aside and desperately chase any female with a heartbeat in an attempt to create what they think is a sincere feeling of interest and intimacy. They’re wrong on so many levels that it’s hard to write about any one of their ridiculous actions here… luckily, you can read this entry from Roosh V about some of the pathetic moves from these thirsty guys.

7 year-end tax tips to keep Uncle Sam out of your wallet, Get Rich Slowly
With the end of the tax year coming in a few days, we should all be doing what we can to lower our total taxable income. For my part, I’ll be hiring a new accountant and giving him my collected insanity of a tax return to file in April 2014. Should be fun… for him!

Cut the cord: New HD antennas bring your monthly TV bill back to $0, Christian Science Monitor
Admittedly, I haven’t read this article yet, but it’s something that I’m very interested in learning more about. The cost of cable television is outrageous. I have hundreds of channels that I don’t watch and I shouldn’t be forced to pay for them because they’re part of a bundle or a package. A few years ago, Senator John McCain was pushing some legislation to decouple all of these channels and allow consumers to select and choose the channels that they wanted to pay for on their plan. I wonder why we’re not there yet?

The Case for Supporting Other Small Businesses, Inc.com
As the owner of two small businesses, I wholeheartedly agree with the point that Janine Popick makes in this article. Small businesses should be supporting one another and I try to do that as much as possible with my small business purchases. This is a good, quick read – so give it a shot.

10 things we’ve learned about fat, The Week
Like most folks out there I enjoy reading about the latest health studies around the major topics of the day. In this case, The Week has compiled a list of the ten things that we – as a society – have learned about fat. They provide links to the different studies that prove each of the ten points – it’s an interesting read.

Learn Your Target Net Worth Multiples to Guide Your Savings Plan, Lifehacker
This is a great article and the best part about it is the graphic at the top. It’s a quick, easy guide to how much your net worth has to be after a certain number of years in the workforce. It also shows what your net worth should be at different ages. It’s an interesting read, but somewhat technical once you click over to Financial Samurai so give yourself some time to review and re-read.

Can Wii Go On Without U?, Game|Life
This is one of the articles I read that informed my post from a week and a half ago about how to fix the blunder that the Wii U has become. This link leads to a few brief paragraphs and then to a podcast if you’re interested in hearing a discussion about this topic.