Little Jigsaw Bits Make You SuperBetter! #FridayRecommends #MonthlyUpdate

It’s not only the first day of the new year, it’s the first of the month, and that means a new Hot Flash on the Hot Flashes page. I’ve been writing one a month since 2002, and they’re all here on the blog, available from the Hot Flashes page. You’re welcome.

Friday RecommendsNow for the week’s recommends.

My dear friend and frequent commenter, author A.C.Flory (aka Meeka) turned me on to this online jigsaw puzzle site, and I’ve been delighting in it. It’s called Jigsaw Planet. You can pick your puzzle, or even make your own. This one evil puzzle only had flat edges, which made it MUCH harder to solve! I loved that one! lol

LittleBits. What can I say about littleBits? I just found out about it, but it began in 2008 and the company was founded in 2011 by a woman, who wanted to make invention fun and easy and accessible. She succeeded. It’s open source and modular. You hook up a power source, like a battery, then hook together the … well … little bits to make circuits that Do Things. This Wiki tells all about it. It is too totally awesome! I have to see if my younger grandkids have any. If not, I need to get them some. If so, I need to go play!

And also: Here is SuperBetter or how to live Gamefully. How awesome is that? Way, that’s how! Imma totally download the app so I can carry it on my phone, but it looks like a person could play online, too. Since one of my goals is to move more, the phone is a better tool for me than the laptop. This, too, was invented by a woman — a game designer. It’s a game structure to help you achieve and overcome, from the minute to the major. Here is the inventor, Jane McGonigal (great name!!) explaining it in a TED talk. She claims that playing this game will give me 10 extra years of life. There are days when that’s a plus, and days when it’s a drawback, but maybe playing the game will make it a full win. I may even apply the game to writing goals. I’ll let you know how that works out.

So happy 2016, and let’s all have a super better year, little bits, and may all our puzzles be solvable.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character solves a puzzle with the aid of good friends.

MA

About

I was born in Louisville, Kentucky, but now live in the woods in southern Indiana. Though I only write fiction, I love to read non-fiction. The more I learn about this world, the more fantastic I see it is.

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One thought on “Little Jigsaw Bits Make You SuperBetter! #FridayRecommends #MonthlyUpdate

  1. Jane

    January 1, 2016 at 10:29am

    Super interesting assortment of stuff today! Thanks.

    Permalink  ⋅ Reply

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