Sound therapists and stress specialists worked with the band Marconi Union to develop “Weightless”, the most relaxing song ever:

Weightless works by using specific rhythms, tones, frequencies and intervals to relax the listener. A continuous rhythm of 60 BPM causes the brainwaves and heart rate to synchronise with the rhythm: a process known as ‘entrainment’. Low underlying bass tones relax the listener and a low whooshing sound with a trance-like quality takes the listener into an even deeper state of calm.

Dr David Lewis, one of the UK’s leading stress specialists said: “‘Weightless’ induced the greatest relaxation – higher than any of the other music tested. Brain imaging studies have shown that music works at a very deep level within the brain, stimulating not only those regions responsible for processing sound but also ones associated with emotions.” [...]

The top 10 most relaxing tunes were: 1. Marconi Union – Weightless 2. Airstream – Electra 3. DJ Shah – Mellomaniac (Chill Out Mix) 4. Enya – Watermark 5. Coldplay – Strawberry Swing 6. Barcelona – Please Don’t Go 7. All Saints – Pure Shores 8. AdelevSomeone Like You 9. Mozart – Canzonetta Sull’aria 10. Cafe Del Mar – We Can Fly

Would you add any songs to this list?

via Scientists Develop the Most Relaxing Tune.

For women it’s easy to pick a costume – as long as you look cute, who cares what statement you make. For me, a Halloween costume is an excuse to either spend the entire party explaining what I am supposed to be, looking stupid, or having fun. I prefer to have fun. So I’ve narrowed it down to these:

Or I just go as my favorite politician – the original party animal himself.

What do you think?

I’m sad sitting here reading about the passing of Steve Jobs, who I never personally met. This sadness, is probably a simular feeling that others have had throughout history whenever a strong leader and visionary has passed, leaving us in a worried wonder of what if, and what might have been.

In retrospect, everything is obvious. But we fail to recognize that it is genius that makes it obvious. It took Isaac Newton to make gravity obvious after thousands of years of ignorance, same with Einstein, same with Jefferson and Adams, same with many countless others, less famous, but who all shared something in common – they refused to settle for the accepted answer. They chose to prove to themselves and to the world one basic truth: that we live in a world of our own making.

If you do not like something, it is within your power to change it. Right now you can change it. It does not require an act of congress, no government grant, it just requires you, rolling up your sleeves and doing the work. A loose board, a creaky floor, an inefficient process at work, a single missing pixel in the website your designing, a new world – design it, build it! It takes genius to make the obvious more, well “obvious” – but that genius is 100% human and its a crown any one of us can wear. I will miss Steve Jobs.

Ok – so I don’t normally use my blog as a platform to ask questions, but I got stuck tonight and want to see if the internet can help. I am trying to add a custom tool pane option in Sharepoint 2010. I have created a copy of of the Content Query Web Part and need to add a custom tool pane options (and then reference them in xsl) Anyone have any resources you could point me to..or any one with a deep understanding of this who would you like to earn some consulting cash helping us out for a couple of hours tomorrow?

Help me internet. Thanks.

I work with a lot of browser windows and other documents. It used to be a nice feature (in Mac OS X Leopard) to click and hold an icon to see all the windows of that type in an expose style view. To get the same view now, I had to first – google for the answer, then read through a forum, then learn to double click with 2 fingers. At this point it is starting to feel like I’m learning sign language. I don’t think you can justify this “natural”.

Suggestion. If we think of the icon as a stack of things of that type: a stack of browsers – then the natural thing to “scatter them across the desk to look at them” would be a click and toss movement. Click the icon and lightly toss it upward to see the windows.

As for the natural scrolling…pushing the page versus “scrolling” the page. It will take a while to adapt to that. I decided to wait a week before having an opinion. But when I went into the Apple store this weekend to pick up my new laptop, I literally thought the mice we upside down at first.

But after the first full day, I’m still finding it very hard to adapt.