After Improvised Life’s part-time editorial assistant Mira Keras had a health challenge that lasted months, causing extended leave from her two steady gigs, her laptop broke. It happened just as she was feeling well enough to return to virtual work at Improvised Life AND when her emergency-slammed finances were at an all-time low. She told me about…
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When visual artist and poet Jen Bervin learned that researchers were experimenting with nano-printed silk medical sensors for patients monitoring serious health conditions, she wondered, If I were to have a silk sensor embedded under MY skin, what would I want it to say? The story of her exploration and the results are astonishing and deeply heartening.
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We were thrilled to find an email from paper artist Matthew Sporzynski, aka Couturier de Cardboard (whose work we’ve featured in the past), that said simply XO from W23! with photos of his a la minute improvisation: a tablet stand. Of course, we asked for details:
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As kids we loved old-fashioned vending machines that would drop a little plastic container holding a treasure — a ring, miniature toy, or candy — through the shoot when we put in a dime or a quarter. Lately, various iterations of poetry vending machines have been coming to our attention, perfect for our adult selves. Imagine…
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We’ve tried numerous day/task planners in our quest for one that really works. We recently came across a graphical way to plan time that claims to liberate us from linear agendas and apps. The GutenTag Method features a clock face that you stamp into a notebook so you can graph you day around it. We found downsides and wonderful benefits once we started hacking the idea.
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Another utterly simple, surprising, transformative use of technology from digital product designer and consultant Bryan Landers:
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The other day I bought a new Apple iPhone 6S. Its remarkable camera and interface were an instant joy, making content gathering for Improvised Life easier and more fun. But as long as I’d been using iPhones, I’d never spoken to Siri, Apple’s attempt at Artificial Intelligence. Before I’d fully set up the phone and had lain down for a nap,…
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Bryan Landers, creator of the wonderful 3 Good Things app, has a lot of interesting ideas up his sleeve. At Medium, we found an article he’d written about making his own motivational phone wallpaper. His thinking is compelling and his method simple and easy. We tried it ourselves.
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Improvised Life site has been down since December 26th and it’s been on a wild ride to get it going. Thanks to the extraordinary generosity of readers and friends, it looks like we’re going to be okay. We’ve learned many lessons and met some remarkable people, which we’ll report on in the coming weeks. We’ve still got a lot of work to do to make Improvised Life stable (and may experience more up-and-downs). But for now, we’re wishing you joy, health, creativity, abundance and love in the year to come.
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Rookie Magazine’s looks-like-neon sign diy made out of EL wire got us thinking about using THAT as our holiday lighting, with signs showing JOY, or a moderne neon Xmas tree, or WHAT IF? or other messages for the coming year. The battery-powered flexible glowing tube has the essential effect of neon without complex glass manipulation. The process is doable in a few hours: a fine weekend project.
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Desperately Seeking Susan was Madonna’s debut film. We hear she improvised this brilliant moment on the spot: “Susan”, arriving at the seedy uptown Port Authority Bus Terminal on 181st Street, prepares for her entrance into the city by using the restroom’s hand dryer in an unconventional way… We will never view hand dryer’s the same way…
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A number of readers wrote to say that hadn’t been receiving their Daily Emails…and WHAT HAPPENED!!!! It was yet another manifestation of what appears to be our own private Mercury retrograde: planetary or other influences that have made our technology spin out of control, one thing after another. We were reminded of Thich Nhat Hanh’s great…
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After we accidentally sacrified our trusty-ancient-unwieldy speakers trying to counteract the bed vibration that woke us up each morning, we went on the hunt for great sounding wireless speakers. We ended up getting two variations because music is so essential to us. It fuels our work when energy levels are low, helps us chill out, and even…
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(Video link here.) When Honda engaged the ever-inventive filmmaker known as PES to make a short video about the company’s long history of innovation, he devised a NEW wildly labor-intensive form of animation. Not stop-motion, not flip-book, it is made by hand and paper, and shot by a camera, so has a quality of being from-scratch and…
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When I wore my iPhone stuck to a velcro forearm band to a friend’s house, she said “How can you wear such an ugly thing?”; it’s terrible!” Terrible? Lighten up! It is actually an amazing device. I workout hard, cook, and do chores with it and it has yet to come off. It’s like a big Apple watch whose serious advantages trump its looks. As with everything I buy, I hacked it a bit, and pushed its limits.
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Today I got an email from a Rachel Fleishman, a therapist I met recently. Attached to the usual email signature with her name and link to her website, was a short poem by Antonio Machado in tiny print. Ahhhh…such a swell idea: to send along some image-producing/light-bearing poetry, or a particularly great quote, that would surprise…
Read MoreOver the past year, I’ve written about the many improvised solutions I’ve created to try to NOT feel the mechanical vibration that shakes me awake every morning. I even looked into making a rig like this “Levitation Suit”, a designer’s attempt at a 3D hotel bed. In lieu of being able to be weightless or levitate, my newest vibration-damping fix came via some readers who had the same problem.
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A public typewriter is stationed at Tompkins Square Park for whoever wishes to write on. It is the brainchild of the The Poetry Society of New York who original introduced it at the NYC Poetry Festival on Governors Island: The Typewriter Project’s mission is to investigate, document, and preserve the poetic subconscious of the city while providing a fun…
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(Video link here.) The outlets of the “charging station” in the little foyer of my Harlem space are seriously overtaxed by devices and too many visible cords snaking out of the countertop outlet. So I was happy to discover the Portiko Extension Cord, a 6-foot extension cord with two outlets and two USB ports. I can…
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Throughout my school age years I kept ratty composition notebooks with me at nearly all the time to record lists, illustrations, ideas, and poetry: a way to combine artistic enjoyment and organization. Google Keep app is my modern version of that, a canvas for lists and notes-to-be color-coded, archived, tagged, and illustrated. My categories vary from the very practical to very playful.
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