I'm a pretty simple guy, and I adore a simple aesthetic. I don't consider myself an Apple snob, but I really do love the clean and simple design aesthetic they have for their products. This is all the more apparent when contrasting with their competitors.

I got a Lenovo T61 laptop at my new job. It's a pretty decent computer overall, but I really, really, REALLY disliked all of the clutter on the case. There are the stickers advertising the processor and the OS. The inset shiny silver logo cocked ever so jauntily at an angle on the right side. And worst of all, a row of useless lighted icons behind the keyboard that blink randomly like so many props on the bridge of some low-budget sci-fi movie from 20+ years ago.

So I got to fixing it. I removed the sticker and the glue. That was reasonably easy. Then I got out the black electrical tape and cut a piece that fit perfectly in the logo depression. and finally, I put a strip of tape over the row of lights.

It's not quite as elegant as a Mac, but it's a lot less annoying. And I do have to admit, I really like the fingerprint scanner for unlocking my computer. Now when will my mobile phone's proximity do the same?

I upgraded my iPhone from the original 2G to a 3S. I skipped one generation with the 3G. I admit I do like the phone a lot better. It's thinner and a lot faster, and it feels like the battery life is better too.

But I am annoyed at the price. Yes I paid $199 for it, but AT&T charges tax on the full, unsubsidized value of the phone: $599. This leaves me with a tax bill of $55.40, or about 28% of what I paid for the phone.

Another annoyance: My phone was shipped ostensibly for arrival on launch day of Friday, June 19. But it didn't show up until Monday. AT&T started my billing cycle on Friday, of course, making me pay for the service for 3 days when I hadn't even activated the phone yet.

Overall I'm happy with it, tho. I'm back to a legit version on the AT&T network. With my corporate discount of 18%, it's about the same price as I was paying to T-Mobile. Plus I actually get reasonable coverage in my house. Which as it turns out is a pretty important feature. Well worth the few extra dollars a month.

And I like that it comes in white to match my MacBook.

I hate the business model of cell phone plans, which is the same one used by parking meters and any system that requires you to buy credits to use it (like iStockPhoto).

I'm sure you've seen the stories. A teen texts 1000s of messages in a month which vastly exce eds the number on the plan, and the parents are stuck with a bill that would buy a nice used car.

The difference between paying $20 and $2000? The decision you have to make ahead of time on which text messaging plan you want. With AT&T, you get no free texts, $5 gets you 200, $15 = 1200, and $20 is unlimited. The same pattern goes for talk minutes and even data usage.

Wouldn't it be great if there was a cell phone plan where you actually paid for what you used, rather than what you think you might use with massive penalties for being wrong? What if they simply charged you the $20 for unlimited texting that month, instead of the $5?

Now of course we know why phone companies don't do that. Because they want people to pay for expensive plans that they don't really need except occasionally. But how about this for a more customer friendly model that still preserves most of the extra revenues: On the month that the customer exceeds their plan, bump them up to the next higher plan that covers their usage, then keep them on that more expensive plan for subsequent months. Customers could still switch back to the lower plan if they choose to. But as we know, most won't.

In the immortal words of Phil Haine, cell phone companies please steal this idea.

As we're sorting through the 5000+ pictures we took during our month in Africa, this one jumps out at me. It is probably my favorite shot. I love the depth of it: the springbok grazing in the back blending into the tall grass, while the one in the foreground looking up causes his face to really pop out.

It was taken in Etosha National Park in Namibia.

I don't have kids, and I don't want kids. According to Dan Gilbert...

If you beep people on a beeper while they're with their children and ask them how they're feeling, they're not so happy. But if you ask people what they like most in life, they say they love their kids -- their kids are the great joys of their lives. The way Dan puts it is that we're wrong. Kids really make us unhappy, but we think they make this happy. He gives different reasons why, but one reason is that we're fooled by the media. We're suckered in by this legend.

To me, it's an opportunity cost. I could invest my time and money into raising kids. Or I could invest it into other causes in the world. While most in society seem to choose the former, I choose the latter. But I do wonder how many people mindlessly have kids because that is the path society expects of you?

We'll find out this fall when The Equity Project school opens in Washington Heights, New York, NY.

The school... is premised on the theory that excellent teachers -- and not revolutionary technology, talented principals or small class size -- are the critical ingredient for success. Experts hope it could offer a window into some of the most pressing and elusive questions in education: Is a collection of superb teachers enough to make a great school? Are six-figure salaries the way to get them? And just what makes a teacher great?

[Teachers at the school will earn] $125,000: nearly twice as much as the average New York City public school teacher earns, and about two and a half times as much as the national average for teacher salaries. They also will be eligible for bonuses, based on schoolwide performance, of up to $25,000 in the second year.

Full article in the NY Times.

As I'm packing for my upcoming trip to Africa, I'm thinking about the 2+ days I'll spend getting there. Not fun. Ironically, the actual "travel" part of traveling is the least enjoyable part of the experience.

I was joking with my wife that I might sneak up behind her this evening and hit her over the head, then drug her. When she came to, she'd be in Africa! But seriously, wouldn't that make a pretty awesome service? Someone else takes care of getting you and your bags to your final destination, and wakes you up so you're refreshed and ready to get out there and embrace the experience. As opposed to wandering around in a zombie-like state from both the exhaustion of travel and the jet lag.

Of course such a service would have to be 100% trustworthy. It would suck to wake up with no possessions or clothes in some slave camp in the middle of the jungle. Maybe I'll stick to the traditional means...

This is pretty cool. The White House has an official Flickr photo stream with some really great (candid, even) shots of Obama, his staff, and his family.

I wonder if there's an official redacting process. The original photos are pretty large, and one might be able to glean info from documents lying around in each shot.

I was getting my hair cut today, and I mentioned I was going out to dinner for my wife's birthday tonight. I told him we are vegan so we don't tend to go to the kind of high-end restaurants most people do when they are out celebrating. He seemed really interested, tho. He asked what restaurant it was (Vegetarian House), where it was (in San Jose), and what the menu was like (mostly Asian influenced with some American fare, but all vegan).

That got me thinking, what if the tables were turned? What if he were talking about an issue that I was interested in hearing more about? I realized that being a hair stylist was a great opportunity for dissemination of information. They meet with 8-12 clients a day, and they probably have several hundred unique clients. And especially at an up-scale place like where I get my hair cut, these are likely powerful and influential people. You could reach a lot of people in a short amount of time an issue you care deeply about.

But then again, the savvy stylist is thinking about the long-term relationship with the client. It's all about them, listening to their stories, laughing at their jokes, making them feel good about coming to see you. They wouldn't want to risk alienating these folks and driving them away. So maybe it wouldn't work as well as I initially thought.

Humans are lazy. We tend towards paths of least resistance. And this is one of the main reasons why I believe more people aren't vegetarian or vegan. It's not really that hard, but it does require a little bit of effort. And that little bit of effort is a big deal for most people.

I came up with this thought experiment I call menu roulette. Take the list off all restaurants in the US and pick one at random. Then take the menu of that restaurant and pick an item off it at random. What are the odds that it is vegetarian? or vegan? 10%? 5%? I bet it's less than 1%.

As a product designer, one of the aphorisms I follow is make it easy to do the right thing, and difficult to do the wrong thing. Since eating meat and dairy is bad for your health, the animals, and the environment, it is pretty clearly the wrong thing to do. Yet our whole society is set up to encourage people to do the wrong thing.

So how can we change this? That is the hundred billion dollar question.

I just got my copy of The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. I figured I should learn more about the religions of the world, so I'm starting with this one. I like what I've seen so far. I'm a huge fan of pasta (here's my favorite tomato sauce recipe or try this one for some onion-y goodness), so I already was a fan from the start.

Some highlights of the faith:

• Pirates are divine beings.
  
• Evolutionary "evidence" was planted specifically to test the faith of Pastafarians.
  
• Heaven consists of beer volcanoes and stripper factories.
• All prayers are concluded with the affirmation "RAmen".

Next on my list: those who worship the Invisible Pink Unicorn. Wow. who knew there were so many religions out there. It might take me a while before I get to some of the more mainstream ones.