Hi all,

It's been quiet on this feed for a few months - we've been busy! Since the beginning of the year, my sister Theresa and her husband Alec moved across the street from Liz and I, Liz started (and has now almost finished) her second semester of her Masters in English program and IUPUI, and I was promoted to a "supervisor" role in the Sierra Club IT Department.

The job shift into management has been a huge change - managing people & making project plans is not something that I have professional experience with, so figuring it out has taken lots of my time and energy. Worries from work have been spilling over into my nights & weekends for the first time in several years. It's taking a lot out of me right now, but unlike my previous jobs in consulting, I'm confident that this higher level of work intensity is only a symptom of the transition process, not the role itself.

With all the work & school busy-ness, I've been trying to keep my free time as well-prioritized as possible, and focusing on prayer, reading, and exercise. I somehow managed to read & review 8 books so far this year:

If you're looking for book recommendations, I highly recommend Stolen Focus by Johann Hari and House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. All these links in the list above tie back to my reviews of the books on my "Micro Blog", which is the other web feed that I manage. This feed, here, that you're reading now, is where I post occasional updates or big ideas that I'm thinking about; the Micro Blog (a.k.a. thombehrens.com) is for smaller, more regular updates - day-to-day pictures & updates from me & Liz's life, albums I'm listening too, thought-provoking articles, and book reviews 🙂.

Speaking of albums, I recently discovered this app -- it's called "Albums" -- that helps you organize & listen to your music library by albums. You can sort & tag albums, make collections, track upcoming releases... it's really great. It's transformed how I listen to music. Instead of having my default listening strategy be turning on a playlist generated by an algorithm, I can pick an album that I love, and try to pay attention to whatever task I'm working on (reading a book, writing some code) long enough to make it through the whole album. I have a big folder of "To Listen To" albums that I add to whenever someone gives me a recommendation, album folders for different activities (reading, exercising), and folders for different people in my life ("Liz Albums", "Andrew Albums", "Theresa Albums"). When you open the app, it looks like this:

These thumbnails are all albums I have in my library - I just scroll, tap one, and it starts playing! Super fun & delightful.

Approaching my music library in this new way has helped me break out of my established listening habits and explore different kinds of music. If you're looking for album recommendations, right now I'm loving to Electricity by Ibibio Sound Machine (produced by Hot Chip), Funky Sixteen Corners by Various Artists (compilation of rare funk recordings), and Howlin by Jagwar Ma.

Jack White also released a new album yesterday - it's super chaotic, but I love it. Liz, Theresa, Alec and I already have tickets to go see him later this summer!

Thanks for reading! If you want to say hi, I'd love to hear from you - send me an email!

Peace,
Thom