One of the aims of developing cohousing communities is diversity — in age, gender, ethnicity, marital status, household composition, sexual orientation, etc. You name it, we want it. Recruitment focuses getting more but groups feel they have failed if those who come forward are not different from themselves. Both forming and built communities are proud to say, “We have 2 of these and 1 of those and 3 more of […]
In addition to letter spacing and line height, optimum line length, the number of characters per line, affects readability and user experience. A long line of text produces fatigue and a short line of text can be distracting. Seventy-five characters per line, including spaces, is usually the maximum for a block of text with 50-60 being the optimum range. Unless a line is short for effect, such as emphasizing relationships […]
The Golden Ratio Typography Calculator addresses one of the most difficult aspects of designing a text: to layout type in such a way that it is most readable and attractive. Most typographers and graphic designers have had years of visual experience that allows them to choose the most attractive and readable font sizes, widths, and line lengths intuitively. Even with comparable experience, however, doing this on the web can be […]
This is a rant against signs. If you like signs, beware. The origin and purpose of most signs: someone is irked so they post a sign to irk someone else. Give an irked person a wall, or any surface actually, and they will slap up a sign with sticky tape or nails, usually big, and irk everyone else. But the only people who read signs are those for whom they […]
I turned on CNN expecting back to back coverage of Steve Jobs but there was nothing. I was shocked. That’s how much a part of my life he has been since 1982 when I purchased an Apple IIe. In 1997, it was still working. Though I had moved on to a Macintosh, one of my students who knew how to find adapters for new printers used it daily. In 1997 […]
What are the benefits and detractors for the standard cohousing model where you plan everything out then build it all then move in vs an alternative model of only selling lots to members and then people build their own houses? Developing a community lot by lot isn’t the standard so much as the only way some communities could get started, both because of funding and because of the real estate […]
I’ve given the following information to dozens of people carefully typing it out each time. It finally occurred to me that I could post it here and both share it more widely and save myself some typing. I’m not a doctor, lawyer, baker, or Indian chief so take it for what it is worth to you. I have been diagnosed and undiagnosed with diabetes for over 20 years in several […]
Kate Swift died 7 May 2011. As the alphabetically second author of the first popular guide to nonsexist language, she and her partner changed the world of writing. No more could the male pronoun be universal or taken for granted or justified. In 1970, she and Casey Miller formed a partnership as editing consultants and were asked to edit a sex education textbook for junior high school students. The author […]
Just when you thought you knew everything, I’ve come up with my life in a harem. No, it’s another book. The title, Some Girls, is not as interesting as the subtitle, My Life in a Harem. If all I had seen was the title, I wouldn’t have picked it up and you wouldn’t be reading this either. Some Girls: My Life in a Harem is Jillian Lauren’s autobiographical story about her […]
A link from my daughter to an article on multi-tasking in the American Scholar prompts this post — or rather congealed it. I’ve been struggling with a life that has become so complex I wake up thinking about taking long road trips in a small car with impersonal motel rooms, or moving to a Tumbleweed House of 200 square feet. Calculating how can I reduce the size of my apartment […]
