Problem: On my iMac, I’d type search keywords into the Chrome browser’s address bar. Google is my default search engine. After the search results displayed on the Google page, the tab would refresh and load the search into Yahoo.

Diagnosis: Browser malware installed somewhere in Chrome, likely a new extension. Not a virus, but annoying behavior nonetheless.

Solution: Resetting Chrome to its factory default settings, which also disables all extensions. Confirmed that searches worked as expected after the reset, which confirmed the bad extension hypothesis.

Turned on each extension one at a time and ran a search to determine which one forced the search to Yahoo.

The culprit: The Facebook Video Downloader extension, also called Social Video Downloader on the Chrome extensions site. Deleted this extension and searches have worked fine since.

---

Reference

Reputable products: A few products were recommended for detecting or removing malware or other issues. I did not install Malwarebytes nor Combo Cleaner; they look reputable but I don’t know — I’d want to find recent reviews of them. I installed Etrecheck to run a scan of my system and it found only minor issues, nothing related to this problem. Etrecheck can repair some damage, but its main value is in providing a report on your Mac’s setup you can use to paste into a support message.

Avoid: Adware Removal Pro (reference)

Other links of interest:

• How to get rid of a yahoo virus that keeps redirecting my google search engine which is set as a default to Yahoo!
• How to eliminate the adware that’s plaguing your Mac
• How to remove Yahoo Search virus [Chrome, Firefox, IE, Edge]
• Remove adware from Mac OSX Safari, Chrome or Firefox [2018]

As my first coach told us, you can have anything you want as long as you're willing to pay the price.

So whether it's saving money to pay off debt or dieting and working out hard to get a six-pack, if you want to put in the work, and persist to the finish line, you'll get where you're going.

But he also said the goal is never about the goal, it's about who you become on your way to achieving the goal.

When he asked me what my goal was, I said, "To get my master's degree in information science."

"No, Mike, that's not the goal, that's a milestone," he said. "The goal is who are you going to be, what are you going to be doing, the day after you get your degree?"

It was a question that brought me up short and that I now deploy on myself whenever I remember to do so.

HIs analogy was of a golfer aiming to sink a putt. The golfer does not aim for the hole — instead, she aims for just beyond the hole. By aiming for that invisible point, she sinks the putt.

Likewise, my music teacher tells beginning guitar students there are eight strings on the guitar: one invisible string above the six you can see, and one below. So when you strum, you strum all eight strings. That way, you guarantee that the pick has enough speed and momentum to make a pleasing sound from the middle six strings.

Amid the many tiny goals and objectives I have these days — losing weight, exercising more, starting a side business — I will forget and then remember my coach's lesson. Particularly the "what will you be doing the day after?" question: after losing all that weight, will I sit down with a cheeseburger and basket of tater tots? Why not start thinking about that now rather than the day after?

I need to shift my gaze from the goal to the life every now and then to make sure I'm going where I want to go.

Cinderella (1965). The color version of the Rodgers & Hammerstein piece, with Lesley Ann Warren. Liz remembered seeing this as a girl and adored seeing it again. It was my first time watching this entertaining, rather darling miniature. I was struck by how it could have been titled "Cinderella and the Prince" since as much time was spent on him and his predicament as was spent on her. Stuart Damon really looked like a handsome prince and was a great actor and singer on top of that; I loved his comic asides at the dance. My friend Scott says the black-and-white 1957 version with Julie Andrews is the superior production. Amazon Prime.

The Crown S2 (2017). We didn't enjoy this series as much as the first, but there is something about this high-class soap opera that is hard for us to resist. Claire Foy's natural warmth resists the cooler, more detached monarch and matriarch that Elizabeth must have been by this time in real life: when Charles returns home from his wretched school, he is greeted and embraced by the staff, but not his mother, who watches concernedly but does not comfort. Spare us the sulking and tantrums from Margaret and Philip. The two best episodes dealt with Lord Altrincham's personal criticism of Elizabeth and the twin story of Philip and Charles' schooling at the cold and remote Gordonstoun school. Netflix.

The Detectorists S2 (2015). Oh my GOD, what a dear, lovely, wonderful show. No farcical situations, no tight one-liners, just a slow-paced, gentle comedy of gentle characters trying to make their way in this world. This is a TV world I want to live in. Beautiful, lingering shots of English countryside that MacKenzie Crook and Toby Jones' characters never see because they're heads-down, sweeping the ground with their metal detectors, looking for buried gold — but whatever would they do with it if they found it? The Christmas special answers that question in a touching and clever way. The third and final series aired in 2017 and I cannot wait to see it. Netflix.

The Good Place S1 (2016). I'd heard good things about this sitcom but was not prepared for its snap and cleverness. And so plotty! Most sitcoms run their characters through their standard paces and expected farces. But this show's "what-if?" creates a world with rules, then breaks those rules, then sees how the characters recover from those broken rules. Although I could feel that the writers' room had honed every beat to a machined polish, I could not wait to see how they would wrongfoot me yet again. Because we don't watch network TV, we're waiting for the second season to show up on the usual streaming services so — avoid spoilers! (But I did read they were picked up for a third season – yay!) Fantastically sharp comic acting from everyone and kudos for only doing 13 episodes. Netflix.

The Big Bang Theory S10 (2017). Apart from the ongoing genius of Jim Parsons is there another reason to watch this show? It's pleasant to have on during supper, but once viewed, forever forgotten. There are now so many characters that Melissa Rauch was basically sidelined with the rather standard new-mommy storyline. Hats off to Kaley Cuoco for making the most of a character who now exists mainly for reaction shots. Netflix DVD.

How did you change as a parent?

I became less invested in milestones and also those lovely hallucinations we have, when our kids are going to become astrophysicists. I also decided that my job is not to try to make the world safe. I think I thought you just create a beautiful, Instagram-y bubble for your kid, and then that’s parenting. And then I realized that I was going to be the worst thing that happened to him if it went badly. I couldn’t live with that. I decided that my new parenting philosophy is that I can’t protect him from the pain of the world, but I can show him that there is truth and beauty in the midst of it. And if I can make him that person, then I have won as a parent.

We attended Kate Bowler’s reading at the Regulator Bookshop for her new memoir, Everything Happens For A Reason (And Other Lies I’ve Loved). She was smart, funny, down-to-earth, and probably the best pal one could imagine having. Her Fresh Air interview is worth a listen. 

The following paragraph from her Duke Divinity School bio tells you more:

In 2015, she was unexpectedly diagnosed with Stage IV cancer at age 35. In her viral New York Times op-ed, she writes about the irony of being an expert in health, wealth and happiness while being ill. Her subsequent memoir, Everything Happens for a Reason (and other lies I’ve loved) (Random House, 2018), tells the story of her struggle to understand the personal and intellectual dimensions of the American belief that all tragedies are tests of character.

If you search this blog, you’ll find UK time management coach and author Mark Forster’s name pop up quite a bit. I’ve been a student, devotee, and practitioner of most every to-do list or task management book, app, or program going. Of course, not much got done as I kept changing systems but that is beside the point. It’s my intellectual hobby and I enjoy it.

(Also — maybe my work is so boring and unimportant that I need new methods to keep myself interested? Discuss.)

But once I found Mark’s work, my desire to explore or try other systems — even other ways of thinking about time management — faded. His ideas on many issues related to the field are so deep, simple, and profound that I have basically stopped my search for other methods and other teachers. 

Last year, Mark challenged his forum denizens to stick to a single system for a specific time period. For the time period, he chose events off the liturgical calendar. Thus, we had Lenten and Eastertide challenges. So in addition to learning a little more about these events, we also learned the ins and outs of our chosen systems by sticking with them for 40 or so days and reporting back on our results.

For this year’s Lenten Challenge (Feb 14-Mar 29), I’ll use Mark’s most recent system, FFVP, at my workplace. At home, where things are more relaxed and I don’t typically face deadline urgencies, I keep a long list of items in a Moleskine cahiers and use one of Mark’s “no-list” methods.

[In looking at last year’s posts on Mark’s forum, I saw that in 2017 I also gave up podcast-listening for Lent! Sounds like a good idea. I’ll start tomorrow. Thank you, past-Mike!]

 

Brad Pilon writes about the goal some men have of being “shredded”: getting their body fat to such a low percentage that you can see their six-pack abs. 

Pilon advises remaining aware of how pleasant or not the journey is to your destination. He is not saying, “Don’t get ripped.” Sure, by all means, if that’s what you want to do, go for it. But enjoy it. Don’t forget all the other things that go into making a good life. 

As Pilon concludes:

You absolutely can get ultra-shredded, but please be aware of the time, effort, and energy it will take, and always remember that the results are not, and never will be permanent…

With whom you eat will always be more important than what was eaten.

 

For a few years, I used to do a dumbbell routine in the mornings, rising at about 530 or 6am to do so. I still find the mornings the best time to do a short yoga or bodyweight/calisthenics routine.

Since I’ve been working out with kettlebells, I have taken to exercising after work — usually around 6 or 630pm — specifically, as Dan Pink mentions here, to avoid injury. A too-vigorous kettlebell routine in the morning, particularly ballistic exercises like swings, is an invitation to injury when my body is not fully warmed-up.

Also, when I did a group kettlebell class at 6:30am a few years ago, I found that I could not concentrate or focus at work for the rest of the day. I could only sit and stare at my computer screen. An afternoon/early evening workout feels good and helps me feel nicely exhausted when it’s bedtime.

 

“Indecision causes suffering.” A line my first coach used a lot and that explains a lot of suffering I see in myself and others. I also used this to diagnose character motivations when I was in a fiction-writing group. 

Another of his maxims: “Why are you making it so hard?” Said to myself whenever I poke my head up out of the gopher hole after several hours spent trying to figure something out. Taking a little walk, taking a break, getting some perspective — they all give me time to pause and reflect rather than overthink.

And this is one I’ve heard recently: “Leave yourself alone!”: stop beating yourself up , harassing yourself, etc. You’re fine as you are.

Liz and I are sitting in a church, in the front row of the wooden pews. There is a brick wall about six feet in front of us. The walls to the left and right feel close. There are many pews behind us, full of churchgoers.

I can’t say whether there is a preacher or choir, but certainly everyone is sitting there to attend services.

Liz and I are both reading big newspapers. I think we’re dressed in going-to-church garb, but our faces are buried in our newspapers.

An African-American gentleman dressed in a suit stands beside me. I look up at him and try to open my eyes but can’t; it’s the way you try to open your eyes when you know you’re asleep, you use all your strength to open your eyes, but the lids will not open.

I see a dime and penny on the floor. I pick them up and give them to him with a smile. He smiles, takes them, and walks away.

What are we to make of this? Unknown, Keptin. If everything I see in a dream is a symbol from my imagination, and stands in for me in some way, then I’d say I’m in a spiritual place but cannot see it because I’m paying too much attention to worldly things.

Two fortunes from last night’s Neo-China takeout:

“Storms make oaks take deeper root.

Spectacular accomplishment is never preceded by less than spectacular preparation.”

Both very apropos considering my (and everyone’s) job situation at the moment. 

I wonder: How do young oaks prepare for storms?