A Man And His Ideas

  A collection of Joseph Flanigan's drawings.

The Newbility Bicycle This is the story of Newbility - the new ability to ride my bicycle When I started riding in 2007, because of the MS in the left leg I was unable to do a standing bike mount.  After practice, to mount/dismount, I would lay the bike left side down, extend my left arm and put the handlebar, once stable, I could wing the right leg over the frame placing it in the space between the crank and front wheel. The handlebar dropdowns, while a little rocky on the ground, acting as a balance and stabilizing aid. Once both feet were between the bike frame and wheels, I could lift the bike, clip in and ride.  In January 2016, a new relapse affected the right leg preventing me from stepping over the frame. For many reasons could not ride my road bike safely. One day feeling confident, I decided to ride my mountain bike on the local bike path. In the driveway, leaning on the car, I mounted the bike, I figured a short ride and home to dismount.  After about a ha...

 Biden sweeping new green initiatives In 1984, GM started Saturn as an independent business to bring robotics into automobile manufacturing. Labor feared the job loss.  The Wang word processor replaced thousands of legal secretaries, and their IBM Selectric typewriters. Horseshoes changed shipping loads distances.  Technology advancements create an interloper phenomena event disrupting established secure social norms: the story repeats and repeats.  The wagon with wheels and axle technology breached Native lands. The wheel and axle, the horseshoe, the robot, the computer are just things. Technology is the applied use of things and the source of the interloper phenomena.  Since before WWII, the automobile industry has been on notice to save energy and reduce pollution. The interloper waits for presentation in the corporate board rooms, and greed defected the breach. GM claims to have all cars electric by 2035. That power demand will be a breach on the power grid—...

  Thoughts on God God’s Gifts and His Teaching God’s first gift was a diverse place to live.             God’s second gift was a diverse life.             God’s third gift was the ability to survive in diversity.             God’s fourth gift was rational thought.             God’s fifth gift was free will.             God’s sixth gift was the ability to learn.             God’s seventh gift shared His wisdom. God began  teaching  lessons about using His  gifts. God’s first lesson teaching is respect for others. The Garden’s lesson teaches the difference between public and private property and the respect for each. The apple is another person’s private property. The free will assault by word (Eve), and deed (Adam) on private property is trespass. The consequences of a person’s trespass  are  misplaced respect.   God’s second lesson expands rational thought to teach community development by acts of respect, restitution, and forgiveness.   ...

Josephism This my list of Josephisms; many are mine; some are borrowed; some are quoted.  Years ago, an MS sponsor asked me to sign bandannas for a team event. The team had 25 riders. The sponsor asked that I give each team member have a different quote with my signature. Over the years since,  here and there, I started collecting Josephism quotes and thoughts, Josephism Quotes  Peace on earth did happen, once. Our challenge is to make it happen again. Live, Ride, Believe. HERO means Help Everyone, Respect Others—time, talent, treasure, and tenacity.  Tenacity – never give up. Every step forward loses where it came from.  Even to turn around and look behind is a different memory.  Every step forward loses time.  To turn around and look behind loses time. Every step forward is a new precious present.  Our challenges grant us the gift of many precious presents.  So happy you are collecting them.  Thinking creates thoughts for stories....

Efficient Thinking Efficient generally refers to performance with the least amount of waste or sometimes the ability to avoid waste. The term efficient is very subjective to context and observations regarding use.  Two of the subjective measurements are the consumption of resources and the use of resources to meet a goal. Each are perceptions on the same consideration, one view is from the producer and the other from the customer.  Efficient thinking in mind and the brain is similar. The neurobiology of the brain produces thoughts, and the neurocognition of the mind consumes the thoughts. Waste has some negative connotations, e.g. trash, but a wastebasket is very efficient for collecting trash. In production companies, the consumption of resources manufactures a product. In manufacturing, quality is an efficiency statement that appears to be a perception measurement about resource depilation that occurred to make the finished goods. Customers who purchase the goods make ...

Think Outside the Box HERO: The word hero is an acronym that means,  H elp  E veryone,  R espect  O thers. You show respect by giving your time, your talent, your treasure, and most importantly, your tenacity. Never quit until we find the cure for MS. Thank you for coming, each of you is my hero. The current dialog on MS has two principal author perspectives. The clinical view and the MSer self-view, or the "them" or the "me" perspective. When I talk about MS From the Insider-Out, I try to have the "us" perspective.  I just look at MS magazines, the principal authors were from the clinical view. Sometimes, the magazine will have an MSer personal story as the me-too story.   The them pronoun can be a logical context  syllogism when referring to  people with MS as the object of the article. Them, you, us and me are just perspectives of the MS box. The clinical views, them and you, see the MS box from the outside. The MSer views, us and me, is f...