Feeling saggy in the Bright Ideas Department? Well, there’s a nifty little green-and-burgundy primer to stoke your flames. Titled “52 Projects: Random Acts of Everyday Creativity” (Perigee Trade, $13.95 paper), it was born out of author Jeffrey Yamaguchi’s Web site, www.52projects.com.
It involves taking a wacky, spontaneous idea and making magic. And there are at least 52 jumping-off points. You might concoct the perfect margarita with your drinking buddies. Or sit down and write the tale of the best night of your life. Or have a dinner party on Friday the 13th, and at the end of the night serve up a tray of pre-personalized fortune cookies, turning everyone’s 13th into a good thing.
All in all, it’s just the thing to beat away the doldrums, be they the wintry sort or any kind at all.
Try this: “Project # 42: Take some chopsticks from your kitchen drawer . . . and, along with $25 cash and a take-out Chinese food menu, seal them up in an envelope. Mail off to one of your currently unemployed friends, your college-age kid brother or sister, or a person you know who is financially strapped at the moment. Keep it anonymous. Do not handwrite the mailing address or enclose a note.”