Shortly written
Tuesday, February 17, 2009 ~ 1 comment so far
The act of writing fiction, of considering the flow and cadence of certain words, the structure and pace of a sentence, the building of a paragraph, laying the foundations for something bigger is something with which I flirt. Most of my flirtations make their way here in the form of odd and completely random blog posts.
A few people have said to me that I should consider writing something longer, bigger in scale but my attention span doesn’t really lend it to such a venture. I’ve made my peace with that as I think I’d have to quit my day job to have anything approaching a chance of writing a novel, but it’s only just occurred to me (yesterday morning) that I might be able to tackle a short story.
Now, at the risk of getting my Mother all excited (she’s my biggest fan, obv), the idea has a lot of appeal. It’s not something I’ll be able to tackle at the moment but I might do some background research anyway…
I should point out that I have the beginnings of a short story already in place, something I’ve dipped in and out of for a long time but I never really (weirdly) considered it a short story as such, more just a consistent place to enjoy the process of writing.
And no, I’m NOT going to publish that little piece of nonsense.
I know a few of you have written short stories (and a few of you have books, gasp!) so if you have any tips or advice I’d welcome them. I’m not overly bothered about getting published (modesty suggests I’m not that good) but I would like to take a proper stab at it… if I do it at all, I fear this may be another flash in the pan idea but, whilst the iron is hot.. no wait, which metaphor am I using??
Too many computers?
Sunday, February 15, 2009 ~ 4 comments so far
Ketchup Burger
Saturday, February 14, 2009 ~ 3 comments so far
Where would you live?
Friday, February 13, 2009 ~ 7 comments so far
I’m off out tonight to have a few drinks with an ex-colleague who is about to head to Merika, for life (well for a while at least). He’s sold up, got his paperwork in order and he, his lovely wife and their still new son will fly over to Texas and setup a home and life there.
It’s an intriguing thought, leaving the UK permanently and one I’ve toyed with a few times. Some times I think it would have to be an English speaking country with Australia and the USA being the main candidates, with Canada not far behind, but occasionally I harbour desires of heading somewhere completely alien to me, where I don’t know the language or culture and really jumping in at the deep end.
Birmingham, perhaps?
It would be a big step but in many ways it’s no different from changing jobs or buying a new house. Obviously the scale and implications are different but ultimately it’s a mindset thing. If I was of a mind to do it I would’ve already. So I’m presuming I’m not.
But then wanting and desiring something like that, something that is a ‘big step’ and quite scary when you sit down and think it all through, is one thing. Doing it, is another.
A few of the blogs I read are by people who have done just that (Fuddland, Little Red Boat, Autoblography, and Plasticbag for example) and I really do admire them hugely for it.
Ultimately I guess I’m either a coward or at some point I’ll run out of excuses to NOT do it.
So, if I rock up at your door in San Francisco, New York, Adelaide, Sydney, Toronto, Wellington or anywhere else outside the UK, do be kind. No doubt I’ll be a complete nervous wreck!
Purging
Thursday, February 12, 2009 ~ 6 comments so far
There is something very cathartic about have a good clearout.
I’m not having a good clearout at the moment, nor a bad clearout for that matter, but I have been slowly whittling down ‘stuff’ for the past few months and everytime I tackle another little batch I do feel very pleased with myself.
By nature I’m neat and tidy. I’m not quite so bad that everything must be in an exact place and I’m more than happy to just bung things in a drawer out of the way, but I do like my minimalism and with that is a need to keep clutter down to a … err … minimum.
I’ve no grand plan in place for any of this instead I’m taking the opportunities as they arise. This evening, whilst hunting for my Microsoft Office installation CDs, I found myself elbow deep in a big plastic box of computer paraphernalia and my inner “declutterer” kicked in.
I now have a bag of software CDs (all crap, the stuff you get installed on a Dell and which I immediately uninstall), a variety of USB cables, an ancient web cam and three power adapters for items which I no longer own. At least I don’t think I still own them, truth is I may never have owned them and just inherited the adapters from.. somewhere…
In the midst of all this I was checking the printer cable and realised that when I got the printer (a year ago?) I neglected to remove the previous power cable. So, for the last year, whilst I’ve been struggling with getting enough power sockets in this room, all along there was a plug that was plugged in to the socket but which had nothing on the other end. Doh.
The next question is what to do with this bag of random computer ‘stuff’. Whilst I could eBay off each individual item the hassle would outweigh the profit (I reckon if I got £10 for the lot I’d be lucky), charity shops don’t take electrical stuff usually so… bin? Really?
What a waste. Surely there is some way of recycling these things? (and no, not Freecycle, again not worth the hassle!).
Anyone got any ideas?
Wanting to change
Wednesday, February 11, 2009 ~ 4 comments so far
Over the past few months I’ve been slowly trying to change some habits, trying to break the patterns that led me to be on the computer until the wee small hours doing nothing particularly productive.
And it seems to be working.
I’ve cut down on the number of websites I visit on a regular basis, be they work or play related, and I now find myself with almost a natural time limit of how long I want to spend on the computer. By removing distractions and some websites that I still visit for no other reason than “I always have” regardless of the fact that they offer me nothing other than sapping my time (I’m looking at you Neowin forums!), I can feel my natural “ok, bored now” reactions kicking in much sooner than they used to.
This is helping me free up my time to do other things, as well as making my time on the computer more productive (I’ve currently got two websites in design phase, breaking a rule for ‘one man designs’ only because one is for sister!).
Now all I need to do is stop filling my newly found free time with extended bouts on the PS3. One step at a time!
In all honesty, part of me is just happy that I am able to change these patterns as it means I’m not quite so deeply ingrained in my way of life as I’d thought. It can be easy to fall into patterns that were ok at the time but no longer have the same benefits (or the same reasoning behind them), so whilst this post doesn’t hold anything particularly revelatory, I am quietly pleased with myself.
This is not change for sake of it, this is change for the better and that’s always a good thing.
Muscle memory
Tuesday, February 10, 2009 ~ Comments Off
As I slowly transition my home computing setup towards Mac OSX, the main thing that is slowing me down is my lack of knowledge around the keyboard shortcuts.
Having used Windows for so long now, many of the keyboard shortcuts I use are now deeply ingrained and I my fingers find the correct combination effortlessly. Whether I’m moving a window (Alt+Space, DOWN cursor key, then cursors keys to move), minimising all windows to get back to that file I’ve left on the Desktop (Windows button + D), then restoring them all again (Windows button + D again), or just the basics of CTRL+V, CTRL+Z and so on (Cut and Undo, if you were wondering) the bulk of my time on a Windows computer is spent without touching the mouse.
However, on OSX I’m still heavily dependant on the mouse and that is beginning to become an issue as it’s stalling my productivity. I’ve found plenty of guides to help me learn them but as my day is spent on a Windows machine, I’m finding the nightly transition to OSX still causes me some grief.
My brain isn’t helping at all, as it currently equates “laptop” with “OSX”. Which was fine up until last week where I got a laptop at work, and I know finding myself in a quandary as the Command key on my MacBook (used for cutting and pasting in OSX) is where the ALT key is on my Windows laptop. That’s been fun, with (seemingly) random menus appearing when I’m trying to cut and paste text!
I’m persevering though as it took me many years to get to the level of efficiency I have with a Windows machine, so I know it will take time and the fact that using the Mac is sooooo much nicer than Windows makes it all worthwhile.
Although I’ve still to try Windows 7, so maybe that will change too…