Technology

Blogging as a gift.

/ wvfurandroot / 14 Comments
From Thinkpad to Paper and Back.

From Thinkpad to Paper and Back.

I started blogging not to be read by anyone, but as a convenient online journal. I have journaled on and off for years and years. As the internet developed and technology improved, it struck me that an electronic journal would serve me best as it allowed for links, youtube videos, and pictures. So. Last August, I set up a blog.

Nobody is more surprised than me that I have a small, but faithful readership. I love y’all for reading my blathering drivel, but it has served to cause me to censor myself. (I’m afraid of the “keep this post private” toggle as I can just see me accidentally posting one of my most embarrassing TMI entries.)

That I can pull my Flickr into the blog (indeed I didn’t use Flickr until I started the blog) really rocks my boat and I love looking at the map thingie to see where my visitors are coming from.

All that aside, the blog has been great for getting me writing on a daily basis again. It’s also provoked me to take more pictures in my quest to be “right here right now.”

[An aside: I love feedback and, seriously, I don’t understand why more of you don’t comment even if only to tell me the post sucked or bored you to tears. I once was part of a writing group and “constructive” critiques are a gift.]

Wood Pulp and Ink

Wood Pulp and Ink

But, since I do have a readership and am censoring, I’m back to ink and wood pulp journaling. I haven’t been very good about doing it every day, but when I do, I like to make a ritual of it. Thus I have a good rollerball and a fine, fine dip pen (Murano glass that you dip in ink.) I love lazy mornings at the table writing secrets, rants, whines, and various blatherings on paper with fine ink.

Still, the blog is so much easier. I can just grab the laptop and sprawl either on the sofa, the chaise or in bed. I am a hedonist and being comfortable while doing anything is critical to my well-being.

Both my son and my father have considerable writing talents and opinions on everything. About a month ago I decided I would set them up blogs as a birthday/Father’s Day gift. I was amazed when I actually followed-through on that idea. Surprisingly, I had such fun setting them up and personalizing them with in-jokes and photos that it was worth the work even if they decide not to maintain them. [If you’re of a mind to, go wish my dad a happy Father’s Day – his life’s journey has been such that if you knew him, you’d love him too.]

fine pens are a must

fine pens are a must

Blogs as a gift are a stroke genius, I think, provided the recipients have any interest in writing and are not averse to a (mostly) silent audience reading their thoughts. I’m pleased with my unorthodox gifts. I think my dad will be and I think my son is.

And blogging, my own and others, has been a great gift to me. I enjoy it far more than I ever thought I would and I love setting up blogs for other people. (For a nominal fee, I’ll make one for you too!)

The Ides of June are slowly ticking away and the gift-giving season will soon be at an end. I’ll be able to get back to my regularly scheduled programming which I am now resolved will involve a more faithful paper journaling.

Brain Wave Theory of Machines

/ wvfurandroot / 7 Comments

brains

The Brain Wave Theory of Machines is really very simple. If the user of a machine is experiencing frustration and/or active stress, any machine in contact with that person will malfunction. It is simple neurophysics – the brain runs on electricity as do most machines. When brain synapses fire signals of frustration and haste, a machine in use will mirror the former and oppose the latter.

The formula looks something like this:

Y=(A/D)(SC) 2

 

For the mathematically impaired:

You Banging Head Against Wall and Threatening to Move to a Mexican Beach is equal to Abject Dismay Provoked By To-Do List divided by Impending Deadline which is then multiplied by the squared sum of Hours of Sleep Deficit added to the Critical Nature of Task (expressed to two decimal points).

 

In real life, this is represented by yours truly needing to mail 640 fundraising letters which are already 3 days behind schedule. The printer, usually a sweetheart, is jamming on every envelope and, like a good overachiever, refusing access to the paper tray.

It’s a simple task. I should be able to feed envelopes in the printer, take them out of the hopper, stuff them with the already printed letter, and toodle on down the road to the post office after which I could cross off the most pressing thing on my task list.

During my sojourn in academia, I never quite believed the students when they arrived with increasingly bizarre stories about computers and printers the night before a paper was due or new cars that wouldn’t start the morning of a final exam.  Their obvious sincerity gave me pause, but still. . .the stories were just too over-the-top.

Then one day as I was fighting with the copy machine moments before a midterm, it all clicked and the Brain Wave Theory of Machines was postulated.

Normally, the best way to handle one of these events is to close the door on the machine and go to lunch for 4 hours, returning whistling and cheerful with a sense of having all the time in the world. This strategy will spread the cheer to the machine, but in the inverse relationship, alluded to but not expressed in correct scientific notation, encourage the machine to complete all tasks in record time.

Instead, I spent 4 hours printing 11 envelopes including time spent dismantling and reassembling the machine, two hours in tech support chat, 1 hour cursing, 20 minutes kicking the machine, and 19 minutes eating chocolate. As the day wound to a close, it found me explaining to a live-action-in-my-office-service-tech the nature of the problem.

Contrary to a typical Brain Wave Machine Event, the service tech immediately identified the problem, but, in more typical fashion, is bumfuzzled as to how to fix it.

It was my mistake. I was so stressed, I failed to apply the correct strategy to resolve and reverse the brain waves. My bad (<– an expression I despise).

Tomorrow, I will try again. [Cue Tomorrow from Annie here.]