v42.5: "Socially" Acceptable

"Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out." - John Wooden

There's nothing like a good storm to get the inspirational juices flowing.  Especially when the power goes out and you lose access to all of the "life distractions" that seem to inhibit inspiration.  On Tuesday this week we had an impressive thunder and lightning show here in Halifax which lasted for a good 8 hours in total.  I have never seen or experienced anything like it before.  There were times during the storm where I was sure my apartment building was going to cave in on me because the thunder was so loud.  I lost power at my place a couple of times, but it only lasted for a minute.  It got me thinking though: how would society cope if our access to data, news and social media was abruptly cut off?

You see it everywhere you look these days.  Smart phones, tablets and laptops are a common scene in our daily society.  News and information is readily accessible wherever you go and social networking is on the rise.  I have been using Twitter since it came out and I recently started using Google+.  I'm amazed at what people like to post sometimes.  I constantly see things like: "I'm on the bus, heading to work" and "Sitting at home, watching TV".  While it may be entertaining, there comes a point when you just need to keep certain things to yourself.  There are some "famous" people who have climbed on the social media wagon and are bad for this.  These people have literally thousands and thousands of followers who read everything they write.  In most cases, their followers will often comment which can lead to a simple post about "Going to bed for the night" into a frenzy of "good night"s and "sleep well"s flooding the stream.  What is the point of telling your fan base you're going to bed?  What ever did we do before we knew what time 'famous" people went to bed?

We (yes I'm including myself in this) are addicted to social media.  We are "net junkies" who constantly hit multiple sites all day long to get the latest updates on things and to see what our "followed" are up to.  I'm just as much to blame for this as anyone especially since I live alone and spend my evenings on my laptop reading streams and commenting.  Hell, I even have a blog where I write about completely useless topics and drink coffee.  Of course I wouldn't consider myself famous, but I do have a small following and my posts are being published on most of the social media streams out there today.  My site will even allow people to share my blog posts to various social media sites if they like what I have to say and want to share it with their followers, so feel free to share.

Now that I've written all this, let's go back to my original thought: how would society cope if all of a sudden our access to data, news and social media was abruptly cut off?  I'd be interested to hear your comments or thoughts on this.

v42.4: Getting Things Done?

Hey folks,

Our office hosted a little seminar today on David Allen's Getting Things Done work-life management tool.  I must admit, I was a bit impressed/inspired by it all.  There are definitely some parts of the system that I could apply to my day-to-day life that would help quite a bit to ensure I get things done properly.  As I was listening to the session, I was trying to put it all together in my head; how to make it work in both my work and my personal life.  Unfortunately, with the way we do things at work, there is no easy way to bridge the gap technically.  I was thinking a smart device like a Black Berry or iPhone must just do the trick, and it may if I could get my hands on one.  I have a Black Berry for work now, but due to the security policies on it, I'm not able to do anything with it except make phone calls and read/send corporate emails.

The first part of the seminar we were asked to grab a sheet of paper and write down everything we had in our heads that are things we need to do.  For example, I wrote stuff like:

• Pay Power Bill


• Pay Cable Bill


• Do Laundry


• Wash Dishes


• Sweep Floor


• etc.

These are things that are constantly on my mind and when they start to add up, you have a greater chance of forgetting things.  The whole idea behind GTD is to write it all down so you don't have to remember it.  This way you can take the things you need to do and categorize them into buckets or areas.  You could create some lists like "Home" and "Work" where you could list things you needed to do for each.  You could have another list called "Call" where you could list all the people you had to call for whatever reason; include the telephone in the list so if you're using a smart device like an iPhone or Black Berry you can easily dial out while looking at the list.  These are great things you can do while driving in traffic or when you have a few minutes waiting for something.  Been putting off calling the garage to get your car in for maintenance?  Add it to the call list so you don't forget it.

Of course this whole idea of lists and writing things down is pointless if you don't review it.  The guide to GTD has guidelines on when to review lists; some are daily while others are weekly or monthly.  This way you are only focused on the things that are most important while the other things can be followed-up on less frequently.  The idea is clearing your mind from all the unnecessary "remembering" and taking the things you need to do and getting them done by organizing them.  It really is an interesting system, but it will only work if you invest the time to do it properly.  If you're interested in learning more about GTD, I highly urge you to head over to David Allen's site and read about it.

Well folks, just a quick update for now.  I will definitely be adding "blog on my favorite blogging site" to my list of Getting Things Done :)

Cheers till next time,

Al

v42.3: Canada Day

Just a quick note to say Happy Canada Day to my friends and family in Canada.  It has been a nice day here in Halifax (for a change) and there are a lot of tourists and families around the city taking in all there is to offer on this National Holiday.  If you're working today, I feel for you.  I had to work this morning but was lucky enough to get away for the afternoon to enjoy the nice weather.

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Please don't drink and drive and have a safe and fun Canada Day!

Cheers,

Al

v42.2: That was close

Morning folks,

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I realized this past week that I had inadventantly allowed my domain to expire.  I had a couple emails from the registrar reminding me about it, but I would read them and immediately forget about it.  This week I got yet another reminder, but this one told me that the domain has expired and they would modify my DNS so the domain would redirect to an alternate site; if I didn't pay to renew the domain, it would be sold off to one of those domain holding companies after 30 days.  Needless to say, I promptly logged in and renewed it for another year.

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I'm still waiting for summer to get here.  I'm not sure what the weather is like in your area of the world, but Summer has definitely been late in arriving here in Halifax.  Our temperatures have been low, it is has been raining non-stop and I think I've even picked up a viral upper respiratory tract infection.  It isn't uncommon for people get "catch" a cold during the transition from spring to summer but since it doesn't really feel like summer around here, I can't say that is the reason :)  While technically Summer started this week, I can't help but feel a bit robbed of the nice weather.  I can count on 1 hand the number of nice days we've had in the last month and even then, spectacular they were not.

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Well folks, work beckons and I must heed the call.  I have a lot of work to get done today so I can relax this weekend and not have to work (like I do most weekends).  Working in IT was not my career choice when I was younger, but at least it pays the bills (almost :) ).  I need to approve a bunch of time sheets (which hopefully are submitted on-time), I need to put together a spec document for a new project my development team will be working on and I need to clean up some old tasks that have been lingering around.  I should be able to get it all done today if I put my head down and actually work, but it's Friday and we all know how motivating that can be :)

Take care everyone and I hope you all have a safe and happy weekend!  If you plan on having a drink or two this weekend, have one for me :)

Cheers,

Al

v42.1: Stalagmites in my Freezer

Howdy folks,

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Today was much like any other day.  I got up, got ready for work and headed into the office.  I worked.  I came home, ran a few errands, came home again and decided to have a glass of Pepsi.  I opened the freezer door and stopped.  I couldn't help but notice all my ice cubes in my ice cube tray had little ice spikes sticking out of them.  It was the oddest thing and initially I thought something was wrong.  Why the hell would my ice cubes have stalagmites sticking out of them?

-slurp-

Of course I had to look this up and apparently it isn't uncommon to see ice cubes with stalagmites sticking out of them.  I bet you're all wondering how this is achieved?  I examined the ice cubes for a few minutes, but I couldn't figure out exactly how it happened.  Did someone break into my apartment and fashion these out of ice?  Was there water dripping down from inside the freezer in precisely the exact spot where my ice cubes were?  Are there microscopic organisms living in my freezer who can only survive in sub zero temperatures and they build these structures to live in?

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After a quick search on Goggle, the answer finally presented itself to me.  This strange phenomenon happens to ice cubes when they freeze from the outside in.  Since water expands when it freezes, there is no where for the liquid to go - but up - when the ice starts to form.  Seems so simple doesn't it?

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On the gaming side of things I've started playing WoW again.  This time I've decided to start up a little Blog to record some of the adventures and to just talk geek about WoW.  Initially I had the domain wowgeek.com registered, but I let that domain expire and go away, so I've decided to use my old domain fiendz.net to house the new blog.  If you head over to http://www.fiendz.net you can check it out.  I don't have any content there right now, but I'm slowly building the site up and plan on doing some posting there soon.

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Anyway folks, time to head out for now.  I hope everyone had a great day today!

Cheers,

Al

v42.0: What the Frack?

Evening everyone,

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I just wanted to post a quick note to let everyone I'm still here and I haven't forgotten about you.  Work has been quite busy lately and my life has been going through some massive changes.  I haven't been doing any gaming lately, which is strange for me; I have always been a huge gamer. I have, however, been thinking of reactivating my WoW account.  Most of my gaming friends have also moved on to other things and none of them (that I'm aware of) are playing WoW these days.  I had thought about firing up Rift as well, but I'm not really looking to start a new game right now.

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Well folks, time for me to sign-off for now.  I'm going to try and post more frequently here in the coming months.  Hopefully my writing dry spell clears up.

Cheers,

Al

v41.9: Roll Up the Starbucks

Howdy folks,

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Apparently while I wasn't looking, the Roll up the Rim contest has come to a conclusion.  Imagine my disappointment when I got a coffee yesterday and I was handed a standard brown cup.  Of course that doesn't mean there are not Roll Up cups out there in Timmy town, just the Tim Horton's I frequent.

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This year I barely drank any coffee in comparison to previous years.  In fact, I believe I drank 60% less coffee than previous years, which is saying something since:

1. This is a Blog about musing over coffee


2. I'm a huge coffee fan


3. I like coffee

Perhaps it has something to do with the broken driver's side window motor in my truck and the other personal issues I've been dealing with these past few months.  I'll be honest here, my coffee "tastes" have drastically changed recently.  In fact, I'm finding Tim Horton's coffee to be a little on the weak side now and I almost prefer to drink (GASP) Starbucks coffee.  I know, many of you are probably as floored as I am about it, but recently I've been drinking (GASP) Starbucks coffee.  I've even picked up a French Press which I use to make my own Starbucks coffee here at home.  It is something a little foreign to me since I've never been really picky about my coffee and I've always been a huge hater of Starbucks.

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Of course that doesn't mean I won't stop by and have a Timmy's every once in awhile; in fact I had a Large Timmy's today.  I don't know what changed, but coffee has taken on new meaning lately and I foresee some interesting musings in the future.  In fact, I may go to an actual Starbucks sometime and write a musing from there.  What a grand idea!

I just need to take baby steps with it, there is no hurry to rush off to the nearest Starbucks and start trying to fit in.  I start off with buying their coffee and slowly work my way into the Starbucks club.  Eventually I will be accepted by them and they will welcome me in as their own.  Then, and only then, will I be worthy to sit in their coffee shops and use their free WiFi to Blog about being there and using their free WiFi.

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Cheers,

Al