James Pearl Thinks Blogging is Dead
- Thread starter Norm
- Start date
@jShort - no, I don't regret it at all. It is taking a long time, but it's good. I've just been sidetracked with writing more on the side. Only so much spare time in the day. I have to admit I was wondering if you were even reading anymore when you didn't comment on my potential switch to VZW.
Woke up at 6:30, dropped a few double espressos and wrote until 8:00, when I heard movement upstairs and brought some tea up to D. Enjoyed the cup and then went down to hit the trainer. My idea was to ride 2 hours again, 9-11, and watch whatever movie struck my fancy. But D asked if my event was 9:00, which got me thinking I should do a race. So I looked it up and there was a 3 lap race in Innsbruck at 9:35, which worked out perfectly.
I described the same course last week, so I will not do the same now. Today, I made The Selection, which is pretty cool and represents progress, especially when the group was 120 racers. The selection is comprised of about 40 people, spread across all the categories. Here is how I see the first ~3 miles of the race, by class:
A racers: Lots of navel gazing until the first hill
B races: Breaking a sweat
C racers: On the rivet, trying to hang on (this is me)
D racers: No data available.
Once we hit the hill, this group totally and completely shatters. This is expected as the true A & B racers walk away from us mortals on that first climb. After this event, which we can call The Obliteration, you get micro groups that form and break up and merge, and so on. Then you have a phenomenon I call the Pac Man Peloton. The Pac Man Peloton is the biggest group of people that forms after The Obliteration. This is typically 6-12 people that start to gobble up the pellets that get shed from the group ahead. Last race, this was pretty prevalent. Today, it wasn't quite as many.
I was out ahead of the Pac Man for a short while, but I was gobbled up and we formed a group of 10 racers and stuck this way more or less until the 3rd hill climb. At that point, things broke apart pretty well and I crested the hill in 34th overall. I rode out until the bigger downhill at which point I coasted for a few seconds to save up for the last 2+ mile stretch. 2 guys were on my tail downhill and they passed me, at which point I hit the gas and dropped my signal for a few seconds and registered no power. They rode away and I finished where I was.
Felt pretty good on the bike today. I know I am bullshitting the world by only racing on Zwift. But I promise I will try to make a real race on Saturday. More details to come later in the post.
We sat in the kitchen and relaxed after the race, drinking a cup of tea. Bought tickets to see Neal DeGrasse Tyson on 12/5 at the NJPAC.
After lunch I went to CR with Julia to hike blue. We tossed some rocks into the mud pit that seems to be getting worse. The effort may help a little but this needs an army of people dragging rocks into it. During the process Julia started getting a little complain-ish so I started talking to her about her activity level (almost nothing) and her weight (rising lately). We talked a bit more as we walked and I explained to her that she is my daughter, and she has my ability to put on weight really easily. I am trying to avoid having her be as massive as I once was, which I mentioned was almost 300 pounds. I'm not sure this had any effect on her. But I am trying to impress on her that she needs to work on portion control as well as being active. This is a tough conversation, because she is at an age where she wants to hear none of this. In all, we hiked for just over an hour.
Pissing on a house fire?
After the hike we went to the nursery to get more flowers for the front yard. Julia picked out the yellows and I think they compliment the purples well. We then hit Acme and went back home to get to work. Cleaned up the kitchen, then went outside to plant the 10 plants we bought. Did a little more yard work, which again, is going to be the case for 13 more days. 13 days to go, and it's coming around a bit. Julia helped on & off, mostly stayed outside talking with me. Her withdrawal from the electronics was still there, but it was getting lesser and lesser.
At one point in the day she actually asked me if I thought there was a god and where the world came from. Then she offered some thoughts of her own. She thinks there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. She does not have a firm opinion on the god thing. We finished off the day putting the Zwift desk together. It's nice to actually talk to a real human being under that veneer of The Budding Teenager she often wears.
Not the most well put together thing, but it should work. It can go 1 higher or 1 lower. Lower is just enough clearance for the bars but you'd never be able to get your hands on the tops. 1 higher seems pretty high but we'll see where I need it to actually get any work done. That will be this week's experiment.
I played a few games of Uno with her then Simon came downstairs and took over for me while I showered. Zac joined them and they did not once ask for any electronics. We made dinner, then sat around having pizza and watching Peter Rabbit, which is geared towards kids. A few funny scenes but overall mostly forgettable. In the end, she detached from the electronics for 8 straight hours. I am sure the second she walked into her mother's apartment she plugged in but that's out of my control.
The Week Ahead
On Friday at CR it struck me that I was really exhausted. The 2 week tooth affair plus this week of training has tired me out. I had a great ride today and I am going to roll this into a rest week which I will break with a race on Saturday. @seanrunnette and I were going to do KMC but we spoke today about it and we're going to bag Connecticut and do Lucky instead. Then on Sunday we'll be at JORBA Jam.
On a totally unrelated note, Simon found his Batman pajamas and decided to wear them. I'll just leave this here and hit submit. He is sticking his head forward in a way that makes it look like he has a huge head.
Woke up at 6:30, dropped a few double espressos and wrote until 8:00, when I heard movement upstairs and brought some tea up to D. Enjoyed the cup and then went down to hit the trainer. My idea was to ride 2 hours again, 9-11, and watch whatever movie struck my fancy. But D asked if my event was 9:00, which got me thinking I should do a race. So I looked it up and there was a 3 lap race in Innsbruck at 9:35, which worked out perfectly.
I described the same course last week, so I will not do the same now. Today, I made The Selection, which is pretty cool and represents progress, especially when the group was 120 racers. The selection is comprised of about 40 people, spread across all the categories. Here is how I see the first ~3 miles of the race, by class:
A racers: Lots of navel gazing until the first hill
B races: Breaking a sweat
C racers: On the rivet, trying to hang on (this is me)
D racers: No data available.
Once we hit the hill, this group totally and completely shatters. This is expected as the true A & B racers walk away from us mortals on that first climb. After this event, which we can call The Obliteration, you get micro groups that form and break up and merge, and so on. Then you have a phenomenon I call the Pac Man Peloton. The Pac Man Peloton is the biggest group of people that forms after The Obliteration. This is typically 6-12 people that start to gobble up the pellets that get shed from the group ahead. Last race, this was pretty prevalent. Today, it wasn't quite as many.
I was out ahead of the Pac Man for a short while, but I was gobbled up and we formed a group of 10 racers and stuck this way more or less until the 3rd hill climb. At that point, things broke apart pretty well and I crested the hill in 34th overall. I rode out until the bigger downhill at which point I coasted for a few seconds to save up for the last 2+ mile stretch. 2 guys were on my tail downhill and they passed me, at which point I hit the gas and dropped my signal for a few seconds and registered no power. They rode away and I finished where I was.
Felt pretty good on the bike today. I know I am bullshitting the world by only racing on Zwift. But I promise I will try to make a real race on Saturday. More details to come later in the post.
We sat in the kitchen and relaxed after the race, drinking a cup of tea. Bought tickets to see Neal DeGrasse Tyson on 12/5 at the NJPAC.
After lunch I went to CR with Julia to hike blue. We tossed some rocks into the mud pit that seems to be getting worse. The effort may help a little but this needs an army of people dragging rocks into it. During the process Julia started getting a little complain-ish so I started talking to her about her activity level (almost nothing) and her weight (rising lately). We talked a bit more as we walked and I explained to her that she is my daughter, and she has my ability to put on weight really easily. I am trying to avoid having her be as massive as I once was, which I mentioned was almost 300 pounds. I'm not sure this had any effect on her. But I am trying to impress on her that she needs to work on portion control as well as being active. This is a tough conversation, because she is at an age where she wants to hear none of this. In all, we hiked for just over an hour.
Pissing on a house fire?
After the hike we went to the nursery to get more flowers for the front yard. Julia picked out the yellows and I think they compliment the purples well. We then hit Acme and went back home to get to work. Cleaned up the kitchen, then went outside to plant the 10 plants we bought. Did a little more yard work, which again, is going to be the case for 13 more days. 13 days to go, and it's coming around a bit. Julia helped on & off, mostly stayed outside talking with me. Her withdrawal from the electronics was still there, but it was getting lesser and lesser.
At one point in the day she actually asked me if I thought there was a god and where the world came from. Then she offered some thoughts of her own. She thinks there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. She does not have a firm opinion on the god thing. We finished off the day putting the Zwift desk together. It's nice to actually talk to a real human being under that veneer of The Budding Teenager she often wears.
Not the most well put together thing, but it should work. It can go 1 higher or 1 lower. Lower is just enough clearance for the bars but you'd never be able to get your hands on the tops. 1 higher seems pretty high but we'll see where I need it to actually get any work done. That will be this week's experiment.
I played a few games of Uno with her then Simon came downstairs and took over for me while I showered. Zac joined them and they did not once ask for any electronics. We made dinner, then sat around having pizza and watching Peter Rabbit, which is geared towards kids. A few funny scenes but overall mostly forgettable. In the end, she detached from the electronics for 8 straight hours. I am sure the second she walked into her mother's apartment she plugged in but that's out of my control.
The Week Ahead
On Friday at CR it struck me that I was really exhausted. The 2 week tooth affair plus this week of training has tired me out. I had a great ride today and I am going to roll this into a rest week which I will break with a race on Saturday. @seanrunnette and I were going to do KMC but we spoke today about it and we're going to bag Connecticut and do Lucky instead. Then on Sunday we'll be at JORBA Jam.
On a totally unrelated note, Simon found his Batman pajamas and decided to wear them. I'll just leave this here and hit submit. He is sticking his head forward in a way that makes it look like he has a huge head.
On reading - you had a huge influence on me reading/listening to audio books. So I like to share and especially now that I'm listening to one of the best... Hyperion. I listened to it a few years ago and loved it but not sure I followed all the little nuances. Seems like when I read something the second time, it's better. The Way of Kings was like that. Also totally recommend that series.
And on taking to kids, not sure it's the same ballpark, but last week at kiddie soccer the older one was a total dick to the younger one and that caused him to completely shut down. I spoke to him for a week on and off and it actually helped. He was really supportive of his little brother, who still wanted no part, but at least one of them was trying. Felt good.
Don't stop trying. Hopefully something will resonate with Julia. Maybe show her pics of you at your best and worst...but not as a way of having the same discussion, but more of a "haha, remember when I looked like this?" Kind of thing...
I don't like giving advice on stuff like this, so apologies in advance. I just think kids have it so fucking hard is their social lives.
And on taking to kids, not sure it's the same ballpark, but last week at kiddie soccer the older one was a total dick to the younger one and that caused him to completely shut down. I spoke to him for a week on and off and it actually helped. He was really supportive of his little brother, who still wanted no part, but at least one of them was trying. Felt good.
Don't stop trying. Hopefully something will resonate with Julia. Maybe show her pics of you at your best and worst...but not as a way of having the same discussion, but more of a "haha, remember when I looked like this?" Kind of thing...
I don't like giving advice on stuff like this, so apologies in advance. I just think kids have it so fucking hard is their social lives.
The first season followed the book relatively well, very interesting historical "what if". Second season went into drama, much less exciting. Feel free to only watch the first season.
@jShort I often think of that book, Hyperion. I would like to read it again, but there are so many good books, it's hard to go and reread things. Maybe I'll pick it up because I really enjoyed those 2 books a bunch and would like to experience it again. The other 2, not as good. In terms of the parenting advice, I'm always open for it so feel free. In a way, bike training and parenting are similar in a certain way. There's no recipe that works 100% of the time. And in both, if you put in the effort, you should see positive results. Also, if you drink too much you'll probably suck at both. I digress.
I slept in today, almost 8 hours, it was nice. The shorter days are getting more real now. How is something more or less real? Waking up at 6:45, it's no longer full light out now. When the temps dip like this, it suddenly gets more real. There it is again, "more real." Sleeping has been nice with the window open lately. I enjoy the temperature drop. Given the rain this summer, I am ok with the season changing. After the usual morning antics of getting the kids off to school, I sat down and wrote for a while. Solid effort, good morning.
Then work, which I sum up with calls at 9:30, 10, 11, 2, and 3. In between there was a Zwift recovery ride on my new desk while I groomed some stories for Duke. Super easy ride. Super useless day. How can you work when you end up on the phone for 5 hours? Aside from this, I have to deal with the Delaware system which booted me because their VPN got twerked for 2 days and then when it came back online, my login no longer works. Calling support is as useful as throwing toasters out the window. Does anyone have any spare toasters?
Did various random things around the house and as the day started to wind down, I realized I hadn't finished anything. After the work day ended, I finished mowing the lawn. In all, we got 4 things done on the wedding list today. So what are we now? 12 days? Almost inside the 10 day weather forecast window. Should I just pencil in rain? Apparently, it's coming in droves tomorrow. I like mowing the lawn the day before it rains because this rewards the millions of blades of grass that have been amputated with some much-needed nourishment.
Showered up, responded to a few work messages, edited some other stuff I wrote a while ago, then D came home from her Monday night CR ride and we made some dinner. Later we watched TV and I registered for Lucky Cross. We got a tent space. Actually 2 spaces.
Watched the first episode of Manifest tonight. I assume this idea was brought about by MH370. Kind of an interesting concept in a thought experiment kind of way. If it's good, I'll try not to get too attached because every good network show we have started watching in the last 4 years has been cancelled after a year. By the midpoint we are now stepping into the supernatural. Not sure about this one. I think more about storytelling right now at this point in my life. In the last scene of this I think they opened the venue up too widely. Obviously I wrote this post while we watched the show. This paragraph was constructed through the duration of it.
Saw a trailer for Bad Times at the El Royale. Looks good. Added to my calendar for 10/11 when it opens.
I slept in today, almost 8 hours, it was nice. The shorter days are getting more real now. How is something more or less real? Waking up at 6:45, it's no longer full light out now. When the temps dip like this, it suddenly gets more real. There it is again, "more real." Sleeping has been nice with the window open lately. I enjoy the temperature drop. Given the rain this summer, I am ok with the season changing. After the usual morning antics of getting the kids off to school, I sat down and wrote for a while. Solid effort, good morning.
Then work, which I sum up with calls at 9:30, 10, 11, 2, and 3. In between there was a Zwift recovery ride on my new desk while I groomed some stories for Duke. Super easy ride. Super useless day. How can you work when you end up on the phone for 5 hours? Aside from this, I have to deal with the Delaware system which booted me because their VPN got twerked for 2 days and then when it came back online, my login no longer works. Calling support is as useful as throwing toasters out the window. Does anyone have any spare toasters?
Did various random things around the house and as the day started to wind down, I realized I hadn't finished anything. After the work day ended, I finished mowing the lawn. In all, we got 4 things done on the wedding list today. So what are we now? 12 days? Almost inside the 10 day weather forecast window. Should I just pencil in rain? Apparently, it's coming in droves tomorrow. I like mowing the lawn the day before it rains because this rewards the millions of blades of grass that have been amputated with some much-needed nourishment.
Showered up, responded to a few work messages, edited some other stuff I wrote a while ago, then D came home from her Monday night CR ride and we made some dinner. Later we watched TV and I registered for Lucky Cross. We got a tent space. Actually 2 spaces.
Watched the first episode of Manifest tonight. I assume this idea was brought about by MH370. Kind of an interesting concept in a thought experiment kind of way. If it's good, I'll try not to get too attached because every good network show we have started watching in the last 4 years has been cancelled after a year. By the midpoint we are now stepping into the supernatural. Not sure about this one. I think more about storytelling right now at this point in my life. In the last scene of this I think they opened the venue up too widely. Obviously I wrote this post while we watched the show. This paragraph was constructed through the duration of it.
Saw a trailer for Bad Times at the El Royale. Looks good. Added to my calendar for 10/11 when it opens.
couldn't agree more.
Riding CR before it rains has the same feel good effect as mowing grass before rain. Right now D is as happy as that amputated grass.
What are you writing, fiction, non fiction, readers digest article...
There seems to be a glut of science fiction on Netflix these days, or shows about serial killers/catching serial killers. Is this what people want? Maybe you should write a story about a mystical powered human serial killer and the team of special agents led by an attractive woman proficient in combat and wearing skimpy clothes.
I just want cheap laughs sometimes. Me and Mary have been watching the Marvelous Mrs. Mailsel on Amazon. Its based loosely on Joan Rivers in the late 50s in Manhattan.
Yeah it's campy but that era is great to visit, the clothes, the cars the music...good retro vibes.
I found my copies of Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion in the garage this weekend. You are welcome to borrow them if you want to re-read them. As soon as I saw them, I thought "man, I should read these again," but I kind of feel the same way as you do about re-reading books. Although I don't really remember them that well, so I probably should some day.
You allude that these phone calls are not working, or not constructive, by stating that you are not able to get things done.
While highly productive when coding or writing, it is still what you know, and what you contribute, or absorb to later render
an opinion, that is the goal of these calls. The power to say march this way, or literally stating that
the project is going to slip given the current situation, has a broad effect.
Consuming large amounts of information, making the best decision, formulating the next round of questions/contingencies,
and communicating is the more valued skill. You've got that -
My question would be, What is your job? vs their expectations, and yours?
We all know the outside company takes the hit for any project failure - so there is time spent protecting one's flank...
While highly productive when coding or writing, it is still what you know, and what you contribute, or absorb to later render
an opinion, that is the goal of these calls. The power to say march this way, or literally stating that
the project is going to slip given the current situation, has a broad effect.
Consuming large amounts of information, making the best decision, formulating the next round of questions/contingencies,
and communicating is the more valued skill. You've got that -
My question would be, What is your job? vs their expectations, and yours?
We all know the outside company takes the hit for any project failure - so there is time spent protecting one's flank...
Sleep is good, feels good to wake up needing the covers. The rain has started overnight and it will wash out the whole day, as we will find out later. I knocked out another 7 hours. I have been catching up on sleep since the pain has tailed off. I get up and write for a bit, chapter 24 this morning. @pooriggy I would call it future fiction, but such a genre does not exist, does it? I like Science Fiction, I do. But I think sometimes it goes balls deep in ignoring things like, I don't know, reality? I like to think of incremental future advances and how it plays out in the future. People are still real. There's no space travel. But AI has advanced. Toasters tell jokes. Shit like that, you know? I'm not gonna give you more than that because I'll never finish it. If I do, I'll never publish it. If I do, it won't sell. If it does, it won't allow me to quit my day job. If it does, well great. But I'm not gonna hold my breath.
Calls for the day are 9:00 (Duke) 10:00 (Delaware) 11:00 (internal/Chicago) 2:00 (internal/various) and 4:00 (internal/Pittsburgh). @fidodie you make a fair enough point but my job is to be architect and consultant and technical lead and developer and project manager and client-facing support and professional services and sales consultant and sales engineer and just-1-of-the-2-guys-that-we-all-go-to-for-questions. Today was a legit 5.5 hours of calls. This would be all ok if I were not expected to produce code, but I am on the "schedule" to be working for Delaware, working their development, for 5 hours a day. That's not possible with the glut of calls I am asked to be on. This is 2.5 hours to do 5 hours of dev work plus the flood of emails I need to pick through and figure out which ones are necessary to care about. I have been told to let the PS/PM org fall flat, because they will not learn otherwise. So I log my 40 and call it a week.
To answer your question, yeah the meetings can be productive and they are in part. But what's most important? IDK.
Worked while riding again today. This is 2 days of almost total rest, which will probably need to come to an end tomorrow. I will start putting more effort into it then. Nothing more of note there. Also managed to run into town to pick up the marriage certificate from town hall then run across the street to get a haircut. When D came home we went to Costco to get wine, some non-amazing beer, and non-alcoholic drinks for those people driving home, and myself. I will almost surely need to top off the espresso bean supply before the big day. I should add that to my list. We did 3 things today from the list.
One thing I need. If you are going to the wedding and like to take pics, I need like 3 people to help take pics. Not going to hire someone. @Delish @soundz @seanrunnette @Mitch @pooriggy and who else wants to take pics? If possible maybe more than phone camera quality? We have a DSLR here also. Maybe I'll take pics of all of youse.
Topped off the night editing chapter 11, which was the biggest one so far. I am putting it out there today because Iggy asked, and this effort has been consuming more and more of my time lately. I have been really enjoying this and as it evolves, I'm sure it'll take up more of my reality. One thing that has been difficult for me is that I started the book writing in past tense, then switched to present tense which I like much better. The first 9 chapters were all past, so yesterday I was happy to realize that 10 was the proper tense and I didn't need to change every was to is, and so on. Then today I realized I was flipping between tenses again. What a pain. Also, I struggle with contractions. After reading up a bit about them, I've decided that this effort does not count as formal enough to avoid them. I also have a problem with starting too many sentences with the word "so". So I need to avoid that. So like, you know, it's not overly So.
On books, @JimN - I have the Hyperion books on the shelf. I think I will reread them eventually, once I read some portion of the 200 unread books I have laying around the house. Or I won't. Also, I have dialed back to 10 pages a day on Cryptonomicon, which I should finish just about the same time I finish the initial pass of this theoretical book I am writing.
That is all. Tomorrow will be nothing short of pure madness as the kids return and we have like 5 events tomorrow night. On the bright side, I only have 2 meetings tomorrow.
Calls for the day are 9:00 (Duke) 10:00 (Delaware) 11:00 (internal/Chicago) 2:00 (internal/various) and 4:00 (internal/Pittsburgh). @fidodie you make a fair enough point but my job is to be architect and consultant and technical lead and developer and project manager and client-facing support and professional services and sales consultant and sales engineer and just-1-of-the-2-guys-that-we-all-go-to-for-questions. Today was a legit 5.5 hours of calls. This would be all ok if I were not expected to produce code, but I am on the "schedule" to be working for Delaware, working their development, for 5 hours a day. That's not possible with the glut of calls I am asked to be on. This is 2.5 hours to do 5 hours of dev work plus the flood of emails I need to pick through and figure out which ones are necessary to care about. I have been told to let the PS/PM org fall flat, because they will not learn otherwise. So I log my 40 and call it a week.
To answer your question, yeah the meetings can be productive and they are in part. But what's most important? IDK.
Worked while riding again today. This is 2 days of almost total rest, which will probably need to come to an end tomorrow. I will start putting more effort into it then. Nothing more of note there. Also managed to run into town to pick up the marriage certificate from town hall then run across the street to get a haircut. When D came home we went to Costco to get wine, some non-amazing beer, and non-alcoholic drinks for those people driving home, and myself. I will almost surely need to top off the espresso bean supply before the big day. I should add that to my list. We did 3 things today from the list.
One thing I need. If you are going to the wedding and like to take pics, I need like 3 people to help take pics. Not going to hire someone. @Delish @soundz @seanrunnette @Mitch @pooriggy and who else wants to take pics? If possible maybe more than phone camera quality? We have a DSLR here also. Maybe I'll take pics of all of youse.
Topped off the night editing chapter 11, which was the biggest one so far. I am putting it out there today because Iggy asked, and this effort has been consuming more and more of my time lately. I have been really enjoying this and as it evolves, I'm sure it'll take up more of my reality. One thing that has been difficult for me is that I started the book writing in past tense, then switched to present tense which I like much better. The first 9 chapters were all past, so yesterday I was happy to realize that 10 was the proper tense and I didn't need to change every was to is, and so on. Then today I realized I was flipping between tenses again. What a pain. Also, I struggle with contractions. After reading up a bit about them, I've decided that this effort does not count as formal enough to avoid them. I also have a problem with starting too many sentences with the word "so". So I need to avoid that. So like, you know, it's not overly So.
On books, @JimN - I have the Hyperion books on the shelf. I think I will reread them eventually, once I read some portion of the 200 unread books I have laying around the house. Or I won't. Also, I have dialed back to 10 pages a day on Cryptonomicon, which I should finish just about the same time I finish the initial pass of this theoretical book I am writing.
That is all. Tomorrow will be nothing short of pure madness as the kids return and we have like 5 events tomorrow night. On the bright side, I only have 2 meetings tomorrow.
i can do it
Kinda figured that was the situation - don't suppose you could hire a minion or two for the code work??
I always found coding to be a creative outlet, so it did provide a sort of positive feedback other than
actually doing what it was supposed to do.
Calls should be productive, and are "work" ! They suck when they aren't.
i've been up for an hour and a half. going to be a banner day.
I always found coding to be a creative outlet, so it did provide a sort of positive feedback other than
actually doing what it was supposed to do.
Calls should be productive, and are "work" ! They suck when they aren't.
i've been up for an hour and a half. going to be a banner day.
I saw this movie once about a writer... Didn't end well:
P.S. anyone else ever watch that movie and notice all the typos in the pages? Like how obsessive was Kubrick to make people type out pages with different patterns and typos instead of just copying a few over and over again?!
P.P.S. I can't wait for the wedding. I have several outfits picked out. I may have to change mid-celebration just for sh!ts and giggles
P.S. anyone else ever watch that movie and notice all the typos in the pages? Like how obsessive was Kubrick to make people type out pages with different patterns and typos instead of just copying a few over and over again?!
P.P.S. I can't wait for the wedding. I have several outfits picked out. I may have to change mid-celebration just for sh!ts and giggles
The Kalmyk
Well-Known Member
Sounds like Norm should be an entrepreneur.
You won't be able to quit your day job unless someone buys the movie rights. You should write the book thinking about how it will work as a movie
Here is what I wonder. Will @taylor185 and I become friends in the next year to the point that if we* were getting married in a year from now, would we invite him? You. I will flip-flop between referring to him/you in 3rd/2nd person just to further confuse the reader. I would like to think, and I do think, the answer is yes. And if I am being honest, I did actually invite 1 person to the wedding that I know, but not extremely well. I decided to include him on the invite list because I like him, and I think we would be better friends if we spent more time together. In the end he declined. So maybe he doesn't feel the same way? Anyway, I ask this question because the vast majority of people who we are inviting to the wedding, were not our friends when they got married. In fact, there are only 2 people/couples coming whose wedding I have been to - Woody & my parents (mom & step-dad).
Feel free** to wedding crash if you think we will be friends in a year from now and you want to take pictures. You can ask Eric & Allison where we live. If you manage to convince your wife to legitimately crash a wedding, I would like the transcript of this conversation.
* by "we" I still mean D and myself, not Justin and I. I mean hey you never know but let's stick with known quantities here
** just to be clear, this was a decision made by me just now, so take it for what it's worth
Ok then. 90 degree turn. Yesterday I bought some Mayan Cocoa Coffee Fontina cheese from Costco and it is Jimmy Walker Dy-No-Mite!
I set the alarm for 6:15 today which was too early, but as you will see later, my day was going to be abruptly cut short by being a dad and losing time at 3:45 sharp. Got up, made espresso, and wrote chapter 25. The story is in a transition phase which I find to be the hardest part to write. I have the storyline set for about 5 chapters from now, but the next few are still formulating in my head. I've read several people say that once they start writing, the story tells itself. I am finding that to be more and more the case, though there are some days when the story just isn't ready to come out. This morning wasn't exactly one of those days, but the details of getting from A to B weren't clear to me yet.
I really love waking up and engrossing myself in this world.
Work was a 10:00 call (internal/various) and then I got on the bike to ride & work. In those 90 minutes plus maybe 90 after the ride, I cleaned the plate of 20 story points for Delaware, which is a huge net on the day. I don't know what it says that I can knock out 20 in a few hours and some of the resources I work with take a week to do 4. This is sort of where we are with the product @fidodie - 2 of us have such an in-depth knowledge that it really does take us 1/10 the time to get things done sometimes. There are a combination of factors there, but the reality is that the available talent pool in the world is dreadfully shallow right now. I've finally gotten one resource at work I can trust, and it's just flat-out wonderful to be able to teach him the tool. He's one of those guys that asks questions that make you understand that he gets what he's doing. I have 1 other guy that rips through 10 points a day but there is a 100% chance that all 10 story points fail testing on the first pass. I am not overstating that. It's literally a 100% failure rate. He's the better of the 2 that came from this external org.
I mostly put the cx bike back together today. I may take it out for a spin and try to relearn mounting & dismounting tomorrow. Or maybe I'll wait to do that Friday or even Saturday morning. It's not that important, right? Crossresults has my rank at 453.74 as of the end of 2015, the last time I raced. Race predictor says I am going to be DFL, with a score of 999. So I have nowhere to go but up. For reference, my best was 255 in 2012. We're a far cry from those days right now. @UtahJoe says I will do "worse than I want to" which is probably fair.
New iPhone came via FedEx today. It's still in the box on the kitchen table. No time.
At 3:45 I left to go get Julia from her after school Wednesday art class, then ended up having to take her friend with us because they screwed up the time, went to Simon's school where the friend's mom was, then walked around the school & field for a bit while Zac's soccer practice wrapped up. Once that was done we got Simon from after care and went home. At this point it was about 5:00. Cleaned up the rest of the kitchen while I made dinner, Zac did some homework, Julia showered, and I tried to keep Simon from distracting Zac too much. We then ate dinner and at 6:00 my boss called and we talked for 15 minutes while the 3 kids did their best to turn the house into a circus. At 6:15 I left with Zac to bring him to a different soccer practice and I was back home at 6:45. The 3 hour block of parenting madness was done.
Shower, edit chapter 12, chill out a bit, blog, read, then off to bed to rest up for crazy parent day #2 of the back-to-back rush of madness that waits us when Thursday dawns. 3 more things off the list tonight. We are getting close, like 10 days now. Tomorrow it pops up on the 10 day forecast.
Feel free** to wedding crash if you think we will be friends in a year from now and you want to take pictures. You can ask Eric & Allison where we live. If you manage to convince your wife to legitimately crash a wedding, I would like the transcript of this conversation.
* by "we" I still mean D and myself, not Justin and I. I mean hey you never know but let's stick with known quantities here
** just to be clear, this was a decision made by me just now, so take it for what it's worth
Ok then. 90 degree turn. Yesterday I bought some Mayan Cocoa Coffee Fontina cheese from Costco and it is Jimmy Walker Dy-No-Mite!
I set the alarm for 6:15 today which was too early, but as you will see later, my day was going to be abruptly cut short by being a dad and losing time at 3:45 sharp. Got up, made espresso, and wrote chapter 25. The story is in a transition phase which I find to be the hardest part to write. I have the storyline set for about 5 chapters from now, but the next few are still formulating in my head. I've read several people say that once they start writing, the story tells itself. I am finding that to be more and more the case, though there are some days when the story just isn't ready to come out. This morning wasn't exactly one of those days, but the details of getting from A to B weren't clear to me yet.
I really love waking up and engrossing myself in this world.
Work was a 10:00 call (internal/various) and then I got on the bike to ride & work. In those 90 minutes plus maybe 90 after the ride, I cleaned the plate of 20 story points for Delaware, which is a huge net on the day. I don't know what it says that I can knock out 20 in a few hours and some of the resources I work with take a week to do 4. This is sort of where we are with the product @fidodie - 2 of us have such an in-depth knowledge that it really does take us 1/10 the time to get things done sometimes. There are a combination of factors there, but the reality is that the available talent pool in the world is dreadfully shallow right now. I've finally gotten one resource at work I can trust, and it's just flat-out wonderful to be able to teach him the tool. He's one of those guys that asks questions that make you understand that he gets what he's doing. I have 1 other guy that rips through 10 points a day but there is a 100% chance that all 10 story points fail testing on the first pass. I am not overstating that. It's literally a 100% failure rate. He's the better of the 2 that came from this external org.
I mostly put the cx bike back together today. I may take it out for a spin and try to relearn mounting & dismounting tomorrow. Or maybe I'll wait to do that Friday or even Saturday morning. It's not that important, right? Crossresults has my rank at 453.74 as of the end of 2015, the last time I raced. Race predictor says I am going to be DFL, with a score of 999. So I have nowhere to go but up. For reference, my best was 255 in 2012. We're a far cry from those days right now. @UtahJoe says I will do "worse than I want to" which is probably fair.
New iPhone came via FedEx today. It's still in the box on the kitchen table. No time.
At 3:45 I left to go get Julia from her after school Wednesday art class, then ended up having to take her friend with us because they screwed up the time, went to Simon's school where the friend's mom was, then walked around the school & field for a bit while Zac's soccer practice wrapped up. Once that was done we got Simon from after care and went home. At this point it was about 5:00. Cleaned up the rest of the kitchen while I made dinner, Zac did some homework, Julia showered, and I tried to keep Simon from distracting Zac too much. We then ate dinner and at 6:00 my boss called and we talked for 15 minutes while the 3 kids did their best to turn the house into a circus. At 6:15 I left with Zac to bring him to a different soccer practice and I was back home at 6:45. The 3 hour block of parenting madness was done.
Shower, edit chapter 12, chill out a bit, blog, read, then off to bed to rest up for crazy parent day #2 of the back-to-back rush of madness that waits us when Thursday dawns. 3 more things off the list tonight. We are getting close, like 10 days now. Tomorrow it pops up on the 10 day forecast.
I say yes.
Wife says she's always game for a good wedding but no crashing if it will be awkward. I say, isn't that the essence of crashing? Shouldn't it be awkward? Otherwise, aren't you just a regular (invited) guest.
She also says to you, Norm:
https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/344e8b27-b78e-4826-ba44-894fdf900bad
Wedding guests. This should be a forum thread-in-itself.
I have two wedding guests that I now question. One, a former boss, is an absolute no. The other, a former co-worker, is a strong maybe. We were lucky with a small destination wedding; it really weeded out the unwanted and uninterested.
Wife says she's always game for a good wedding but no crashing if it will be awkward. I say, isn't that the essence of crashing? Shouldn't it be awkward? Otherwise, aren't you just a regular (invited) guest.
She also says to you, Norm:
https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/344e8b27-b78e-4826-ba44-894fdf900bad
Wedding guests. This should be a forum thread-in-itself.
I have two wedding guests that I now question. One, a former boss, is an absolute no. The other, a former co-worker, is a strong maybe. We were lucky with a small destination wedding; it really weeded out the unwanted and uninterested.