It takes a lot for the truth to come out.
Where does the truth come from?
When does the truth come out?
Today I have begun to find myself on more comfortable footing about the challenges of developing a new skill. It has been hard sitting in a project house just kinda staring at a series of works in progress. And meanwhile i’ve been trying to learn and then also get comfortable with making mistakes and learning; i’m not a perfectionist. I’m also intimidated and indifferent with quirky and high end finishes. I also worry that I don’t yet have a true north about my voice or style.
Getting comfortable with developing the skill of carpentry has run headlong into trying to deal with my anxieties of dealing with my ignorance about new things. I apparently haven’t had to deal with new stuff outside of computers, for a long time-except having kids. Even when i’ve worked in the creative realm it has been via the computer, so the baseline has been comfortable.
The truth is also complicated. Looking at things from a sober perspective i’m now taking a lot of risks. The safe money would be on staying in “The Game” (computers,) but these days i’m either going to have to get deeper into project and program management or upgrade my skills. The baptism of fire that I had with management was pleasing but the commitment was high. The compensation was also high, it got me a house and a pretty decent remodel underway, but quality of life was no good.
The truth is that I’m afraid. This is no call to arms. This is being in the dark with fast dimming light. And i’m nearly certain the only way that i’ll have a chance at success is to run headlong into the darkness of my fear. As a person committed to the long game the voices say that I should run back to carpet and cubicle walls. I should learn my way around another nondescript building and gird myself for having to climb the ladder again. There are always voices.
Being into the long play does not mean you’re conservative or afraid, it means you are going long, you are trying to stretch your resources over a long period of time. On some level I have to admit that I structured my IT career around my own planned obsolescence. I like computer support. I like the access to people, I like fixing broken things. I have no interest just sitting in front of a computer for a eight to ten hour work day. I did not want to be a DBA, or a security analyst. I didn’t want to be a network administrator. I wanted to be the guy who fixed your computer and helped you. And I most certainly didn’t want to be chained to a phone. I can stay in the game, but the corporate IT Administrator is being combined with the Network Administrator. The corporate IT support individual is doing everything, every job is becoming a catch all, it isn’t all bad, but golly... Lastly I loved my job and the mix of support and project/program management was super awesome. I was stretched thin, but it was good, a true challenge to juggle and make everything right.
I was not afraid to leave corporate.
I was not afraid to give up the money.
I am afraid at failing at my new job. I am afraid to be a failure as a carpenter.
Why change careers? I mean, why would you give up your whole segment and do something dramatically different. My experience with remodeling and carpentry is mostly from spreadsheet and shepherding the vision. I can successfully remodel a house, that is troubleshooting. Replace this, paint that, make this bad thing better. I can do that. I’m working with master carpenters now, even in the role of an assistant carpenter it is challenging work and every day there is a medley of new shit we’re doing.
house projects
*2 thoughts on 2 things “2 on 2” *
Two thoughts on Architects
Always use an architect.
Never trust anything an architect says... You hired them to make a pretty picture and specify materials.
Two thoughts on General Contractors
Always use a General Contractor
So there is that adage “You can have fast, good, or cheap, pick two.” it is absolutely true. Have that conversation with your General Contractor after you have honestly decided how you lean.
Writing about writing implements
I think I don’t have anything to write about my 12 inch PowerBook G4. Ok, there is one thing... I’ve been trying to get the laptop to stream Netflix. I have no interest using the laptop to play Netflix. I just thought about it one day. Bear with me. I get totally obsessive about eeking performance out of computers. I also take some odd pleasure in getting equipment to do something it was never meant to do. This habit of “I wonder if...” usually occurs when I have nothing to write about.
So I found myself with nothing to write about and was just curious. And since I know you probably own a Powerbook G4 yourself and want to know the answer, it is possible. I haven’t gotten it to work, but it is totally possible, or at least I haven’t given up on it, yet. I’ve currently been having trouble getting into the osX 10.5.8 package.
Getting into packages changes with each version of osX, which if you’re an apple person isn’t so confusing, but if your a windows person it sounds a bit weird. The part where Apple totally rewrites the desktop and OS underpinnings on a regular basis is also weird. And I cannot figure out the terminal command line to write out that will get me into the package and extract it to a desktop. So I keep going back with different syntax trying.
Carpentry
I have this area in my kitchen where my sink, my dishwasher and oven live. This area (sans oven, which we just bought) was a part of the “remodel” that occurred to the house before we bought it. But by remodel I mean some really lousy remodelers took scrap materials and fashioned a partially functioning counter, sink and dishwasher. Like they literally pulled some discarded kitchen materials and cobbled them together to make a kitchen area. The sink leaked, the dishwasher didn’t work, the carpentry (how dare you sir) is of the worse kinda construction. And all of this work was recently done. It’s pretty terrible. No part of this area is level or plum.
To make matters worse redoing the area would require decommissioning the oven, dishwasher and sink and keeping them offline till I rebuilt the space. Rebuilding the space would require literally taking the area down to the studs and rebuilding everything, so daunting. Any compromise means that I have to pick a place where I take my stand.
Do I take the wall down to the studs? If I do, I might get into a bigger project than I imagined. i have to contend with are some really weird framing choices that were made. The sink had one of those ledges behind the counter, y’know that spot. When the house is for sale it would have some olives and peppers floating in oil, all artfully arranged in a ornate glass bottle. Usually that would mean that the framing would extend out to accommodate the ledge and drywall would go around that framed outline.
I know what happened. They changed the layout of the space and brought in the dishwasher. they also did not want to spend a nickel on any change in the piping they had worked around. So they made one cut and added the breath pipe for the dishwasher and then they hit it in the ledge and also rigged up the electrical. Shoddy. Still with me? So I have framing that is extended past the original drywall and not tied into the wall structure at all and then it was also drywalled. So either I rip out the entire structure, all the framing and both layers of drywall and the plumbing and then start over.
That’s what it all boils down to, how much do you want to spend. How much are you willing to inconvenience yourself and your family. And how much do you have to change to achieve your goal? Otherwise, you have to pick a series of compromising starts and work around the structural issues and still manage to make it look good. Pretty tricky, unless you want to wash dishes in the sink and not have an oven. To be utterly honest with myself i’m doing the same wrong things they did. i’m looking at some really warmed over shit and trying to shape it into something else.
In the heart of remodeling this is the big question; what wrongs do you build on? Indeed. Every day we have to make that call.
Snips
*It would be like if Microsoft made Windows XP and then named the next seven operating systems Windows XP1-7 and then stuck on “Windows XP 7 Banana Peel” and then named the next one “Windows XP 7 Orange Rind” and then “Windows XP 7Almond shell” cause that is what Apple did. *
*After we bought the house the Owner/Agent offered to loan us his man to fix the “minor issues” the house had. That was like having the “buy here pay here” warranty, you’re not getting a quality car and you are not getting quality repairs. We declined the offer and closed on the house and got our own guy. *
*We gutted about 85% of the house, guess what we didn’t gut. *
Mumble mumble
Writing about writing on a computer continues...
*If you told me i’d want to spend a disproportionate amount of time writing about what I was writing on, I would have self criticized myself. Writing about writing is bad enough. Writing about what you’re writing with is * probably* worse. There must be some reason though, outside of just having nothing to write about and just looking down at the instrument and that being all that comes to your mind. *
That said...
*I’m currently writing with Pages 09, it’s lean, has a good interface, feels Microsoft Workish. But it doesn’t offend the “I like Microsoft Word” crowd. There is a very pleasing “full screen” mode. This single tasking function gives you a white screen for your text, bordered by a larger black background. The only information it communicates is word count and how many pages you’ve written. The help function is pretty amazeballs and guides you to what you’re looking up and it does all of this in real time. T*
*I’ve wondered about whether I should maybe get out of traditional entry writing business. Maybe I should build a series of entries that I add to and edit. Then I could just have one gargantuan entry about the 12 inch Powerbook G4. *
Website vs Mobile ready: The quotable madman.
I’ve been thinking about getting back into code again, just some simple HTML and maybe a little CSS. It seems overwhelming and overkill for blithering on about random shit. Squarespace seems fine for the more static image centric and self promoting elements I need to have on hand. I’ve also been thinking about bringing back the old KFO, even bringing back the 3.0 interface, but that interface is not mobile friendly and that is the kiss of death now. How do you make a mobile friendly zine that also houses a blog? Should my energy be about trying to figure out a mobile friendly solution which is appropriate for the time but completely abandons the web site model?
And do I go back and touch my old entries? Do I maybe make them bite sized, or quotable? Do I repackage the stream of conscious into tweet era style writing? Yesterdays deep is todays rambling mess, right?
At the mall
Rosie and I went mall shopping today. Rosie isn’t much of a fan of clothes shopping, but she has a gala event coming on and we all agree her wardrobe is not up to snuff. Shopping for clothes can be fun, as long as your goal is to just hang out and trying things on. If your mission is that you have to walk into a store and absolutely must walk out with your required garments, it can be a downer.
We went to a half dozen stores. This was my first time taking her to Nordstorm Rack. Think Marshalls, with clothes at Marshalls prices and in addition to that a rich selection of ludicrously priced stuff that has been lowered to just absurd prices. We did find one piece, matte, non tapered stretch slacks, out of Indonesia. They need to be altered, so next up is establishing a relationship with a local tailor. We now have five days to find a shirt and shoes to go with it. I think we can do it.
Bug Out Bag: Writing
The concept of the bug out bag is that you have a satchel packed for emergencies. When said emergency occurs you’re then ready to BUG OUT!
I have to break in and say that I have two running thoughts going on here. One is about bug out bags as it pertains to writing. The other thought is the impracticality of the bug out bag in a true survival situation. I don’t know if I can merge the two or not.
As it relates to writing I’ve started to think about maybe carrying one computer all the time, but how I should also feel comfortable with maybe having a second computer that I bug out with. The whole reason for this mind exercise is that I have two computers well suited to the experience of writing, with minimal internet distraction. But both computers have strong points.
The Toshiba Portege is strong. The Portege battery is good for about 70 minutes. It wins hands down in lightness, as I think it weighs about a pound and a half. The downsides is that the mouse click button is hidden in plain sight and my thumbs just can’t find it. This next trait is bad and a negative. The linux operating system is lean and stable, the standby mode is good. The choice in word processors is not awesome and i’ve hit some walls trying to get other packages to properly expand on the build. Slightly above my paygrade-and annoying. The Windows XP build is rock solid, with a near perfect hibernate state and has word. I have no complaints about windows xp, it kinda messes with my head, like i’m in the way back machine, but otherwise it is all good. The deal breaker is quite possibly the lilliputian mouse pad and button.
The Apple powerbook is totally... Ok. I don’t know about the titanium powebooks, but all the apple laptops bother my forearm; what’s up with the sharp edge? Part of me thinks i’m allergic to aluminum, but the polycarbonate macbooks are also annoying and hurt my wrist. That is the first downside. Battery life is a bit better on the powerbook, like an hour and a half. Standby mode is nearly magical on the apple, though if i’m going to be honest, Apple standby feels better, Windows hibernate though maybe is more stable, by a hair. The Apple has the glowing apple, the screen feels really great on the eyes, it isn’t retina, but it feels damn nice. And I have every port I’d ever want. I suffer from faberge egg syndrome though when I carry the apple, i totally hate the thought of scratching or messing it up.
So I think I can benefit from both computers. On a day to day basis I seem to be picking up the power book and not the Toshiba. But I have this cute baby messenger that the portege and not much more can fit in and I just really think i can grab it and go. I can’t grab the powerbook and just go.
If i had to bug out in real life, the portege would be more practical.
If we have to bug out we are dead. Bugging out... Dude. There is no up side to it. My survival instinct is strong, but outside of my will to live, do I really have any interest running from place to place?
From a concept of writing though, bug out for me translates to just being able to write anytime. I mean, what i’m trying to do is build back my writing voice. This entire exercise is all about finding a voice to to convey my thoughts. I’ve lost so many of the things which made my previous perspective and defined my voice, time to build something new. I attempted poetry a few nights ago, no luck. The role that technology plays in how we express ourselves, now that is a interesting conversation piece. I grew up desperately wanting a computer, as we were people of humble means my first computer ended up being a smith and corona word processor. All I wanted to do was write and that is all I think I want to do these days...
Return of the 12
Ok, so as i've been wrangling with the Toshiba Portege I was reminded that somewhere in Atlanta there was a restored 12 inch Powerbook that I had parlayed for a nice carbon fiber road bike, many years ago. I was pretty certain that the powerbook was sitting on the shelf of a friend, in exactly the same condition that it was in when I traded it.
We're talking pretty old school though, like as old as you might want to go. For the sake of conversation, that being a conversation where we chat about why you might be inclined to invest in a old computer, there are some fascinating opportunities out there. I think this scenario of seeking out an old piece of hardware is mostly unique to Apple though. Occasionally a pc form factor will come around that is very exciting, but not ususally. The Apple hardware spec is so high end, if you don't have a early off the assembly line dud, or some weird occasional design misstep, you have a highly reliable piece of equipment in your hands. But why would you go backand when should you do it?
Now we're talking right? This is the reason for me to be writing tonight. "Paul, how can I buy some old shit to fit a needless niche in my life?" Glad you asked... Maybe we’re using computers wrong. Maybe the smart phone and the tablet should be our consumption devices and we should go back to focusing when we use a computer. If you’re interested in that idea you’re gonna keep reading, if only to hear the idea out. All that said, the person you should be getting/buying your old tech from is the frequent upgrader. This person has two or hree computers, they remember exactly what they paid for each computer and that is part of the reason for why they can't part with their classic collection. The frequent upgrader sometimes by default becomes a defacto collector cause their love for equipment never quite lines up with their acceptance of depreciation.
The upside of getting vintage hardware from the frequent upgrader is that they have the worlds best hardware (in this instance an eleven year old computer that is still banging around,) and the appropriate software suite to compliment it. What do we use computers for? We used to use great pieces of software and we'd store our files on the computer. The notion of the web as the resource for software, file storage and acting as virtual desktop is a new concept. What really muddies the water is that hardware for the last ten or so years has become "end of life" or retired cause of RAM constraints more than anything else. And I know for some that is a over simplification, but it isn't far off.
I guess the point is that most computers (when you're not buying cheap and underpowered) are potent for their time. This 12 inch powerbook that i'm writing on right now is more than powerful enough to write on and do simple image editing tasks and by simple I mean I can break out photoshop, work in layers and apply filters. I can also check my email and if I want to I can browse the web, but i can't open up twenty tabs and cruise to my hearts content. It's an interesting idea, but it's only an interesting idea if you want a great piece of hardware that has a very limited purpose, but man oh man, Apple makes some great computers.
This is a sneakernet thing though, while you can go online and buy an old powerbook for about three hundred dollars, you can skip the powerpc line and grab early macbooks and macbook airs for not much more money. No, you're gonna have to find people who have old powerbooks in their house and they can't just stand to get rid of them. The same person who couldn't bear to sell their computer for nearly nothing will give that computeraway if they think the other person will use it; sometimes we just want to know it found a good home.
So as deals come around. The first owner of the powerbook had really loved the computer, but they had killed it. I then came into possession of it and restored it, my initial investment was that I traded a LCD screen for it and I think that was it. It was a fair deal, a dead, slightly beat up 12 inch powerbook (and bag!) for a nice working LCD. I then sourced parts forthe powerbook and got it back up and running. It's possible I convinced my job to boot the costs, ahem... It was my main computer for a few years, till I upgraded to a 15inch powerbook. I then traded it for a nice road bike. My buddy I traded it too built the roadbike out of parts he had and some ebay deals. I got the upside of that deal, but only in the sense that the old apple hardware hold value and this computer has only depreciated about twenty five percent in the six years that I traded it away. Today i got it back and it cost me a LCD, we've come full circle.
How can it still be valuable, but not useful? And how did I get it back for a quarter of its value. One, it's great hardware, my ten year old pcs have not faired as well-so there is your physical value. Butthis computer is of no use to the person who wants to open a computer and have said computer be their looking glass to the Internet. Man, I really don't want that and there is a small contingency of people who also happen to be mac faithful who have computers which they use cause of the software, not the web-it is a novel concept. There isjust some amazing hardware and software out there, some truly great platforms that are nearly discarded cause of the web and cause of upgrades.
Here are the things I like the about the Powerbook 12
• Small form factor. She's dense but a very small package. Somehow the screen does not feel like a compromise though. Big upside versus the Portege
• The keyboard is a keyboard from ten years ago. They made great keyboards back then. They're really messing up keyboards now. This keyboard is dense, loud and has great travel. For a qwerty writer this keyboard is really quite pleasing.
• The mouse pad feels like something out of Germany, the click is loud and the action is clunky.
• The screen is a TFT XGA 1024x768 and it is both sharp yet somehow warm.
• OS X 10.5.8 is a pretty clean OS X instance from the past. If you're not doing a bunch of web stuff, or working to heavily in say Photoshop, you're in a very stable environment.
• Last thing. You have audio in and out jacks, firewire, ethernet, a modem, and a superdrive
• And you get that glowing apple on the back.
And here is the deal, mostly I want to type and leastly I want to web. I want a computer for computering. I know i'm writing this and putting it on the web-not sure if that is ironic, but there you have it. I'm gonna work on both machines and see how things shake out.
Magazine Articles
Mon 25 Jan 2016 09:19:19 PM EST
Today I began to wonder about what the transition must be like for corporate workers who go into other industries.
In my early professional years i'd read Time and Newsweek articles about people (usually well off boomers) who'd given up their high pay, high stress, high status jobs to make cheese, or become farmers, or learn to cobble shoes in Italy. Often times these fantastical stories had people who really struggled with the decision to go. Other times people were forced out with no choice, whether it was downsizing or burnout. And in many if not most of the stories the people either took their large savings, retirement fund or some other sum of money to jump start their new venture.
Trying to understsnd, decipher, make sense of or chart some plan reading magazine articles is for the birds.
I realize a huge part of my window onto the world was with magazine articles that explained life to me, except it didn't. In the same way that you really won't learn much about architecture reading Dwell; you really don't. You don't really learn much about the people, the human condition, or how to move through life with the contemporary magazine articles. But back then I had gone through my own transition and I didn't know it then, but I was looking for understanding.
I spent the first 14 years of my life upper lower class, I like to say. But even that assesment of my life is probably off. We werent lower class, we also weren't upper lower class. We were middle lower class. We didn't live in a ghetto. My father was not around though, so it was just my mother and I. We lived month to month and some months we did great, things would be stable, we might even go into a year or two of stability, inevitably we'd gypsy around though. By the time I was in my early twenties I was in my first decade of middle class life. We had moved on up as it was. My mother married, we moved to Atlanta, my step dad started a business and we busted our asses. If i'm going to be completely honest, they busted their asses and I took some advantage of the situation, but not nearly enough. We didn't know any better, any of us, we were riding by the seat of our pants. Hell, we were still living month to month, we were just on the upswing.
As I found myself building a career, moving up in the world, my parents were not able to help me very much with an outlook that offered any perspective on white collar, middle class living. Enter Time & Newsweek, US News, The Economist. There were not many "So you've become middle class! Here is what you should know" articles to read. Most of the articles were "White professionals have it good, even when they have to deal with change." And since that is what was out there, that is what I read. I also read the articles about how bleak it was for blacks, there were a lot of those.
Many of my life choices were framed by these people portrayed in the articles. Their life choices influenced my thinking and strategy. I didn't know it then, but I planned my life with the prism of "What would i do if I was white, successful and looking for a plan b that was both satisfying, fulfilling and still made enough money so that I wasn't destitue." I also entered the job force in the early nineties, which was a dreary time. The Savings and Loan disaster had happened, it was a brief blip in an otherwise already dreary time. Japan was beginning it's long recession and the eighties downturn looked like it was holding on to the first half of the nineties.
There is probably a box of magazines in my basement which chart my strategy in life.
I didn't do too bad...
I'm currently on sabbatical and debating if I am touristing around another industry or if i am leaving IT. A part of me does not want to embrace this new thing. If you've ever written a plan for yourself and given your future self instructions for how to live life, don't stop working on the plan for future you. Future you gets pretty dependent on your forward looking assessments to plan their life out. Problem is old me doesn't read those magazines anymore. Old me is disappointed with current me and what I made of my life. Current me doesn't know what the fuck is going on, future me is waiting for instruction.
Miscellaneous
I spent a few hours in the XP build trying to make it as lean as possible. Out with Java. Out with Flash, no programs loading with startup. But I still prefer to not be in a "rich" OS. So i'm back in Peppermint working with "Gedit" a no frills text editor. It looks like it has three features, it can save a doc, insert date and time and spell check-we'll see about that.
Spellcheck doesn't work... So it has two really good features.
I don't know how to feel about LED bulbs.
I have some big decisions to make, all of them change my life in a dramatic way, kinda scary.