From time to time I get antsy about my own existence and try to come up with plans for making it better, more valid; prosperous, fulfilling and extraordinary. This weekend I have decided I need some new shelves.
Ever since I moved back into this place, I have decided to minimalise my life. I don’t want loads of useless things that I will use perhaps once a year and discard in an unloved heap in some dark corner. This has served me reasonably well up until recently, at which point I started rooting around in packing boxes looking for things I’d previously shelved but not forgotten about. The result is a magnificent mess everywhere because I’ve got nowhere to put any of my new old stuff.
Wouldn’t it be great if I had a place to put other things? I think my life would be so much better if I were to go out and buy furniture, and in fact I’m going to tell myself sternly that this is precisely what I’m going to do. When I get around to it.
The real solution is quite obviously to put everything away again, but that requires far more proactive effort on my part than dreaming of minor life renovations and implementing no change whatsoever. You may point out that this is a character flaw, but I’ll politely ignore remarks like those.
- Posted August 1, 2010
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The week as sort of melted away. I find myself in the second half with little recollection as to how I got here. I have given up on trying to do anything constructive on weekdays, after work. I burn out far too easily, which is sad because I don’t do nearly as much work as some people I know.
Despite forcing myself to take things slowly, I am left with the nagging feeling of not having any free time. It’s uncanny and completely unfair, but I guess it’s a side effect of full time work. I ended up buying myself a laptop at least, which is another.
- Posted July 28, 2010
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Turns out the Dell notebook I was looking at, agonising over, and eventually going to buy has today jumped $500 in price. It was an attractive price to start with, but now by comparison it seems like a total waste of money. It’s not that good a machine, but it hit a sweet spot in the lower price bracket.
Now I don’t want it, and I’m not sure what to do. It seems that the two big qualities I’m looking for in a laptop are possibly a bit unrealistic.
- Solid-state disk,
- Reasonable display.
The advent of the catchphrase “high definition” has stymied laptop displays, and it seems the standard resolution has become x by 720 as a result. Even on higher end products it’s disappointing to note that there’s been absolutely no progress on screen definition over the last, what, five years? Sweeping generalisations aside, I have given up on finding a laptop with a workable screen resolution because they just don’t exist.
The disk is less important because I can always replace it, but buying a laptop with both optical and magnetic storage I will never use angsts me terribly. If I’m going to buy a laptop only to swap bits out, it kind of defeats the purpose.
In five years time I suspect this won’t be such a problem, but until then it looks like I’m going to be settling for hardware that I don’t need or want and won’t be happy with. That said, I do crave portability and want to get my grubby hands on a mobile computery something pretty damn soon. The question is “what”?
- Posted July 24, 2010
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My angry driving catchphrase is “where’s your indicator, dickhead?” as I come to a complete and unexpected stop behind some cretin turning right across two lanes of unbroken peak hour traffic.
I’ve been without my bike for a week because apparently that’s how long it takes to charge someone $300 to twiddle some knobs. If I knew more and cared even slightly I’d learn how to service my own damn bike, but until there’s any incentive I’ll continue to be surprised by unexpected bills such as this.
I really want to get myself a new bike all of my very own, but it’s a massive purchase and I still don’t know enough about bikes to know what I want. I think I want a sweet road bike so that I can zoom past the traffic and get to work in five minutes flat, but I’m concerned about the amount of maintenance it will require going backward and forward through the most filthy and industrial side streets of Eagle Farm all week.
I will have to do some reading up and work out exactly what I want. I might have to go to a workshop or something and see if I can pick up some tricks.
As I motored in to the bicycle superstore tonight with bike rack in tow, I couldn’t help but feel relieved. Even the extra eighty bucks extortion I handed over from this second lot of repairs was fine, because it means I can stop stressing about transport. I like riding to work because of the freedom it provides, and relying on buses and trains and cars is terribly crass. Maybe I will be happier now.
- Posted July 22, 2010
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I’m about to head to work, but I thought I’d blog about yesterday first because being in a rush makes me feel important.
Yesterday Matt and I cycled to Landsborough from Burpengary. It was about forty-something kilometres and was mostly flat, but it was awesome to be out riding (not to work) again for the first time in ages. We had rum and wedges at the Landsborough Hotel, then caught a train back to Caboolture.
It was loads of fun and I vow to start cycling more outside of commuting to work.
- Posted July 4, 2010
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Simon Pascal Klein
Tate Johnson