The F91W experiment has been a success: I am mindful. but documenting it here is onerous so I have decided to end it. Thank you for reading.
The trouble with being half ill is that it is difficult to assign a proper cause: you end up blaming what you’re doing not what you did.
I don’t know if it is something to do with having short hair, but I have an overwhelming desire to start doing yoga again.
Head aching after being dumped in the deep end of an Olympic-sized project without any floatation aids.
Sunny but cool, a dualistic day. The brain needs the window open, the body wants it closed.
Incipient hayfever is becoming more cipient, it drags me down to lethe’s snotty jaws, where I am consumed.
I love the smell of university libraries: its an air of neglect combined with the aura of being safe, unlike in council libraries.
I now completely filter out the chime on my watch, which is worrying and interesting, perhaps being hit on the back with bamboo might work?
Considering the ethics of selling an iPod Touch to my spouse. Either I should give it to her or not mention it. Otherwise it is a bit mean.
Tired now, after staying up late reading Andrew Juniper’s book on Wabi Sabi. I found it compelling but unbearably light.
The sound of the servers cooling their innards, immobile plants longing for summer, dust accumulating in a hair strand cul-de-sac.
Trucks rumble past and shake the building, the rat in my throat has shrunk the size of a mouse, papers pile up on all desks except mine.
Throat still sore, mind still fugged, feet still cold, but feeling much better after singing along to Grease.
Doing one thing at a time, unfortuately that one thing is puzzling over what it is that I should be doing.
Outside, the faint cry stupefied drunks incapable of celebrating their victory. Inside, a shiver, a croak and an irrational groan.
That thing in my throat yesterday: tonsilitis. A dampener. Francesca Woodman will have to wait.
Is it that time already? Conclusion: Life is easy, as long as you’re brave enough.
Weird. The volume on my watch alters depending on how often I click the function buttons. A design flaw in the f91w or delusional deafness?
I sometimes feel like I am in a world populated by people from an Alan Bennett monologue. Those wistful glances, the revealing line . . .
Lectured yesterday on how I should wear a cycle helmet even when I rarely go on the road. More worried about Roy Porter or Doug Adams death.
The weekly review mindsweep ram dump is such a relief. My interior mental furniture is in order with excellent feng shui.
A very productive morning. Maybe it is my new lack of hair. Maybe not. Either way, I am slightly perturbed that no one has commented on it.
Light headed without my hair, cooler, spiky, listening to Sterelab, legs crossed at ankles, poor posture, the rat of hayfever in my throat.
I thought this Facebook phishing scam was an intelligence test of sorts, but now I realise it is an ingenuousness test. Alas, I am a cynic.
All my hair cut off. “Have you lost your strength like Samson”, said the wife. Apparently not, and now she’s in casualty. Whoops.
My eyes are Blears, my hair is Straw, my Balls are aching for my Darling, when I am old like Beckett I will doubtless have a Jowell.
Am worried that learning Flash isn’t going to as easy as I hoped it might, my brain is palpably stretching with the cognitive dissonance.
How many times have I done something for the last time? When does a man resign himself to indulgence?
Everyone has short hair: conservative cuts, neat hirsutitude, skin shaved clean. Tonight I will join the massed ranks of hairless purists.
Nattering cacophonious voices, the buzz of activity, daddy longlegs walking over the meniscus of thought.
An empty CCA, the Aye-aye books a welcome distraction, the Dada almanac looks interesting. Where’s Rob?
Stillness. The things I have seen. Consumed in the moment, looked back on as something strange and obscene.
Half of my todo list is now a todone list. Finished all the itty bitty annoying things and am now going to move onto the capacious big ones.
We have IQ and EQ, but what about a quotient for a person’s ability to make long term decisions?
Waiting for the app to deploy whilst reading Sam Anderson on the benefits of distraction: http://is.gd/AUzo
Just read a brilliant PKD story, The Chromium Fence, about a world divided into Purists and Naturalists. Which one am I?
Bracing myself for a long rush-hour cycle to Paisley through the acrid streets of Glasgow.
If you consume the bad, it will make way for the good, says the easter egg chocolate. Eat me, go on, before I’ve can really get my claws in.
One thing at a time, like a cone, everything centres on the central point – wit, sharp consciousness, it all comes from being able to focus.
After years of saying I would learn Flash I’ve now put myself in the position of having to learn it. See also Daffy Duck and the Golden Egg.
Getting money from the government for an old junk car, leaving your partner for a world where you can be the star.
9pm, night for me, yet still light, the sky a million shades of grey. Back in front of the screen, familiar, homely. Waiting for day to end.
Watching Brideshead Revisited to remind myself what Sebastian Flyte is actually like and whether it augurs well for my nephew.
Shattered. Literally. My consciousness exists as tiny shards of thought: useless, sharp, and shiny.
Somehow managed to destroy my lovingly sculpted firefox profile of all its passwords and add-ons. Am now bereft, unbelieving, angry.
A new bike, awkward and ungainly, no good for long distance cycling. Not yet. A new fear, that it will be stolen before I can enjoy it.
Strange atmosphere. People making lifechanging decisions for which the reasons are unclear. Me? I keep on keeping on.
A weekend’s worth of ffffound to catch up on leaves me overwhelmed with creative possibilities and filled with regret of not doing it first.
Creeping inevitable hayfever explodes out of my nose, pouncing on my tired body like a tiger, leaving me ravaged and luckless.
Watching Super size me with Mum and Laura whilst feeling bloated after curry.
Relaxing in front of hignfy with Dad, Gran, Corinne, and Laura. Strangely desolate. Me that is.
Avoiding getting in the way of my Dad who is as prickly as a hedgehog when focused on making dinner.
Explaining mindfulness to my Gran. What are you going to do with the next hour? Am I going home? She says. Where do I live?
Wondering what book to read on the plane. My first instinct was the Beckett Trilogy, but I somehow think it isn’t appropriate.
Starting the long slow path to grid based perfection, cross site enlightenment, and the tao of web design.
Email would be a lot more useful (in productivity terms) if you only got it once a day, like normal mail.
Weird to be at work with my big thick black rimmed spectacles on. I wonder if a goldfish sees differently outside their tank.
Thinking about line-height whilst listening to A Saucerful of Secrets. I love Pink Floyd, as the Sex Pistols almost said.
Man is defined by the decisions he makes, especially the decision to be indecisive. It doesn’t matter what you know if you can’t decide.
Cooking butternut squash, courgette, prawns, peppers, baby plum tomatoes and brown rice. Virtuous food tastes much nicer.
In my diary from 2000 I frequently wrote a single word – Nothing. Retrospectively, this can’t be true, but today is one of those days.
Eerie silence. Things are being mulled over. They see a forking path, which one looks the most attractive. They take the plunge. We accept.
Webdesign is, for the most part, a mathematical problemsolving discipline and like maths there are occasional moments of vertiginous beauty.
Really huge pannier bags under my eyes, shame I’m not doing the shopping today.
Wondering how people who sell wordpress themes make money when there is such an abundance of free ones available.
How much are you worth? How much do you think you’re worth? If only people were like objects and had price tags.
Uninstalling Fireworks CS4, a really terrible upgrade to what was a fantastic application. Adobe, why are you so clunky?
I have a new nephew, Sebastian! According to wikipedia, he shares a birthday with Florence Nighingale, Joseph Beuys, and Ian Dury.
After trying kung-fu and octopush, I’ve decided to focus my sport-related efforts on cycling and yoga. Now where can I go cycling?
I’ve never seen people look more happy than when engaged in exploitation and nefarious deeds, worth watching out for that, I think.
I was counselling Laura about how to avoid firefighting all the time at work. But what can you do when there are so many pyromaniacs?
Congratulations to my sister and her family who have had another baby. Not sure what sex it is yet, but can’t wait to meet it.
Serious problems – what to do – we should do something shouldn’t we? – but what – let me think – I know – what? – no . . . – lunch? – yeah
Is Kaizen is a selling point in an age of revolutionary exponential improvements technology? Small, iterative changes to make things better.
Enjoying browsing the incomparable site showcase http://is.gd/z6RI . So rare to have one put together by someone with a really good eye.
A dreamfilled sleep with characters from the past – Paula and Michael Brett, Karen Miksza. Like knots in the past, tripping up the future.
1980 wasn’t as good as 1974, dragged down by the aesthetic and the music, but I was still very impressed. How did I miss it first time?
Looking forward to watching the second of the Red Riding films based on David Peace’s books. 1974 was so so well done: http://is.gd/ySGA
Planning whilst tired is like swimming with your clothes on: heavy, awkward, and clingy. Tho’ not as bad as writing aphorisms whilst tired.
Deploy. Scar. Ring. Headphones. Compiling. Mouse. Mug. Reloading. Error. Shirt button. Pen. Laptop. Notepad. Neil Scott: this is your life.
Anti-celebrity is beyond banality, it is the invisible reality beneath the spectacle, it is fumbling, softly-spoken, redundant.
Happy listening to Michael Jackson for the first time in a year . . . the joy of rediscovery, like blossom bursting forth on aged branches.
Wondering about whether the intuitiveness of infinite scroll ( http://is.gd/yOpi ) outweighs the potential usability issues.
Time + curiousity – reality = foolish scheme to redesign internet. Really enjoying my work at the moment but don’t want to take on too much.
A 10am satsuma, ever so slightly dessicated. Quiet Monday morning as the juice (or jouissance?) of the weekend is squeezed out of you.
Procrasturbatory, unmindful, egotistic, looking over my todo list with an admixture of ennui and horror. But last night’s OMG was brill.
Unearthing old teenage lyrics and poetry for OMG, a confessional comedy night at Offshore Cafe in Glasgow. It starts at 8.
Finished my work for the day and looking forward to going out to take photos of… I don’t know what, but my foto blog is feeling neglected.
Really enjoying working on a creative services website, I’ve done about 34 iterations so far and it feels like it is almost there.
Why do I always wake up early? Still at least I have tea and motd. Dinner party was great; music by Stereolab.
Preparing for a dinner party. I’m cooking simple hors d’ouevres and drinking tawny port. Going to get the music right this time.
http://twitpic.com/4u8xz – Putting together a slightly wonky regional map of the UK. It looks weird but strangely appropriate, I don’t k …
Joining Black Squadron, apparently, merely through listening to Adam and Joe right from the beginning. Wonder what music they’ll play.
Arranging my financial folder, throwing away dead receipts, date ordering statements, whilst listening to the Collings and Herrin podcast.
A rush to leave, to embrace the freedom of the weekend: how light is your step, how much baggage do you carry from the working week?
Discussing if there is such a thing as optimum global population or if overpopulation is just a conspiracy theory of the rich.
Weekly review time, which involves downloading the ram (and the sheep and goats) from my brain using this pdf: http://is.gd/xKo5
Listening to Henry Blofeld’s strangely irate podcast: http://is.gd/xJdq Is he still on Test Match Special? I hope so.
Small scar on my hand, the faces people pull at their computers, the futility of overhead lights in a sun-filled room, an empty task list.
After spurning last night’s meaningless audiovisual innovations at the CCA, I find myself enjoying the authenticity of Jackson Browne.