Dex's blog

Vox Hunt: Latest Read

Book: Show us the latest book you bought, borrowed or received.

JavaServer Faces: The Complete Reference (Complete Reference Series)

Chris Schalk

Yeah...exciting stuff.  *eye roll*

Getting organized

For the past couple of days I've been on what I can only call a hyperproductivity streak. 

Since I was feeling pretty brain dead this afternoon after a spate of intense meetings in the morning, I decided to spend some time going through all of the stuff on/around my desk and getting things in order.  In this case "in order" means going through my stuff and deciding what is actually *stuff* and what is stuff that I don't need and has clearly met its endtime.

By the time I was done, my recycle bin was full, my trash bin was half-full, my file cabinet was considerably whittled down, and my in-tray had gone from being so full that it sagged in the middle to having exactly four paper-clipped small bundles of paper in it.  Each of those four items now has a post-it stuck to it letting me know exactly what action I need to take with the information.

And in my bag right now is a list of all of the action items I've had floating around in my head over the past couple of weeks--some are personal (like "take shoes to repair shop"), some are for personal projects (like "put camera in bag), and others are for work (like "prep for candidate interview").  I'll be spending some time this evening getting those sorted into something more manageable than a piece of paper in my notebook.

I also need to remember to put together the file storage/roller thing that's been sitting in my closet for about a year.  Something else to add to that list...

(I truly worry about the destruction that will commence if I get a wild hair and try to attempt this at home.)

Good Intentions...

Why can't I seem to remember to take my camera with me when I leave my office during the day?  I remember to put it into my (fabulous, new) bright orange messenger bag in the morning when I leave the house, but then I promptly forget that I have it with me.

I know this is hampering one of the personal projects I've been trying to get off the ground recently, but I can't seem to shake it.  Annoying.

On an unrelated note, how can I get the following two comments about my attire/appearance on the same day?
Co-worker 1: You kind of look like a pirate today.
ten minutes later...
Co-worker 2:  Wow, you look so...conservative...today.

What?  So I look like a conservative pirate?  I mean, I realize I wore my hair down today, eschewing my usual borderline pomapadour/high roll with exposed shaved sides (ala a mohawk), for the first time since I got the notion to take clippers to hair a few weeks ago.  But, really. Conservative?  A pirate?   WTF?

Gorgeously Galliano

I know it's a few weeks after the fact, and I don't know how in the world I let it slip past me, but... Have you seen Galliano's Christian Dior Spring 2007 Couture collection?  In a word:  OhMyGawd.

I don't know how he manages to completely blow me away season after season, but he does.  I feel like I'm still recovering from his Spring 2006 Dior Couture show--the dark moody, almost gothy, post-industrial thing he had going on then was scorchingly hot.

And now he's shown another flash of the kind of almost theatrical, costume-y brilliance that in recent years only he has been able to carry off with aplomb.  If he weren't such a strange little troll himself, I'd have to worship him a little.

Anthony Bourdain gives it to me just right...

I've said it many times before, but I have a raging hard-on for Anthony Bourdain.  I always have.  He's like the poster boy for Charming Assholes the world over.  His latest commentary on Food Network chefs has my naughty bits quite warm...

A snippet from the above, this one on the much-beloved Rachael Ray:

Complain all you want. It’s like railing against the pounding surf. She only grows stronger and more powerful. Her ear-shattering tones louder and louder. We KNOW she can’t cook. She shrewdly tells us so. So...what is she selling us? Really? She’s selling us satisfaction, the smug reassurance that mediocrity is quite enough. She’s a friendly, familiar face who appears regularly on our screens to tell us that “Even your dumb, lazy ass can cook this!” Wallowing in your own crapulence on your Cheeto-littered couch you watch her and think, “Hell…I could do that. I ain’t gonna…but I could--if I wanted! Now where’s my damn jug a Diet Pepsi?” Where the saintly Julia Child sought to raise expectations, to enlighten us, make us better--teach us--and in fact, did, Rachael uses her strange and terrible powers to narcotize her public with her hypnotic mantra of Yummo and Evoo and Sammys. “You’re doing just fine. You don’t even have to chop an onion--you can buy it already chopped. Aspire to nothing…Just sit there. Have another Triscuit…Sleep….sleep….”

Oh how I adore a man who can string together a proper rant.

F*ck Powerpoint

Like anyone who has had to sit through presentations, training sessions, or talks at professional conferences, I have developed what I consider a healthy hate of Powerpoint.  And certainly in my many past roles as a project manager, ui designer, usability evangelist, and information architect I've trotted out a few Powerpoint presentation of my own...though I have to admit that I've apologized more than once to my audience for perpetrating such crimes against them.

When I ran across the following clip on YouTube, I nearly creamed myself.  Fuck nearly.  I totally creamed myself.

This is how it should be done.  Want to get a message across?  Make it interesting.  Make it compelling.  Make sure it's not static.  (And no, a few lines zooming in across your slide while text rotates into place isn't going to cut it.)

I'm not particularly interested in the actual content of the message here.  To be honest, I'm more than a little "Web 2.0"d out.  But I'll be damned if I didn't sit and watch the whole thing.

Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us

Imagine the day when sitting through some talk at a conference when something like this would be playing on the big screen behind the presenter.  I'd be willing to bet money you wouldn't be barely holding on to wakefulness then.  Hell, I think even I could manage to sit through another douche giving a "Power of Community and Web 2.0" talk if I had something pretty to look at during...and a nice, dry martini to sip on.

Lots of talking...

These are the reasons I don't hate my job today:

1. The opportunity to rail on Agile development methodologies within a service oriented architecture.
2. Verbal smackdowns of bitchy technical architects who are a little too used to getting their way.
3. Back hallway standards discussions leading to plots to subvert the man.

Despite being physically tired, I'm mentally flying high.

I feel a treatise on Agile in an enterprise environment coming on soon...

Fickle fascinations...

A conversation last night (I was drunk, and therefore babbling) prompted me to go looking for some of the shots I'd taken at the height of my toy/vintage/crappy camera obsession a few years back.  I'm now remembering all of the fun I had with those cameras, and kicking myself a little for not keeping up with this thing that usd to bring me such sublme pleasure.

This is the first picture I ever snapped with my Holga.  I happened upon this ashcan that someone had drawn a heart in outside of a little mom and pop store on the side of a highway on the way to Leavenworth.  I have a framed print of this on my desk at work, because I love it that much.

Ash_heart_02c

And this is the one that seems to be everyone else's favorite Holga snap from my collection.  It's a bench in some random park out on the peninsula.

Bench

When asked last night, I came up with my Falcon Mini-Cam Junior as my favorite camera from my (ridiculously large) collection of crappy cameras.  It's a small bakelite camera manufactured in the 1930's that takes "vest pocket" 127 film, and yields a 4x4 or 4x6 negative.  Here's some shots from that one:

And last on the medium format front, a few shots from the last trip I made out to the Hoh with my Lubitel in hand.

I realized this morning while letting my eyes roam over the shelves in my living room that I have a great many camers that I've never taken out for use in the wild.  And I have a lunchbox full of film.  That's just ridiculous.  I may just have to rememedy this situation soon...

That's about right...

Dilbert_ui

QotD: Right Before I Doze Off

What's the last thing you usually do or think about before you fall asleep?

Do? Masturbate (or have sex, depending on if I'm alone in bed or not)

Think about?  "Damn, I'm good."