It just dawned on me, that I will be traveling to Ames Iowa this week, just in time for the Micro.blog photo challenge! I’m not sure what kind of town Ames is going to be but it’ll be a different scene. All I know is that it’s going to be cold af 🥶, which I’m not that excited about. Regardless, I’ll be taking my camera 📷 with me and find a thing or two to snap.
I have a few ideas (or projects) in mind for my blog that I’d like to get to in the next few days or so:
I am going to attempt to add categories to the posts, like some other members of Micro.blog have done. I am not super technical savvy when it comes to do any major customization to my themes but know enough to figure things out. And if worse comes to worst, I’ll just start bothering people in the Slacks.
I need to redo my About page, just because.
And that’s about it — I think.
Dealing with ‘Friendship Overload’ in the Age of Social Media - Literary Hub
It feels shameful to admit that, sometimes, staying on top of communication with friends can seem more like a chore than a pleasure—just another piece of after-hours life admin. These are supposed to be your friends, after all.
Great read and thank you for @vasta for sharing it. So many things in this article struck a few cords. I do feel like a bad friend a lot of times when I either take forever to respond to a message or haven’t touched base with a good friend for a while — even family.
I have gotten to the point where I have to re-charge my AirPods at least 3 to 4 times a day. Luckily they do charge pretty fast. After that, I may get close to two hours of Podcast time before they die again. I don’t find it aggravating, I mean these are first-generation AirPods, it is has been a couple of years now. More than aggravating it is more of an inconvenient-or annoyiense.
I could use my Power Beats Pro, instead, so far they las forever but they are not ideal for long periods. After two hours or so they start bothering me a little bit, like behind my ears. And they are usually inside my car since I use them mostly for the gym and I don’t want to go to my car to go get them – because I am lazy it’s freaking cold out.
So the obvious solution would be, buying the new AirPods Pro!!!
This probably won’t happen, I’ve already spent 250.00 UDS on the PBP not too long ago.
That being said. I will consider buying another pair when I get to the point of recharging at least 5-6 times a day. 😝
On-this-Day does it again, bringing back some memories. A year ago today I posted this blog-post.
On April 16, 2018, I was hired as a Quality Specialist for a new company in town, not science-related but one that I could use my “quality assurance” skills. It’s been almost a year and it’s going well, I like the job just fine, I have met new people, new friends, new challenges and learning new things and skills. But… and not to disparage my current job but that feeling of proudness and self-worth I had, it isn’t quite there. I don’t feel like I’m miserable at the job but I often have these feelings of doubt. If this what I really want to do? Should I be doing something different? Or I just need time to move on and adjust to my new career? Is this the show?
It was pretty interesting reading this because I still remember every sentiment or the feelings behind each word. My frustration at the time and the feeling of, maybe failure. It has been a year now since that post so I guess I should maybe update.
I no longer have those feelings of doubt or feeling miserable. I am not depressed about my job anymore, I am quite happy now. As most of you know I started a new job, back on August 26th, 2019 (science-related) and I love it. I am not in a lab anymore, I am now on a different kind of role and I love it. Fantastic company awesome management, I have also met new people whilst still keeping in touch with the awesome people from my previous job. I am in a good place and I very much appreciate that.
Obviously, no everything is peaches and cream, there are a few things to work on but that is life.
As I have said many times before, it is always nice to look back and see where you were and where you’re now. Get reminded that struggles don’t last forever. They either get overcame or simply worked around.
I am having a little bit of a conundrum. This coming week, I am traveling for work, to Iowa of all places. Not super excited, simply because the idea of going somewhere that is colder than Idaho it’s just not it (😐). Nevertheless, in the past every time I’ve traveled for work, with me I’ll be carrying a laptop computer – my work computer – and an iPad. Well, this time around I won’t be having the iPad with I. Remember, I gave it away, to my lady? Usually, on work-related trips, I mostly will be using my computer but the iPad usually becomes my hotel tv, it’s where I’d watch Netlfix or the Hulus – for media consumption only. What now? What will I use now? I wonder.
One thought and probably the easiest answer to this problem is to take my Macbook Pro with me. However, that would mean I’ll be carrying two laptop machines, in my backpack. I am not sure if I really want to do that nor have I tried to shove two laptops in my super-dupper-fancy Peak Desing 20L Everyday Backpack. My work computer, I consider it a Bahamut, it’s an HP something – 15'' I believe. The Mac isn’t that big or heavy, it’s just a 13" and pretty slim, but still. I am thinking about how much weight this will add plus TSA and all that. Plus besides the two machines, I’ll also have the Nintendo Switch (can’t travel without it), my camera and lenses and all the dongleses and cableses!
I don’t know, we will see.
UNRELATED:
I was thinking about Tom & Jerry this morning and that I could never figure out who was Tom and who was Jerry when I was a kid. 🤔
Like every morning I had my Greca ready, turned the stove on and walked away. I finished up getting ready and by the time I was done so it was the “coffee”, in theory. The water had boiled passing through the “ground coffee” and ready to be served. Well, as I was pouring it, I noticed my “coffee” was way to clear, not very coffee-like looking. At that point I had realized, I never put coffee grounds in the damn thing (😂).
I am loosing it more and more everyday.
Don’t you find yourself missing some good-old software (or apps in this case)? I have been using iOS as my primary platform of choice and consequentially the iPhone, since the iPhone 4. Since then I have, as you can imagine, purchased a number of apps of different kinds. Note-taking apps, email clients, twitter clients, etc. A few of these made a huge impact on my ‘productivity’ or they even defined the next generation of apps.
Here is my list of apps (or software) that were or are my favorites and in some way, I miss having today. Some of these have not been updated in at least two years or so and may still be around in the App Store and others got pulled and/or retired, for obvious reasons.
Vesper, Still to this date my favorite note-taking app, loved the design and typography and how simple it was. I miss it greatly.
Mailbox, This email client redefined, at least for me, what email should be like. And I dare to say that many email clients nowadays have followed suit.
Dispatch, This was another favorite email client of mine. Until recently it was still been promoted by the App Store and yet it hadn’t been updated in two years or so.
Blink, Blink was/is a great way to create iTunes affiliate links on iOS. I believe it’s been retired from the App Store a while ago, I still use it when writing some of my posts to get nice markdown links to apps, Movies, Music and Books that can be found in the app store or iTunes. It is still part of my toolbox in a way, same with Associate for Amazon links.
Editorial, My second Tex editor I have ever used and it was great. My first was Byword which it’s still alive and kicking! I really enjoyed Editorial and I’m sure a lot of people still like it but, it hasn’t been updated in a while and so many other apps have gotten so much better.
I was listening to this podcast, called NOS REIREMOS DE ESTO! (We will laugh at this!). I am not a hundred percent sure of the idea or the premise of the show. All I know is that they’re two comedians in Miami and they’ve got a show. Though the reason I am listening is that their guest in this episode is Chente Ydrach. He is a Youtuber, podcaster and comedian from back home that I listen to often and he’s currently on tour in the US, a comedy tour. He is part of a group of comedians and they do improv, I believe its called Esoez. As he was explaining to the hosts about the group, he mentioned a motto or tagline that they’ve come up with to best describe the group’s intention or the idea behind the group, in away.
“Dándole Buenas Oportunidades a malas ideas” (Giving good opportunities to bad ideas).
That resonated with me. If this blog had a tagline, that would probably be it right there. I do nothing but give myself the opportunity – or liberty – to express and put out in the form of writing tons and tons of bad and/or dumb ideas/thoughts.
So yeah, if you have a’dumb' thought and think it might be a bad idea – publish it!.
It is very rare that I’d workout on a Sunday. Sundays are usually donation days (Plasma donation) and the process leaves me not feeling too awesome at times. Ergo, the reason I don’t do much intense physical activities. Today though, a little after diner, I decided to do a little bit of a workout, something “light” but still.
Well, it was a failure! The moment I dropped on the floor the girls starting jumping on me, laughing and playing. So today I logged a 4 minute workout. 😅
Name: Mosaic Double IPA
Style: American Imperial IPA
Brewer: Belching Beaver Brewery - California
ABV: 8.8
IBU:
Rating: 5/5
Notes: very smooth, for an imperial.
I’ll be dammed, this is a great double IPA! Brewed with 100% Mosaic hops this beer is packed with complex aromas showcasing crushed grapes, citrus, passion fruit and grape fruit. The finish is dry and slightly sweet.
Cool music , whether they were singles or albums, that I listened this week.
Name: Future Legend Hazy IPA
Style: New England IPA
Brewer: Terminal Gravity Brewing Company - Oregon
ABV: 6.9
IBU:
Rating: 5/5
Notes:
Future Legend Hazy IPA is both hazy and juicy, coming in at 6.9% with significant notes of mango and guava. It is double dry hopped, which gives off a robust hop aroma. Future Legend uses Citra and Denali hops as well as an experimental hop variety known only as 07270. Gold rush malt from Baker City makes up part of the malt bill.
Name: What’s in the hops.
Style: Hazy India Pale Ale
Brewer: Belching Beaver - California
ABV: 6.5
IBU: No sé
Rating: 5/5
Notes: very floral and citrusy — loved it!
What’s In The Hops?! Hazy IPA our 7th Anniversary Beer release! Don’t lose your head over the insane amount of hops we used in this beer to create a paragon of dank and juicy flavors.
Name: Bourbon Barrel Aged 18LB Imperial Porter
Style: American Imperial Porter
Brewer: Georgetown Brewing Company - Washington, US
ABV: 11
IBU: No sé
Rating: 5/5
Notes: anything that is bourbon barrel aged I’m a sucker for. Not a huge fan of porters but this one it’s pretty good!
According to Day One, two years ago today, I dropped my MacBook Pro 💻
Ouch
Today I went to my local coffee shop and whilst I was drinking coffee I found a job to apply for. On a sad note, was going to take a picture of a tree 🌳, took out the camera and accidentally dropped my backpack 🎒on the concrete. Now the Mac 💻 has an ouchy in one corner 😅
The ouchy is still there, covered with a sticker. You know what they say, “out of sight, out of mind”.
Thinking back, I can’t believe it’s been 2 years. To me it feels like it’s been much longer or almost didn’t happen at all.
They were very dark times. I was unemployed. At that point I had been without a job for five months or so — I think. Besides my profesional life being a dump, also my personal life. I was a fool and in deep depression and unfortunately, the way I cope with depression is by buying things. For example, this MacBook Pro and many other things that later on would get me in some financial trouble. Because then again, I was an idiot 😅.
I like very little, remembering, thinking and writing about these things, to be very honest. But sometimes it’s also good to look back and see how far you’ve come. And to put things in perspective and focus on the things that still need some ‘work’.
IN OTHER NEWS:
Workout this morning was pretty gnarly 😅.
My current blogging workflow it’s both simple and complicated – in a way. Most of my writing it’s on iOS, using my iPhone XS and Drafts as my main text editor. I have used almost every text editor under the sun and I still like most of them, like iA Writer and Ulysses being the most recent but Drafts makes posting to Micro.blog much easier. I don’t like composing in iA Writer (or Ulysses) and then having to copy and paste when I can, again, just do everything from one app. And again this is all done on the phone. I can compose and even add images to Drafts using shortcuts and Drafts actions. Super simple, no friction, chin-boom-baam (as we say back home).
If you read my unprofessional blog, you’ll know that I gave my iPad away a while back. Consequently, if I am not writing on my phone, I am probably using my Mac, there I use Drafts for Mac and especially since its got Actions Support. This makes my workflow just as easy as it is on iOS, except when having to add in-line images. Then it gets a little tricky (🎶 It’s Tricky to rock a rhyme, to rock a rhyme that’s right on time
It’s tricky, tricky (Tricky) tricky 🎶) because currently there aren’t shortcuts support on the Mac. So typically what I would do is use Micro.blog on the web and paste my text there and upload the images. I have been playing with the idea to use MarsEdit at it works great but, still, not sure about that one.
If I am at work, well it can go either way, I can either compose using my phone or like I am doing right now I would use Grammarly. Most of the time it’s just easier to open a tab on Chrome with Grammarly and type away rather than reach for my phone, plus it helps with my grammar. So if you notice some inconsistency in my grammar well, some posts are made using Grammarly and 60 percent of them aren’t. Again, very simple, I compose using Grammarly, copy and paste to the Micro.blog site. I have played in the past with Quill it is a good option if I ever needed to include images to my posts, which I have done before, but is not the usual.
I don’t keep anything I post per se. If it is composed in Drafts, it gets archived or deleted, If I write using Grammarly I think it gets saved on the website but a lot of times I cut and then paste so sometimes they don’t even get saved at all.
I think that is it – for now.
One method of writing - Austin Kleon
Make note of every dumb thought that occurs to you throughout the day.
Tomorrow morning, pick the thought you think is the least dumb and write more about it.
I like this, in fact, I do this in a way. Except that whatever dumb thought that occurs to me, ends up published the same day. 🤪
What makes a task so mundane that it can’t go into your task-manager of choice?
This is something I hear a lot, “you don’t add ‘take the trash out’ to your tasks manager!” But, why not? A task is a task. Ain’t it? I mean, I understand, we all have our ways to organize things in different buckets and that’s all fine and dandy. But a lot of times it’s been portrayed as, adding a “mundane” task to your sytem, it’s a big fat no-no. I feel tasks-managing-shamed every time I hear this, el-oh-el.
“You are task-managing wrong!!
The only things I consider not to go into my current tasks manager are reoccurring tasks but more specifically, bills. Why is that? Well, since I jump from system to system (judge not – I may cry) there are a few things that I do not want to lose or mess up with, I think. Those would be my bills and my medication, so those have always lived in Reminders and will probably stay that way until the end of times, or until I have paid all my bills, whichever comes first (most likely the end of times 😅). Everything else, no matter what it is, does go into my task manager.
Lately, I have been using Todoist, again. It integrates well with my day-to-day activities since, unfortunately, everything at my current job it’s Windows-based. This is kind of a shame because I did pay a lot of money for both OmniFocus and/or Things 3. I do own these two in every platform (Mac, iOS and iPad), except Windows of course. But I am enjoying Todoist a lot, the Natural Language Parser it’s hard to beat, making quick capturing things super easy and very little or no friction at all.
It’s cool.
IN OTHER NEWS:
Bad night last night. The girls didn’t sleep well. Which means mama and papa didn’t sleep well either. I have warned my coworkers that I may fall asleep at any given moment.
According to my On this day, I had linked to this article, a year ago today and gave it another read. And found another gem in it.
Things you shouldn’t give a fuck about
- What other people think about you
- Whether or not other people like you
- Whether or not other people approve of your decisions
- The things you can’t control and can’t change
- The expectations of others – unless it’s your boss or your customers
- The opinions of others – especially those who don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about
- Celebrity gossip
- The latest trends
- The news – 99% is just clickbait garbage
So, so on point! Especially, the last four, at least for me.
Well, let me tell you a story. Tonight I decided I needed to play some Star Ocean, on the Switch, as you do. When, something happened.
I was ready to roll out with my crew.
Minding our business. Exploring the wilderness.
Then these guys showed up!
We fought bravely, we fought well. But ultimately, we got our assess handed.
Oh Poop!
The End.
Just to keep me motivated I’ve come up with a silly idea. Starting today, well, this week, I will make a note of how many pull-ups I did on my workout that day. Like I’ve said just a silly thing to make things interesting and fun, also for my own tracking. See how I progress and then see where I am at by the end of the year and the total amount recorded.
But like every other idea (and or project) I have, I might drop it without notice or just forget about it. It’s a thing that happens often, either I get distracted or bored or just forget!
That being said, I will try my best to stay on it.
For this week, so far: 16 15
Side note: I’m sure I’ve done more than that but, I don’t remember, therefore they don’t count 🦾😬
AJ+:
People in Puerto Rico protested after a warehouse was discovered filled with unused aid — including expired baby food and mattresses. Many demanded the governor’s resignation. 5,000 people are living in tents after it was hit by 1,000+ earthquakes since late December. pic.twitter.com/KBQkU0442q
🤬✊🏼
I was late today and I totally blame my one-year-old (Luna). I mean, it’s not like I have a tight schedule, as long as I show up around the time I am usually around. My job’s pretty loose when it comes to that, which is kind of nice, as long as you don’t abuse it of it that is. It is kind of hard to get off the bed when the girls are yet sleeping, it’s not all the time that happens, except that it is not the weekend 👎.
Well, it was more like 50/50 their fault. I normally wear my Apple Watch to bed and have set my alarm to no sound. All I get is the watch vibrating on my wrtist, that way I don’t wake up anybody. So typically even if the girls are still sleeping I’d get out of the bed and get ready – not today. I think at one point I meant to snooze the alarm and I might accidentally turn it off instead. Ups!
I loath, slow days! Too much time in my hands! And I get bored. And then I start fiddling with things. I start messing up with my site, messing up with my iPhone’s home screen and breaking things because that’s what you do. I don’t like it, at all. But at least it made me realize that the fact I keep changing things around, at least on my website, is not that I am not a hundred percent happy with the look or whatever. The problem is that I just get bored and fiddling with my site keeps me busy and “entertained”. I have somewhat found a “healthy” way to do so. Instead of fiddling with my blog-site, I can use the test-blog-site to play around without actually changing my principal blog-site.
My phone, well it is kind of the same, if I get bored I will start messing and moving things around just because. Also having nothing to do makes up for an opportunity to overthink stuff and guessing every desition I have made so far. Do I really need this task-manager (🔔) app? Or. Do I really want to keep my Instagram and or twitter….ect, etc?
And also allows for insignificant posts like this one.