You see, the thing is I must have written three post’s worth of content in the last hour. The problem is that I don’t feel like it’s polished enough yet to share with the world.

Of course, I run into this often: One could call it being perfectionist. But rather than go deeper into my psyche on this matter, I like to talk more about consistency.

One of the many reasons why I decided to force myself to blog everyday was to push myself into an hour or so of reflection time. And actually, not only to have reflection time, but to have some time in structuring the lessons and collecting them in a concise, clear, and coherent format.

Then I realized that… I don’t write enough code to justify my existence these days. And so, to tack onto my daily blogging shenanigans, I would like to add coding to the mix.

I’m not saying I’ll be making products every single day, but I hope to create some kind of meaningful code releases.

We’ll see how long I can last before I lose it like I did with this blog post.

But definitely, I need to give my blogging an extra hour of the day. I keep pushing it later and later during my awake hours.

But wait, I think this one counts. Judges?

Instead of using the web interface provided by WordPress, I’ve been using TextMate as my main blog editor (blogged about it here). I’m pretty sure a whole lot of you developer kinds have heard about TextMate and the ridiculous extensibility of the bundles, but it seems as though the Blogging bundle has been gone largely unmaintained for some time. (Maybe a year or so, but I may not be looking hard enough. I even looked through the public list archives, but couldn’t find anything… If anyone knows of the status of this project, let me know.)

Previous Workflow

When I get the desire to write, this is normally how it goes:

• Open up a new blog page using shortcut I crafted (ctrl + opt + cmd + n)
• Fill out the text for “Title: “
• Write the post
• Create keyword field (“keyw” + tab), fill out keywords
• Create category field (“cat” + tab), wait for server, select which blog I want, select the blog AGAIN in a second dialog box(for some reason, this never got fixed)

Then I’d fill out the title, and start writing. After I was done, I would type “keyw” + tab for the keyword field, then type my keywords, cmd + opt + ctrl + p for preview, and post using ctrl + cmd + p to post online.

Problems With This Workflow

• Timezone Bug: Talked about this before. I don’t know if this is ever going to be fixed, where if you reupdate an old post, you will continuously subtract or add the difference from your time zone and the GMT. For example, if I fetched this post and reposted it, it would be 5 hours behind. I didn’t realize this for a long while until I started posting in intervals faster than 5 hours when I noticed that certain posts were written earlier than I had thought.
• Double Dialog Boxes: There’s also a strange bug requiring a blog to be selected twice on the drop down menu before looking up categories or posting to the blog. If you’ve got multiple blogs, this is just a little annoying.
• No live preview
• Image Handling: It’s cool that you can tell it to upload to your blog, but there’s no image manipulation… nor is there a way to get some Flickr integration.
• File Creation And Saves: The file that you create while posting should have the filename of the post title. If there is no title, then ask them with a dialog box. (I love this feature in MarsEdit and Ecto. I don’t have to worry about making up crazy permutations of “asdf” and numbers.)

Features That I Hope To Keep

• Linking: Creating links from the clipboard (ctrl + shift + L) and from the top Google search (ctrl + cmd + shift + L) is a feature I don’t want to let go.
• Snippets: There’s something to be said about TextMate’s ability to do so much with so little. The ability to type a few characters and hit tab to create a data field is ridiculously handy.

And so, I have started to look at Ecto and MarsEdit, to see if I can become a little faster. But of course, I don’t think I’ll be able to let go of TextMate for everything else. So many lovely shortcut keys… the delicious snippets… everything, but for this specific domain of blogging.

I feel amazingly privileged to have some developers visit the site and comment on my comments on their software. I just hope to have others do the same with the software that I hope to write one day.

This got me to thinking about blogging the process of The World’s Next Best Thing (TWNBT). Basically, until I come up with a project to pursue after this week, I’m going to be referring to it in this tongue-in-cheek manner. Back to the point.

Keeping things in the public has its purpose. I just need to learn to not keeping things in the open for the sake of it being in the open. You see, I follow standards and structures that I believe in blindly quite often. Only recently, I’ve started to question some of the core things about life, let alone TWNBT. Through facing these questions I feel like I’m learning a boatload of lessons.

Lessons, Lessons, Lessons.

But really, what a lessons without actually applying them? They just become another list of things, another cause of listlessness in my life.

I feel like blogging helps me here. I feel like when I write something down for the world to freely access, including me, I feel like I’m leaving something behind. I feel like the lesson becomes a part of me in some meta-electronic/spiritual way.

And this is why I must continue to blog. But at the same time…

Actually DO SOMETHING.

That’s the key. Application.

Oh, yes, that was a pun. I made a funny.

Of course, life threw its usual curveballs. After church, I had realized that my printer was being wonky. I also realized that NewEgg’s return policy on broken items sucks (you have to pay for shipping for sending it back), which makes me not want to order from them ever again unless it’s something like an.. xbox live 12+1 month card. (Which I didn’t get from them, because buy.com has it better. DO IT.) I’m probably continue to order from Amazon… I love everything about this company, from Prime down to its amazing return policy.

That took a while, then I had a couple hours of fun on the guitar as well as the 360. Eh, it was bound to happen.

Productivity

Then I buckled down. I realized all the physical needs of a human being, including sleeping and eating, really gets in the way of doing some productive work. I worked on and am still working on organizing all the web “properties” I have. I’m talking email addresses to AIM screen names to… you guessed it, domain names. Yesterday night, I did something I should have done a while back.

I finally bought joshk.im. Currently, I’m beta testing something called SweetCron, which is perfect for the purpose of that site. I have this strange feeling this might be a project I look forward to committing some changes to. Yes, even though it’s PHP… but it’s so well written! So pretty! I’ve never seen CodeIgniter code before, and it looks very very clean. I’m only used to seeing the insanity that is Symfony. It might just be that the guy who’s writing this thing, Yong Fook, is quite good. It was interesting to find out that SweetCron was going open source just as I found his blog a couple months ago. I really do hope for great things, if he’s reading this.

But alas, I may do something else with my newly acquired shiny domain name. I’m fresh out of ideas at this point, but I really wanted it to be a site for just that.

So What’s The Next Project?

I’m still figuring this out. I hope to have a list of my requirements for this project. Here’s a preliminary list:

• Must not depend on advertising as the main stream of revenue
  • Basically comes down to freemiums or charge per use.
• Must use Rails (if I’m doing a web project)
  • This is to learn Rails, btw… I’m not saying Rails is the end all for web projects.
• Must be doable by “myself”
  • I’m sure I’ll be hitting up people left and right for help, but largely, it has to be my own.
  • It could be a source of pride, but I need to make sure I can do something on my own.
• Must not neglect health of body and mind
  • This is like… uber important. Must maintain some kind of healthy habits.
• Must blog daily progress reports, like this one
  • Accountability: So people can call me out. Important thing is to stay truthful.
  • You’re going to see lots of FAIL on this blog starting from… before this blog started to the day I die. I hope to see more WINs in the days to come, though.
  • Maybe, possibly, someone else is trying to do something like I’m doing. Maybe by doing this, I can find someone else who’s trying to do it his or her own way.

Sidepoint: Blogging Schedule

So I’m looking back on February 2008′s posts, and it seems like I stopped blogging like a madman after I found Twitter. Then this blog turned into, for lack of a better phrase, a Twitter archive. But before then, when I actually contributed to the world with some meaningful posts on the web… ugh… 2.0 market and on life in general, I would have multiple posts in various stages of completion.

I’m back at that stage. I have screenshots and halfway finished posts all over the place. I may need to slow down a bit, but I feel so energized.

I want to have these daily blog entries about the status of the “project”, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be doing some other random updates along the way. I have a feeling something about Rock Band 2 is going to get posted. Effing Braid needs to get a good review also. So many lovely post ideas…

Completely Random

Man, what the heck did I do with all this time I’m using up for the blog? I really have no idea. Must have been watching and playing things… Hmm. If I could have tracked all that lost time… but really, what’s the point then? What’s the point of being meta with things that you can’t change if you’ve already changed and are looking back?

Ah, the meta-life post. [Creates a new draft] I’ve deleted and rewritten this post so many times, physically, electronically, and mentally. ARGH.

Posted with MarsEdit.

What This Time?

It’s been a while since I had a meta post. It where I try and think about what all of this is about. Of course, “all” in the past sentence, hopefully, will contain mostly about this blog itself, less this post will burst into a book I’ll never write.

The question that haunts my mind as I try to blog usually starts with a “Why?”. But let’s start with what.

What?: Topics Of Interest

There are a couple posts in the works… but I’m just seeing a trend in what I want to write about. I feel like my mind has a predisposition for these sort of things.

• As the gamer in me comes out into full swing, my desire to post on it has grown. The medium and the business world of video games is an amazingly intricate one. Very slowly, I’m beginning to accept that gaming is much more than simply a facet of entertainment… it can be more powerful in some ways compared to traditional, and even, “new” media.

• As the development speeds up (and winds down, for some) on my various projects, I’ve become interested in blogging about the process that’s going through my mind. I might as well start up a vlog to capture some of it.

• As the business side of my mind develops steadily, I’m beginning to see just how hard and easy some of this stuff is. I want to track this mental development, also.

• And as always, I’m retardedly pensive. I have a couple of posts in beta, talking about people and relationships again. Ugh.

But these are just topics. But then, what are the motives behind blogging it all?

Motive #1: The Desire To Write It ALL Down

This has to be one of the top reasons. There’s this huge desire in me to track it all. Eventually, computers will be able to capture all of a person’s sensory data; I just don’t know when that’ll happen. But when it does, the problem becomes filtering out the noise, and keeping all the great memories. If I ever need closure or need to win an argument over when happened where, I know I’ll be able to refer back to that day and time.

What I have to realize here is that while this serves a great purpose for me, it’s almost useless at times. There’s no way I’ll be able to sit down and consume all that information again at a later time… by that point, I’ll be generating even more data, and I won’t have time to go back to it all.

So it’s… this moderation business again. Which I fail at, constantly.

What happens with me is that I tend to become completely handicapped at the moment I realize I can’t track something involved with bettering myself. I need to keep a daily log of miles ran, feeds read, songs listened to… more or less, NUMBERS. Lots of data points. This is why I love going to Google Analytics from time to time.

Conclusion: This motive will never go away. It’s just understanding that a whole lot of people won’t care much about (unless I somehow become famous or the events I write about are worthy of attention) and a very few people will care a lot posts of this nature. More or less, the “Personal” category has been fulfilling this need… when I do post.

Motive #2: The Desire To Be Kept Accountable

When I make todo lists on this site, I do not because of motive #1, but also so that people can call me out. I’m hoping that guilt of not being able to meet my own standards of awesome will goad me into doing something.

It’s worked, on a couple occasions. I’d like to think that things that make it on the public todo list are quite doable… it’s when I can’t achieve those goals that things get mighty annoying.

Conclusion: I’m going to continue to do this. Whenever I can. It’s my blog, after all. Just like the Twitter Updates, I’m going to consider making this not a part of the feed. Because of motive #1, these goals have to be tracked somewhere… not just in a bug/feature tracker, but in a life tracker. Once again, thinking too big…

Motive #3: The Desire To Seem Awesome

Pride.

Writing about what I’ve bought or what I’ve done or this and that… I have to realize that everything I do will be tainted by this. Guilt will lurk in every action as soon as I give it a moment’s thought.

Conclusion: Stop thinking. Just write. I try to keep it as humble as possible, but it’s hard when I’m so awesome. Um. Right.

Okay, For Realz: The lists that I make in #2 has a tendency to shoot a little higher. When those goals aren’t met, I tend to not write about the failures all too much. Of course, I shouldn’t have to write on every single way I suck here, but when it makes sense… Man, I just need to learn some moderation.

Motive #4: The Desire To Monetize It ALL

While I may enjoy writing on completely random topics, the problem comes in when I want to monetize everything and anything I do. I have to learn to give this up. The desire to actually kill two birds (these birds being creating content and making income) is so suffocating that I’ve almost been led to post on certain topics over and over again.

Conclusion: Monetize elsewhere. Stop caring about being so freaking efficient. Just write what you write.. at least, write something of value. Be proud of what you do write, but don’t pander too much to money. Let the money come to you. Try to throw in a couple product placements, but that’s because I love Amazon so freaking much. And you can’t monetize 90% of this site anyway, seeing how it’s more or less “Personal”. So, stop.

And Just Because

Exactly.

I need to realize that while I have readers, I still have full control on what makes it up here. I need to reduce that awkwardness… that friction that saps away the desire to post. That way, something will stick. Something will make it.

Must. Keep. Going. I feel so much like a teenager when I write posts like this…

Let’s Do It Live

So many things to write on… so many new topics sitting in my TextMate project… Will they ever see the light of day? Will my forearms ever stop hurting again? Will Gadgetget ever get “started”?

This is hardly a post.

This is merely a test.

Is caffeine his only Muse? Or maybe it’s the desire for that caffeine… that inner desire to use anything that’ll give him the edge in this roller coaster game called life.

And thus. He begins to type.

I don’t want to quote Britney Spears, but you get the point

Yeap. I’m back. Things have settled down to the point where I can sit here for the next 2 hours and not move until something gets typed up.

I have a strange feeling I’m going to have a lot of bumps and bruises at the end of this, you know, from trying to get back on the blogging-cycle.

I don’t even remember the last time I made an actual post that contributed to the blog-o-sphere… because all the while I was using this thing called:

Twitter: The New Frontier

I’m just very sad I didn’t get into the game early enough. As an avid (relatively) user of web applications, I couldn’t believe I’ve been so behind on this new medium.

I’ve been having a hard time explaining to other people (and to my old self) what Twitter is really for. And to tell you the truth, I still don’t know. I feel like this channel is still very new, that rules are still being created.

There are some social norms that have developed with more traditional channels of media. For example, it’s pretty much the norm to call someone back if you missed his call. But in the world of Twitter, I’m still left with how an actual conversation starts and ends. I feel like so many people use Twitter in whatever way they want. A whole other post could be written on the different type of twitterers (Tweeters? Twitterati? See what I mean about how new this thing really is?) exist.

A few random points about Twitter after using for a bit.

• Following/Followers: I have this thing about keeping this ratio less than one. Does anyone else care at all?
• The “@” reply: I reply as much as I can. I rarely start them, however, unless I know that person through twitter. Then “@” is used liberally.
  • Of course, the problem with contacting the people directly is that the conversation is no longer handled by Twitter, so the record of said discussion now is at the mercy of the AIM logs/email/phone conversation
• HUGE usage pattern differences
  • I’ve begun to use my twitter as a place where I keep track of all my past AIM away messages. Morsels of wittiness or some other random links
  • I’ve been using Twitterific. This is basically the core set of functionality I wanted for StatusFix, the project I’ve stopped working on.
  • As long as Twitter continues to be as open with its API, I would have no problem entrusting it with all my status data. The only problem is… stability.
    • Please be rock solid stable, and prove to the Rails hater that it’s very possible…

But yes, Twitter is quite fun. Finding new people I’d like to follow and having people that follow me… it’s like this new frontier.

However, I don’t see this thing becoming mainstream anytime soon. It might happen, but just not soon enough for it to matter to me.

Google Calendar: The Next Web App I Need to Learn

There’s really nothing else to say here. I just begun to realize that I’ve been losing calendar data for some time, and haven’t really cared about it. I guess I’m paying a little bit more attention to it now.

The Reviews Galore: MacBook Air, Nintendo DS, Gamefly, AppleTV, Sumo Lounge Chair…

So many random new toys, just waiting to be reviewed. I wonder if they’ll get the treatment they deserve. Because…

GMATs. June 21st.

Yeah. I’ve got this to worry about. I guess I should start paying a bit more attention to this one. It’ll probably be helpful in trying to going for the MBA.

I’m losing focus

I told you I’m rusty. Heck, there isn’t an image associated with this post. Frick.

Oh, maybe I could end with this

Yeah. So this is what I’ve been doing in my free time. WoW, indeed.

That’s plenty enough eye candy for now.

And yes, I’ve completely given way to just insanity.

Let’s try again tomorrow.

It’s been a while, I know. As each day passed without a worthwhile post being put up here, it got harder and harder to write. My thinking is that if I could somehow blog about how I haven’t been able to to blog, it’ll get the ball rolling, and the dailies will follow.

Physical Limitations

Subtitle: “I’ve got tunnels in all up my extremities”

Yeap. My wrists are acting up again. And quite a bit, actually. I feel like exercising and working out helped to lessen the pain, but… I’ve also been having issues with my ankles for two months. Turns out that after seeing the doctor for the first time since I got my work permit, I might be onto something called Tarsal Tunnel Syndrome. We’ll see if I have both Carpal and Tarsal next week after I get some strange electrical testing done on me.

It could be that all these issues are connected to some kind of Hypothyroidism. I hope not.

Also, for about a week, my jaw wouldn’t open all the way. I’m only realizing now how much I grind my teeth as I sleep. Might be why my jaw feels a little stiff when I wake up.

And I’ve been having pain in my upper left abdominal region. This one is still up in the air. Maybe poor posture?

So to sum it up: My body is like… melting away. This leads into…

StatusFix

Ah yes. My first multi-member project that I hoped to be a part of. Health complications definitely made me a little bit hesitant to continue in this endeavor. Also, there were huge lessons I started to learn as I partook in this project.

Which will follow later.

So those that don’t know yet: I’m off StatusFix. It still feels kinda like my own project, but it’s… time for the next project?

The Next Project

If my wrists aren’t going to be stupid, I’ll be posting the details to my next awesomeness. Also, I’ve secured another client to work for. At least I’ll be secure in that for a little while.

New Toy: AppleTV: Delicious

• Overall, it’s great… when it works. I’ve had it crash and start on me twice, and it hasn’t been a week yet. Once, I had this weird green screen that made it restart on its own; the other time, I had to physically hard boot it. That was just at the beginning: now it’s getting better.
• It’s made me watch video podcasts at the beginning, because I didn’t have any video content on it at first. Like Diggnation HD, which is pretty entertaining, although not that informative (this podcast stuff is another post on its own… my goodness, is someone keeping count on how many other posts this single entry is going to spawn?)
• Over 802.11g, it’s slow. It’s slower than I could have ever imagined. Streaming music isn’t a problem. It’s the part where I want my entire music library and a few TV shows/movies on AppleTV. The first sync took me an entire night.
• Rather than hack it, I’ve just started to re-encode things into H.264. Not the best codec for quality… or maybe it’s just the fact it’s re-encoding from .avi files. Hope to figure this out.

Twitter: It’s destroying the way I blog

Seriously, it’s making it blogging too easy. I also looked at Tumblr.

Less friction to getting my content out means faster updates. It also means a HUGE decrease in signal-to-noise ratio.

A second blog

See what’s going on? These sections are becoming Twitter updates. Oy.

But yes, I’m thinking about starting up a second, much MORE focused blog. I’m just trying to figure out the logistics of keeping and maintaining two WordPress blogs. I might have to call on some source version control software to automate plugin updates and such.

BLAH BLAH BLAH

Okay. I’m blogged out for now. Come back later for something more worthwhile.

>* What am I trying to say? >* What words will express it? >* What image or idiom will make it clearer? >* Is this image fresh enough to have an effect? >* Could I put it more shortly? >* Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly? >* Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print. >* Never use a long word where a short one will do. >* If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out. >* Never use the passive where you can use the active. >* Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent. >* Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

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