Nov 2004, 40 entries

I’ve been keeping track of my morale for a while now. But I still feel I didn’t have a good grasp on my morale’s trends. What makes it go up, and what keeps it down? Is there any way to relate sleep patterns, alcohol consumption, or caffiene intake with my mood? What about hours worked, food eaten, money in the bank, blood pressure, movies watched, purchases made, etc? If I had all of the data in the world, would I understand myself any better?

Well, I still don’t know how I’m going to figure that stuff out, but I had an hour or so to reacquaint myself with the GD::Graph perl module and play around with my data model. Hah, what a Saturday night… but I guess I treated every other day of the week as if it were Saturday night, so it’s only fitting that I stay in tonight. Daniel, sorry that I was too lazy to make it to your synth club (this is the first time that being in Belltown has prevented me from going out… I know I would’ve gone if I were still in Capitol Hill). Bah. Can’t let yuppie town breaka my stride.

So, anyway, now at the top of my blog (in case you’re reading this in an RSS reader), there’s a little graphic that condenses the last 30 or so days of morale, coffee, alcohol, and sleep data.

I actually maintain that in a little app I built using Ruby on Rails which runs on my powerbook but which updates a remote database. That way I don’t have to worry about password protecting it, and I can update it even when I’m not online (which is increasing rare). It’s a cinch (and even a guilty pleasure) to update my data… people get a little creeped out when I tell them what I keep track of… but don’t worry, I’m not keeping track of how many times I go to the bathroom and in what capacity.

Now that I’ve broken out the GD::Graph module, I wonder what other quick little graphics I might like to make. The more useless the better. Maybe I should plot the correllation between the direction I am facing when I wake up and the mood of John in the Morning’s annoying baby.

After the first couple days on the Twinkler edition of 43 Things, the top three things that people wanted to do were be happy, live simply, and get laid. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a more honest philosophy of life… the fact that it emerged from the wise crowd so quickly was really encouraging to me.

Josh invented a game on Twinkler where you’re supposed to try and create a list where each item on the list is unique (meaning that you’re the only person out of all 30,000+ people to visit the site that actually wants to do that thing). Josh got a perfect 43 with this list. Daniel shortly thereafter did the same (can’t find the link to his list at the moment…). After delaying most of the day, I decided that I’d give it a try as well. It’s a nerve-wracking game… I’m picky enough that I need to actually want to do each of the things on my list, and I also tried not to add pronouns and adjectives in order to unique-ify otherwise duplicate goals. The first 10 were really difficult. I dropped a celebrity’s name, got a little meta, and paraphrased a goal I had entered earlier for a different list. Then, I started thinking that perhaps it wasn’t that difficult after all… after all be hypnotized passed. Unfortunately, I got a little too cocky and died on paint a mural. I only got to 14. I might give it another try tomorrow, but my mind is too drained to try again tonight.

I’m a little self-conscious about talking about work-related stuff here so frequently here… I’m just really enjoying it. It has one of those “this is your life-calling” feelings… I wonder if I’ll ever be able to stand having a normal job again (not that I plan to). Loving your work is a beautiful thing.

Other things going on too. Got kicked out of Shorty’s last night (not my fault). Going camping in the cold this weekend (bringing a bottle of whiskey). Planning a big new year’s party at the loft with a volunteering party planning mentor.

I love how there are small things in the periphery of your life that have a large impact on your happiness or depression. For example, I think the fact that I’m now walking by bakeries on the walk to work injects me with an extra dose of happiness. So does lying on my side on my bed and being able to look out the window down onto the Viaduct and the people walking across the street (I assume that they can’t see me). So does the flickr desktop app, 1001, which puts rotating pictures from my friends on my screensaver. Yeah, major epiphany—small things make all the difference. And you wonder why you keep coming back here… where else can you find such finely recycled cliches?

37 days until the New Year.

Twinkler Pony has launched:

Stepping into the door of my new place today, putting my bike in the closet, pouring a glass of wine and practicing one of my songs on the guitar while staring out my window tonight, I realized (again, though maybe more vividly than before) that the flavor of my life has completely changed. From bubble gum to mint. Sort of one of those the-molecules-have-all-been-replaced-but-it’s-still-the-same-person moments. I wish I could explain it better than that. Stupid English degree.

A big week. This weekend I moved into my new place, and today we launched our first teaser site at the Robot Co-op: Twinkler. Named after this pony. About figuring out what you want to do with this life. I talked more about Twinkler over here.

I’m planning a big party for the first week in December. I’ve never thrown a party before, so this should be a good and traumatic experience. I’m all about good and traumatic experiences lately. I’m exhausted.

Thanks to Ivan, mizrobot, and lalamaus, I got all of my belongings to the new place in two car loads. Here's proof. I should've taken pictures during the day, and not with my camera phone, but oh well.

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

It was cold out, couldn't leave the doorway

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo:

Buster Butterfield McLeod posted a photo: