bookmark_borderEmbracing change

Given recent events, I’ve had a few weeks of free time/garden leave and if I’m being honest with myself, I’ve probably not done everything I could with them.

Of course I’ve had some things to think about, finding a new job being a not inconsiderable part of that, but on a personal level I’m trying to use my recent redundancy as a reason to do something positive. Change is good, so it’s time to embrace it!

Less is more

I’ve read their blog and cherry picked some bits and bobs from it in the past but today I’m starting their 21 days into Minimalism plan.

I’m interested to see how far through this I’ll get but, as I’ve mentioned in the past, I’m still on a minimising, decluttering kick. I am determined to have fewer things so this is a good chance to fast forward this train of thought.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this stuff recently, one recent thought was to ask why I have books on bookshelves that I’ve not read. I like reading, but I now do most of mine on a Kindle (or iPad for articles). Is having unread books actually adding a tiny bit of stress to my life? Is the answer to plan to read them, or admit that I’ve passed over many of them when I had the choice so they’re better off being given to a charity shop?

Anyway, I’m interested to see where this 21 day plan will take me, or even if I’ll make it past day 5!

Starting this one today.

Apple Watch Activity Ring Challenge

Simple enough. For this month I will complete all three circles every day.

I’ll admit that I’m a sucker for gamification and the Apple Watch activity rings play right into my sweet spot.

The main challenge will be to hit 30 mins of exercise every day (Activity and Standing I already manage most days) as I’ve realised, having spent a few days doing literally nothing, that I feel better for it. Oddly if I spend too much time sitting down I feel sore, but if I manage to get out for a walk or a cycle I feel much better. Who knew! (I know, I know, EVERYBODY knows… whatever…).

The Activity Rings track the following:

  • Red = Activity – basically tracks estimated calories burned through your day. At the moment I’m hitting it easily so will up this one a bit by the end of the month.
  • Green = Exercise – 30 mins where your heart rate is elevated, doesn’t have to be continuously.
  • Blue = Standing – for 1 min of every hour, get up and move about. The target is 12, so easily achievable as long as I don’t lie-in every day!

Here are my circles from July. Not great (spot the days I barely moved from the sofa).

July Activity circles from Apple Watch

I tend to thrive when I have goals, so this plays right into that sweet spot for me. And I’m telling you all to try and keep myself accountable.

At least, 30 mins exercise everyday, shouldn’t be that hard. Right?

bookmark_borderThe Magic Number

Three
That’s the magic number
Yes it is
It’s the magic number

Todays earworm is brought to you by De La Soul – The Magic Number.

News comes in threes, or so we are told, and they are usually all grouped together. Two not so good things have happened? Ohh look out because ‘bad news comes in threes!’, two good things have happened, ‘ohhhh I wonder what the third thing will be, this is a great week!’.

Well I’d like to buck that trend and give you three recent events that have happened. You can decide which is good and which is bad.

1. I got made redundant

It all started a few weeks ago.

I had been on holiday for two weeks, attended Glastonbury one week, a stag do in Newcastle the next, and went in to the office on the Monday to formally sit down with my new boss (over from the USA) to plan out my work. There was an HR meeting scheduled at 12.30 that day, which I presumed was to finalise my job description and title.

It was, of course, the meeting to inform me that I was a candidate for redundancy.

Ugh.

I’ve been made redundant twice before, but this time felt worse (even though, mental health wise, I handled it a lot better!). It was more of a shock considering that I was in the midst of moving to a new role but c’est la vie. I know why it happened, the company have been very supportive and helpful throughout the consultation process so I’m happy to move forward and see what the future holds.

2. I’m gonna be an Uncle

In the midst of all the above upheaval my sister gave me the amazingly wonderful news that she was pregnant (due in January).

Tears of happiness filled my eyes immediately and I choked back the lump in my throat to congratulate her and her partner.

I cannot imagine just how much that kid is gonna be loved and spoiled, and I’m already trying to figure out how to get ultimate ‘cool Uncle G’ points!

3. OK, I don’t have three things

But I guess when I get a new job that’ll be number three…

Onwards and upwards!

bookmark_borderWeekend Reading

Another week, and I’m still reading loads of random crap… who knew there was so much stuff on the internet?!

  • How to design an enduring logo: Lessons from IBM and Paul Rand
    Many tech companies these days obsess over constantly redesigning and tweaking their logos. In that context, IBM’s 43-year-old logo is veritably the branding equivalent of ancient sacred scripture. Its iconic eight-bar logo is the marquee for IBM’s awakening to the power of design in the 1950s.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1Oo5hsr
  • Meet a man who has been dating a crowdsourced Internet girlfriend for the last three months
    This year, a start-up launched that lets lonely souls buy a text message-based significant other. Called Invisible Boyfriend or Girlfriend—depending on your gender of choice—the start-up relies on thousands of crowd-sourced workers to write messages to its customers.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1OAZMHE
  • How Dare You Say That! The Evolution of Profanity
    At street level and in popular culture, Americans are freer with profanity now than ever before—or so it might seem to judge by how often people throw around the “F-bomb” or use a certain S-word of scatological meaning as a synonym for “stuff.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1HEFCrC
  • Everyone Likes Red and Pink Candies Best
    There’s an Internet meme floating around—Miley Cyrus posted it to Instagram a few months ago—that implores, “Don’t ever let someone treat you like a yellow Starburst. You are a pink Starburst.”
    Read: http://ift.tt/1MhDYBz
  • There’s an Escape Release in Car Trunks Due to One Woman Kidnapped and Locked in Hers
    Above the mantlepiece in the living room of Janette Fennell’s home, there’s a painting in whites and pinks and sweeping blues and yellows. At the center, an angel is holding a baby. Behind her, two others hover. And then, there, in the bottom right corner, are two small, human figures.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1fje57p
  • Muji’s minimalist white toaster  JUL 24 2015
    Fukasawa also designed Muji’s wall-mounted CD player. The toaster is only available at select stores in the US for now, but can be found in the UK and Europe in a few months. Or buy it now on eBay. (via @daveg)
    Read: http://ift.tt/1g9C7mg
  • Labour is now so passive, it might as well be led by an out-of-office email
    So Labour passed the welfare bill with the passive silence of a married orgasm. It has lost touch so badly that it is now getting lectures on empathy from someone from Paisley. Harriet Harman might as well stand down and leave the party to be managed by an out-of-office email.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1ggVGcv
  • John Horton Conway: the world’s most charismatic mathematician
    On a late September day in 1956, John Horton Conway left home with a trunk on his back. He was a skinny 18-year-old, with long, unkempt hair – a sort of proto-hippie – and although he generally preferred to go barefoot, on this occasion he wore strappy Jesus sandals.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1KlzSZP
  • What’s In A Namaste? Depends If You Live In India Or The U.S.
    If you take a yoga class in the U.S., the teacher will most likely say namaste at the end of the practice. It’s a Sanskrit phrase that means “I bow to you.” You place hands together at the heart, close your eyes and bow. That’s not the namaste I know.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1ggecSc
  • Musk, Wozniak and Hawking urge ban on warfare AI and autonomous weapons
    Over 1,000 high-profile artificial intelligence experts and leading researchers have signed an open letter warning of a “military artificial intelligence arms race” and calling for a ban on “offensive autonomous weapons”.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1JK6jvg
  • The Evidence Supports Artificial Sweeteners Over Sugar
    In the last few years, I’ve watched a continuing battle among my friends about which is worse for you: artificial sweeteners or sugar. Unless you want to forgo all beverages that are sweet, you’re going to run into one of these.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1JKjPz2
  • Jon Stewart’s secret White House visits
    Jon Stewart slipped unnoticed into the White House in the midst of the October 2011 budget fight, summoned to an Oval Office coffee with President Barack Obama that he jokingly told his escort felt like being called into the principal’s office.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1HXP9Mx
  • Welcome to the Quietest Square Inch in the U.S.
    Reaching the quietest square inch of land in the U.S. is literally a walk in the park. Well, a rainforest, to be precise.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1I7BwZb
  • The Man Who Walked Out of Prison a Few Times
    In early 1998, an emaciated Texas inmate named Steven Jay Russell was granted a special parole — one which put him in the custody of a hospice. Russell’s medical records spelled out the reason: he had HIV/AIDS, and wasn’t likely to survive much longer.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1glMcwC
  • Vine star Logan Paul profile
    Logan Paul knows how to blow up the internet: That’s the easy part.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1IrIETN
  • This Teenage Duo Could Be the Future of Music—for Better and Worse
    Jack & Jack’s new EP, Calibraska, is no one’s idea of groundbreaking music.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1ScnGi6
  • The ‘Happy Birthday’ song could soon be free for you to use
    “Happy Birthday to You,” the song that has graced billions of birthday celebrations in the last 120 years, is not free for the public to use.Movies and TV shows, for example, must pay royalties if they include the ubiquitous ditty.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1DbGac7
  • How A Small-Time Drug Dealer Rescued Dozens During Katrina
    NEW ORLEANS — As Hurricane Katrina barreled toward the coast, small-time drug dealer Jabbar Gibson and a friend decided to hunker down in a motel down the street from his home in the dilapidated Fischer public housing complex.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1gqIpOz
  • Lead Finger: Incredible Miniatures Carved Out of Pencil Tips
    Eagle feathers, the folds on Yoda’s robe and individual bricks on iconic buildings are among the impossibly tiny details captured in pencil lead by miniaturist Salivat Fidai.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1DQhYqx
  • A month later, Apple Music hasn’t killed Spotify
    Apple Music, the company’s long-awaited streaming music service, launched one month ago. So far, two things are clear: Apple Music was a bit rushed, and Spotify, the leading independent streaming service, is doing just fine—for now, at least.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1U9t3MG
  • How the way you type can shatter anonymity—even on Tor
    Security researchers have refined a long-theoretical profiling technique into a highly practical attack that poses a threat to Tor users and anyone else who wants to shield their identity online.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1OzQKtM
  • The Invisible Man: The End of A Black Life That Mattered
    Editor’s note: Since the original version of this story went to print, our reporter was able to review unreleased body cam videos of the incident and recordings of police interviews with those involved. The story that follows incorporates this new information. Open your eyes. Sunday.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1dJvDs9

bookmark_borderWeekend Reading

More random stuff I’ve found on my web wanderings.

  • Designers : Apple Watch “fails to excite,” is “underwhelming”
    In April, Apple courted the design world by presenting the Apple Watch at a pavilion in Milan and holding a glamorous dinner for leading designers. So what do designers think of the product now – and why are so few of them wearing it? Dezeen investigates.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1OjyCVB
  • Austin Kleon — Mary Oliver, “Wild Geese,” from New and Selected…
    Mary Oliver, “Wild Geese,” from New and Selected Poems, Volume One Here’s a recording of her reading the poem:
    Read: http://ift.tt/1L3TsrR
  • On Spinsters
    It’s the queers who made me. Who didn’t get married … I EXPECTED to like Kate Bolick’s recent book Spinster. I would certainly seem to be its ideal reader.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1MfkPRF
  • Give me file hierarchies, or give me chaos.
    Even in an age when the biggest operating systems in the world actively eschew file hierarchies, Dropbox is thriving—its service matters deeply to countless users.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1J8YW0e
  • How a bunch of government space geeks at NASA won the internet
    In an era when the media whips itself into a frenzy over how to make things go viral, and marketers take their cues from big brands, a government entity has quickly and quietly become the darling of the internet. Those searching for proof need look no further than this week’s Pluto flyby.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1I5oxfS
  • The end of capitalism has begun
    The red flags and marching songs of Syriza during the Greek crisis, plus the expectation that the banks would be nationalised, revived briefly a 20th-century dream: the forced destruction of the market from above.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1Ojq3tL
  • The Pixar Theory of Labor
    A lot of Pixar films come packaged with a quasi-humanist narrative hook that enables the public digestion of their work.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1fbzIGP
  • Reddit needs a real leader
    Will a real CEO please stand up? Someone? Anyone? In 2005, Reddit was founded by Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian: two college roommates who wanted to create a place to exchange links. It wasn’t a “bastion of free speech,” or anything even resembling a community.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1LqS2I5
  • How Kindness Became Our Forbidden Pleasure
    “Practice kindness all day to everybody and you will realize you’re already in heaven now,” Jack Kerouac wrote in a beautiful 1957 letter. “Kindness, kindness, kindness,” Susan Sontag resolved in her diary on New Year’s Day in 1972.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1HWwQuh
  • “Can’t you just CHOOSE?”: Being bi with a preference
    I’m bisexual. Genuinely, dyed-in-the-wool bisexual. I shit pink, purple and blue, I pray nightly to the spirit of Saint Brenda Howard Mother of Pride and I know all the words to everything Ani DiFranco ever even thought about writing.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1J9gGwL
  • The Really Big One
    When the 2011 earthquake and tsunami struck Tohoku, Japan, Chris Goldfinger was two hundred miles away, in the city of Kashiwa, at an international meeting on seismology. As the shaking started, everyone in the room began to laugh.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1SioVad
  • The impending Pacific Northwest earthquake  JUL 19 2015
    Flick your right fingers outward, forcefully, so that your hand flattens back down again.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1IdbOrt
  • Obama on the Hoofbeats of History
    I’m a fan of Glenn Thrush. For me, he is in Politico but not of it. But I think he gets this take on Obama, coming off his fractious and steely Iran deal press conference, simply wrong.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1VaOUVq
  • Katie Hopkins : ‘I definitely identify with that murderer thing, where you click off’
    Most people will do anything to avoid being hated, but Katie Hopkins seems to run frantically towards hatred. Take the 18 days of her life beginning on 29 March. She started with a series of tweets mocking depression: “UK has seen a 500% growth in anti-depressants since 1991.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1LmcT0X
  • Go to Sleep : The Washington Post
    See that lady on the bus, back there. The lady with the long black-brown braids, with red wine lipstick and feet so swollen they seem to melt into puddles, spilling over her black shoes. See her backpack, her home on her lap. She is wearing a jacket, despite a heat index of 106.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1LyjGmE
  • The Media Is Lying to You About Men’s Emotions, And It’s Really F*cked Up – Here’s a Healthier View — Everyday Feminism
    Robot Hugs (RH): Hey, you know what’s weirdly gendered? Person #1: Everything?
    Read: http://ift.tt/1Lzl9u7
  • 16 Emoji You’ve Been Using All Wrong
    If you have an iPhone, chances you’ve used an emoji or two in a text. But are you actually using them correctly? There are a few popular ones that are often misinterpreted, but we’ve found their official meanings via Unicode.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1ecgpfx
  • Who Was the Greatest Wizard: Gandalf, Merlin, or Dumbledore?
    This question originally appeared on Quora, the best answer to any question. Ask a question, get a great answer. Learn from experts and access insider knowledge. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus. Answer by Ernest W.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1LwJC23
  • My Tattoos Aren’t an Invitation for Harassment – So Please Stop ‘Tatcalling’ Me — Everyday Feminism
    I’m standing in line at an airport Starbucks, shifting my weight back and forth as I try to leverage the bulk of my backpack-stuffed-with-too-many-outfit-choices-for-a-weekend-trip, peering over the counter to see if they have any packets of earl gray tea left. I feel a tap on my shoulder.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1IKQoMW
  • The science of “hangry”—why some people get grumpy when they’re hungry
    Have you ever snapped angrily at someone when you were hungry? Or has someone snapped angrily at you when they were hungry? If so, you’ve experienced “hangry” (an amalgam of hungry and angry)—the phenomenon whereby some people get grumpy and short-tempered when they’re overdue for a feed.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1Jt1Jl9
  • How Mindfulness Meditation Builds Compassion
    Mindfulness meditation is best known for its positive effects on practitioners’ brains and bodies. My research suggests it may also encourage compassion toward others.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1g158kf
  • Does Mindfulness Mean Anything?
    We are in the middle of a mindfulness revolution. According to Time, The Huffington Post and a host of other media outlets, mindfulness and meditation are having their moment in the spotlight.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1Gzxw1B
  • Inside the warped mind of Anders Breivik
    Four years after Anders Behring Breivik slaughtered 77 people in Norway’s worst peacetime atrocity, the author Karl Ove Knausgaard looks for answers Norway is a small country. It is also relatively homogeneous and egalitarian.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1CNJgTd
  • Apple Music is a nightmare and I’m done with it
    I love Apple. I love them because they take difficult problems and come up with innovative, simple solutions. The things they make just work and we trust them. Unfortunately, my experience with Apple Music has been exactly the opposite.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1IeBsGj
  • Easy DNA Editing Will Remake the World. Buckle Up.
    Spiny grass and scraggly pines creep amid the arts-and-crafts buildings of the Asilomar Conference Grounds, 100 acres of dune where California’s Monterey Peninsula hammerheads into the Pacific. It’s a rugged landscape, designed to inspire people to contemplate their evolving place on Earth.
    Read: http://ift.tt/1TPLJAU
  • The Lingerie Football Trap
    For top female football players, there’s no game in town besides the no-pay Legends Football League and its revealing dress code Heather Furr just twitched: a quick nod toward the women behind her, who wear football pads and eyeliner and garments that
    Read: http://ift.tt/1VzZrtE

bookmark_borderThis time last year

I was all prepared, the uniform was laid out ready for the 6am start, I had read through the guidelines in the pack we were given and was mostly pottering about my flat until the opening ceremony started.

The Commonwealth Games came to Glasgow last year, and I look back on my involvement with pride, happiness and a nice sense of nostalgic glee. It was a whirlwind week the memories of which will remain with me for a long long time.

I still wear the jacket we were given and occasionally get a knowing smile as I pass someone in the street.

This past week the World Swimming championships returned to Glasgow to the venue I attended, alas I wasn’t selected as a volunteer this time but here and there I see requests for help for various events and find myself pondering them (most recently this one).

It was a great time to be in Glasgow, the city was buzzing with so many tourists and supporting events, and it will live long in my memory.

bookmark_borderThe AMAZING Apple Watch

There is no doubt the Apple Watch™ is a lifestyle changing piece of technology.

It is a quintessentially Apple product that soon makes you forget it’s pulsing with electrons, a tiny technological marvel strapped to your wrist, and almost immediately it becomes an integral part of your life, intrinsic and woven into your everyday. Without it you are less, with it everything is more.

Why didn’t they say all this in the adverts!

When I ordered my Apple Watch™ I hadn’t fully appreciated the impact it might make but, as I’d held back from ordering one as soon as it was launched, I’ve had the time to read a lot of reviews driven by actual day to day usage. Reading those I knew that it would enrich my life in oh so many more ways than even Apple seem to have realised.

At first it was subtle.

I was more active (how quickly you get used to just standing up regardless of where you are or what you are doing, I was talking to more people, and widening my social circle, even including some people I didn’t even know – it’s a revelation, an enlightenment, to talk to perfect strangers and feel a connection with them, something all too lacking in our modern lives, glued to our phone screens as we are, as I was, but no longer.

Now I stride confidently with my head held high, part of this beautiful world that we inhabit. I feel calmer, more connected to the world. As I walk people look, some stare, some ask some questions.

It’s nice to feel popular, I’m wary it’s a temporary thing but no, it can’t be, not whilst I have my Apple Watch™ strapped to my wrist! It will never wane or fade, this is my new life, it’s all so exciting! Each day I wonder who will notice it, who I’ll talk to, who I’ll connect with on that deeper emotional level that eschews the technology itself.

Sometimes, of course, those connections are fleeting, a whispered nudge to a friend as they point at my wrist, or even just “Apple Watch™ wanker” murmured in passing. I can’t believe it, I am being noticed!! THIS is the attention I crave and deep down I’ll admit it’s one of the real reasons I wanted to get an Apple Watch™.

And for me this is the crux, this is the reason Apple will continue to rise and rise. It’s not just a company that makes products, it creates life-affirming objects that enhance everything around you, raising those who partake, and fully buy-in to living life the way Apple know it should be lived, to new heights of being, new realms of spirituality.

I still have riches to come as well, as yet I haven’t actually managed to find someone else with an Apple Watch™ but when I do, I’ll be drawing crude squiggles (haha! a penis, that will be funny!), or simply sharing my heartbeat which isn’t creepy because we’d both agree that it had no intent it was purely because the technology would allow us.

It may notify me of when I receive one of my 4 emails a day, or the occasional text from those lovely PPI people (I’ve text them back a few times, but they never respond. I’ll keep trying), and I think it also tells the time, but the biggest achievement Apple Watch™ has had is in transforming my life.

I might save up and get a new strap next as, whilst I love the sleek black that I bought, I don’t seem to be making as many connections with new friends as I have been recently, a bright green strap should help.

I wonder if I can get one with LEDs in it, maybe flashing ones in the shape of arrows pointing to this wonderful new part of me.

Yes, that’s right, it’s part of me. It’s not just a watch (sorry, not just an Apple Watch™).

I have to admit I’m glad it’s the summer, I hate to think what’ll happen when I have to start wearing jackets and jumpers again come Autumn. Maybe I’ll wear the Apple Watch™ over my clothes! Yes, I could start a new trend because everyone would notice it then!!

I love my Apple Watch™.

I should’ve written this post before now, I know, but life with my Apple Watch™ is a far more fulfilled and meaningful existence than I’d imagined.

Gosh, I wonder how this post will look on my Apple Watch™?!