bookmark_borderFriday This and That

I watch BBC News in the morning and I’m getting increasingly annoyed by the “plug an upcoming BBC show” section. This morning it was about school reports as, apparently (I wasn’t really paying that much attention) the BBC will be a broadcasting a programme about this tonight.

So, instead of catching up on world events and, you know, news, instead I got to sit through random excerpts from peoples school reports, emailed in by viewers, including the HILARIOUS revelation that one report card stated the pupil “didn’t excel at geography” and, guess what… go on guess… bet you can’t… yes, that’s right, they are now a geography teacher. WOW!

I wish there was some way to convey just how far back into my head I’m rolling my eyes at the moment.. put it this way, it’s so far back that it really REALLY hurts. Actually, it’s a bit like an ice cream headache. Odd.

Really should stop doing it though. Hurts.

~

Zeldman has started using WordPress. Not such a big deal to many, but considering that up until now he still hand-coded his site it’s a fairly big step for one of the early web design “pioneers”. I’ve been reading his site for over six years ya know (and still prefer the old orange to the current ‘organic’ colours).

~

Billionaires are on the rise, which proves the old adage that the rich keep getting richer. Well, it’s not so much an adage as a “power-law distribution” and the same type of reasoning (the popular keeping getting more popular) can be applied to blogging as well.

The latter article is a mildly interesting read. Probably one for those who are continually pondering on WHY the “A-listers” are so deemed. Turns out it’s all our fault. Funny that.

~

Profumo dies (great photo of him partway down the page). This was, I’m told, a BIG THING back in the day. It was around the time of the Cold War, a period where everyone left their fridge doors open with last person to close it declared the winner (there are still some fridge doors lying ajar in deepest darkest Siberia. Allegedly)

My knowledge of the Profumo affair is solely based around the Queen song Scandal which was used for a movie based on the events. I’ve not seen the movie.

This means my knowledge of this incident includes the name Christine Keeler and that famous photo of her, a copy of which was stolen and published in the Sunday Mirror.

I’m just too young I guess.

*ducks*

~

Top Blogging Tip #23152: Post more often.

I’m basing that tip solely on the fact that my stats seem to be rising in the past couple of weeks, especially this week, when I’m finding myself posting more than once a day.

Of course this is typical. I’m far too busy, shouldn’t be blogging or reading blogs at all but with my current workload comes an increased requirement to focus on tasks at hand and that’s then turned into more posts rather than less. I’m sure smarter people than I have a term for this.

And no, it’s not task avoidance… well not completely…

~

Afternoon proverb: Chilli and Guinness for lunch do not a productive afternoon make. Roll on 5pm.

bookmark_borderDon't stop complaining

The immediacy of the internet still catches me off-guard, as does my tendency to generalise at too high a level. With those thoughts in mind, I’ll start out by saying that Podz is correct when he responds to my “Stop your complaining” post with his own well stated post “Do not stop complaining“.

I’ve commented on what he had to say on his site, but want to expand a little on this theme.

I’ve said it before, and no doubt I’ll say it again (I’m nothing if not repetitive) but life isn’t black and white. My post was, like Podz’s, a direct and immediate reaction. I posted it without fore-thought, and with little regard for how it may be read, bucking a trend I’ve tried to develop of giving what I’ve written at least one read through before posting.

Now, whilst I agree that at some level blogging is raw, I do think that, depending on your situation, some level of self-censorship/editing is required.

And here we enter the murky grey tones of life.

Some people approach this hobby we all enjoy with a “blog and be damned” approach and I enjoy reading posts with that carefree spirit, even if sometimes they are painful or insulting, or deliberately provocative (yes, I read posts of that nature even though it’s a pet hate), and some people approach this hobby in a more considered fashion, for a variety of equally valid reasons I’m not going to comment on as I refuse to judge anything I don’t know (kinda).

So, when Podz says “It’s your life, your thoughts and your blog. Say it as you see it.” I have to agree with the sentiment, but question the view that everyone has that option. Say it as you see it is a very liberating thing to say, but like many things, it’s far harder to achieve.

One of the main reasons blogging is so popular is the people behind the blogs and how their emotions and values seep through into their writing. When I called for people to stop complaining I was capturing the direct reaction to my own emotions, and specifically my own guilt at being healthy yet continuing to moan about workloads and people on my commute to work.

No I’m not retracting my statement as whilst “our ability to see things from our own unique perspective” can sometimes mean we seem self-centred and narrow-minded, it is also the very reason why you should have a damn good moan when you need one as it can be very therapeutic. Your problems are, rightly, a major focus in your life and I hope that you all continue to deal with them in the method that suits you best and everyone else be damned! Yes, it’s a contradiction. Let’s shade it dark grey and be done with it.

Re-reading my post, and with the inside knowledge of the author that I have, I can see a lot of anger and vitriol simmering under the surface, coupled with a healthy “fuck being nice” attitude which I think a lot of you will have missed. All of this is because of my perceived guilt, after all, Susan didn’t berate me for being healthy nor did her husband, so why did I feel guilty? I had no reason to be feeling anything approaching guilt and I put it down to the same basic traits that make me preface and caveat my opinion at every turn. Hey, I’m just a nice guy…

Ultimately, and I learned this lesson the hard way, freeing yourself from shackles of perceived guilt, by realising that it isn’t something you need to have or that you can control, is just as liberating as saying things as you see them.

And it’s just as hard to do.

bookmark_borderULS Presentation

Apologies for not mentioning this yesterday but the whole ScottishBlogs/BritBlog thing got in the road a little (and will continue to do so for a wee while whilst we respond to all your questions).

The presentation went very well, thanks again to everyone who commented and made suggestions and, if she’s reading, thanks to Gillian and everyone at ULS for making me feel very relaxed and very welcomed.

To be honest the presentation was a bit of a blur, I know I missed some of the things I wanted to mention, and that I mentioned a few things I hadn’t planned on, but as I said before I was confident enough in my ability to waffle. In saying that, I did have a mild flutter when I realised that I was almost at the end of the presentation and I still had 15 minutes to fill. This was a bit perplexing as I’d done a couple of rehearsals and both times I’d taken just over 50 minutes but, as it turned out, I had no reason to worry as I finished almost dead on the alloted 45 minutes. Perfect judgement indeed, and not a hint of luck about it… honest.

The audience were very receptive which whilst understandable as they chose to be there was still encouraging. The Q&A session, held after a short lunch break, was fairly lively and engaging and I certainly learned a few things from it, but then it’s always interesting hearing other points of view (it’s one of the reasons I blog).

I also learned a new method for taking notes. Jennifer approached me afterwards to show me her unique way of creating both a set of notes, and a visual reminder of the presentation.

ULS-notes

Excellent, isn’t it. Thanks for that Jennifer.

I’m also happy to report that everything I read or was told about presenting in public came true; nerves disappeared after the first few minutes, if you are knowledgeable about the material you are presenting you’ll NEVER be stuck for something to say, pausing every now and then helps “punctuate” things, and if you want people to raise their hands in response to a question raise your own first.

I thoroughly enjoyed myself yesterday, and I hope the people who attended learned a bit more about blogging and took away some ideas of their own. Would I do it again? Yes, I most certainly would.

bookmark_borderPresenting

A while back I mentioned that I’d been ask to give a presentation on “Blogging and Communities”. Well I’ve finally finished writing the damned thing and wondered if anyone would be interested in giving me some feedback. Obviously I’ll be talking over and through these slides, and I’m confident enough on the topic that I won’t just be reading the slides (death by powerpoint!), so I can only really ask you guys and gals for thoughts on structure and topic choice.

The audience is people who want to explore different ways of increasing communication and learning in their organisation or business place, but it’s more about the basics of blogging and I’ll give them a quick demo of creating a new blogspot blog as well (all 4 minutes of it). It’s a 45 minute slot, and I’m pretty sure I can waffle for that long on this topic, as I’m sure you’ll agree. I will be rehearsing, so please spare some thought for my captive audience darling wife.

Anyhoo, here’s a PDF of the presentation (final draft).

Have at it!

bookmark_borderBlogmet

Another day, another blogmeet. After spending a couple of hours wandering around Edinburgh, I had the pleasure of meeting some old friends, and some new faces, in the Jolly Judge pub. Amongst a lot of laughing we discussed all sorts – politics, blogging (why?), stats, Edinburgh, and a lot more that I can’t remember. It’s always a bit odd meeting with, essentially, a bunch of strangers, but for some reason it works. Granted there are now a few familiar faces, but this was no different from the last two blogmeets with the conversation leaping all over the place, to a fascinating degree.

Anyway, for the record, I’d like to thank the following people for taking some time out of their weekend:

Unfortunately I had to head off for the last train around 8pm, but it was an excellent afternoon, in wonderful company. If you couldn’t make it along this time, keep an eye out for the next blogmeet.

Some photos taken by Will (on his rather fancy phone).

bookmark_borderPrison Blog

I received an email, to Scottish Blogs, the other day asking for some help with a fairly unique blog. If you are interested let me know and I’ll pass on your details:

I am going to prison on 20th dec to continue a sentence for a road traffic offence, I expect to be there for four to six months.

I though it would be interesting to do a blog from there as having already done a month of the original sentence,(I am out on appeal), I feel I could give an interesting insight into life and conditions in Scottish prisons today. Obviously I couldn’t do this myself as there is no internet access for prisoners. I would need help to set up the site and input to it from my correspondance. Do you know anyone from the blogging community who would be willing to work with me on this issue.

Could be an interesting site, any volunteers?