another thing

Another of the thousand great things must be cheap wine in large bottles.
Oh, sure, there was a time when I believed that "life is too short to drink cheap wine", but it turns out that life lasts a little longer than I thought. It certainly lasts longer than my budget for wine, so do I get 1 glass a day of good wine, or 1/2 liter of cheap wine?
No one is here to criticize, so I'm going for the jug from the grocery store.
Easily one of the 1000 good things.

My own 1,000 things

I just watched the Awesome presentation on Ted.com: http://www.ted.com/talks/neil_pasricha_the_3_a_s_of_awesome.html
The speaker is the man who put up "1,000 awesome things" blog site. It's a good talk. I'm going to try to put his Attitude/Awareness/Authenticity into practice. And at least for a while, I'm going to try to find my own 1,000 things that make me happy.

First that comes to mind is heat: I have electric heat, gas heat, and wood heat. I don't have to be cold if I don't want to be. The temperature is below freezing and there's snow on the ground. I am warm.

bioblog?

I'm trying something new, a bioblog. I'll try a sort of one-page advertisement for myself as a demonstration and summary of what I think I can provide in the way of document creation.
For me, it's more than just technical writing. Providing a customer with "documentation" includes an understanding of what the customer needs from the software; it may also include document design: templates, font selection, and some skill in designing a document that can be served as PDF, as HTML, DocBook, or context-sensitive help.
And one should not forget that selection and manipulation of images, screen shots, and other illustrations is part of the full package.
It's a LOT more than just writing.

Of course, since I am skilled at all of these things, I have a clear bias. I think I am the one to do all of this for a customer. I don't say I'm the _only_ one, of course.
That would be egotistical.

I am not alone

Among all the myriad other reasons I believe I'm part of a large crowd, I find myself at the start of another year vowing to post more often. So does everyone else.
I am normally not given to "New Year Resolutions", preferring instead to spend January 1 just doing what I wish to do more of in the coming year, and avoiding what I want less of from it.
I try to read and wargame and cook, but skip cleaning the gutters and vacuuming the house.
I would, however, really like to post more entries online, especially as I am keeping the wargame table assembled full-time now.
In a follow-up to what I see was my last post, I once again failed to complete the NaNoWriMo effort in November to write a complete novel in a month. That time, I got to about 16,000 words before I lost interest. And if it doesn't interest me while I write it, no one else will care about it either.
Nuff said.

Trying a new thing (for me)

I've been back-reading Gelernter's ideas on Lifestream; I read Mirror Worlds when it came out, but lost touch until I stumbled across www.edge.org and his latest updates to the concept.
I agree that the desktop metaphor makes things more difficult than it should be.
So I'm trying chi.mp under one of my aliases. Jump to santomas.mp and see how it looks.

Don't Do me any Favors

OK. If you're riding the bus and you get to the end of the line, stand up when your turn comes and get off.
You're not being polite by waiting.
If you make me stop and wait, that's rude. If you continue to sit, forcing me to go first, you now add a mild sense of guilt: was I too pushy, should I have waited longer? And you still slow down the whole remainder of the bus when debarking should be a smooth, simple process.

I don't need extra stress.
When your turn comes, get up and get off.

Same thing for waving me on when I'm in the car. If you're at a corner and I stop at the stop sign, cross the street! Waving me on either means you think I'll run over you if you walk in front of me, or that somehow I'm more important than you, or that I don't understand how the turn-taking priority precedures work.

I don't need that, either.
Get with the program! You're not out there alone. A lot of what you think is courtesy to me is just plain annoying to everyone.

Don't do me any favors.

I Like Hats

I have bought three hats in 4 months, thanks to Bernie Utz. I suppose I can't blame the store for selling them to me, though, can I?

I got a nice brown Trilby, but eventually decided it was too small.
I went back next to buy an Ivy League cap, from Gruppo Doria (Borsalino). This time, it was a bit larger than I need.
A few weeks ago, I got a beautiful black fedora (Bailey's Tino) and it's a perfect fit.

So I figure that now I know how to get one the correct size, I should replace all the old hats that I don't wear.

I'm sure BU would sell me five or six more hats, if I ask them nicely.