Unhurriedly

While I like guns and shit-tons of money, I also think we should be able to kill babies and not have ill-conceived wars with oil-rich countries. Yeah, I said it. Some might say that an inflammatory sentence like that is the last thing we need, but petty squabbling has left the two candidates to fight over each other’s intangibles.

While I’m not completely behind the Obama/Biden ticket (mostly because of Mr. Biden) I sure as hell can’t get behind the crusty, out of touch, old man and his even less experienced than the competition, hick running mate. McCain/Palin scares the crap out of me and as I walk the streets, looking at way too many lawn signs and bumper stickers supporting them I worry about how close the election will once again be.

This is not to say that I don’t see as many, if not more, “Hope” being bandied about, but I like many others don’t often show our support so visibly in either direction. We’re left with polls that conflict with each other and media outlets who pretend to be impartial. Even when I try to aggregate all of this information and simplify it into simple red and blue, all I see is a blank canvas.

In the end, the most vocal supported on either side are the minority. They hold little sway in the bigger picture. Unless you believe in the conspiracy of rigged polls or feel that the electoral college is a broken, outmoded system (both of which I struggle with) then the election lies in the soft spoken heart of America.

Either way, half of us are going to think we’re fucked. I just don’t want it to be my half.

My ratio’s of digital input versus output have become so skewed that even though I realize that the disparity has become almost overwhelming I can do little about it. Like a debtor who borrows from the bank to pay off his credit card loans, I constantly find myself turning to the internet more and more to fill in the gaps left by the absence of my own creation.

While I have eschewed most of the trappings of the cable mentality, sitting through a crappy show to get to the good one, the quality of on demand content is rapidly growing. Legitimate and cheap TV and Movie sites are getting significantly better. Blogs update more often and with a high enough signal to noise filter offer a more “real world” picture than even the best news organizations. (Though don’t get me started on the true difference between blogs and the news.)

Social networks offer the ability to peek into someone’s life without the reciprocity of a real conversation. “Did I tell you about that?” “No, I read your blog.” I feel like I know people better than I do, or at least have a stronger relationship with them because of it.

RSS aggregators, notification services, push email and the like first leave me in a constant state of distraction and then make my computer nearly useless without an internet connection. While, I have more clock cycles than ever, I truly use them less and less. A dumb terminal to the internet would be sufficient.

Even now, as I test drive WriteRoom, a distraction-less text editor that takes up the whole screen and blocking everything but the text, I still find the internet creeping in via Growl notifications which I take for granted as always being there. There is always something to read, or watch or try.

Sadly, the title is much better than the text and once again, I’ve run out of motivation. The second half of the piece was meant to talk about my own production of digital content, but we might have to put that one into part two. (Who am I kidding?)

Oh man, how the time just whips by like a passing train that you almost failed to notice because you were dicking around with your iPhone. It give you the same cold sweat that trickles down your spine.

The large congruence of upcoming events has me a little freaked out but no more motivated than ever. My procrastination gene is in full effect as I become more and more distracted on a daily basis from the real things that require my attention. Weddings, moves, prepping houses for rental and regular old work are harder to think about when your RSS reader of choice isn’t at zero unread. Or your email. Or your Twitter. Or your Flickr. Or any other number of things that have been embedded into the daily ritual.

It may seem that we’re rushing into things, but I assure you this has been a long and drawn out process. Many (most) of our friends and family know already, but I just wanted to let the world know what the heck is going on. I’m going to see if I can get another sentence in without actually getting to the point. Ah, there it is. Oh, and here is another!

Bethany and I are finally getting around to the formal act of marriage! We’ve been together long enough that sometimes it feels like we already are and others have said that we’re “married in God’s eyes.” (Though not in the law’s eyes…) Part of the problem has been that previous dates have fallen through for one reason or another and we’ve both been hesitant to really get comfortable with the idea that it is coming soon. In fact, it has come so quickly that we’ve only got a month to go!

Friday, August 8th is the big day, and I know that many friends and family won’t be able to come on such short notice. However, we’re fine with that. I feel like I don’t want people to make a big deal out of it. We’re not doing a church service, though it will be a christian wedding, and we’re not having a huge bash afterward. I’m sorry if it seems we’re not being inclusive because we really do want all of you to come, but small and intimate were the big goals. Well wishes are preferred over people going out of their way for us.

We have another website setup where we’ll keep you up to date on the goings on. Check out the first post here.

My, how plans change. One minute we’re on course with everything (relatively) laid out in an orderly fashion and the next we’re scrambling to catch our bearings after the floor drops out. While I’ll be the first to admit the failure of a mixed metaphor, there seemingly can be a time and place for such transgressions. Swearing under your breath as one more thing goes south is a common occurrence for me now.

It’s not that things a bad, per se, but I think I could do without all of the drama.

We’re moving to Baltimore. Oh, wait, now we’re moving to Chicago. This is my shining example, the most dramatic of a long list that I dare not commit to “paper”. After what seemed to be a very long ordeal for Bethany to apply to and accept a grad program, we had settled on MICA in Baltimore. The program was perfect, run by a very well respected designer who’s admirations came from both university and professional sources. We had also come to grips with the idea of Baltimore. While it wasn’t our highest choice in cities, we had come to build a short but potent list of pluses.

Well, more than a month *has* past, but the archives don’t care.

It’s not that I haven’t had a lot going on that would be blog-worthy (at least from a journal-ish standpoint), but I just have had the time or the motivation to post. High up on the list; getting married (soon), moving (soon), getting a (brand) new car and work++. Plus, there are lots of little things like movies, games, music and friends that deserve mention.

Oddly, I do like to write and I love to use all these great gadgets to do it. I’ve lowered the barriers by leveraging them do it quickly, easily and from everywhere, but I just don’t do it…

Keep and ear open for me though, I hope to reshape my habits over the summer. With any luck, being a little more prolific will be part of it. For now, this post is just a reminder that I’m still here.

For some stupid reason, I though it would be a good idea to pick up Guitar Hero III for the Wii. It was almost 50% off by the time I was done with my order.

For the longest time I had scoffed at GH, but I always burned with the secret shame of envy. The rhythm mini-games in RayMan Raving Rabbids was just too much fun. Luckily, the GH entry point was too high. Unfortunately, that couldn’t hold out forever. The awesome Gizmodo pointed out an extremely short run sale on Amazon. I got approval and popped it in my cart. To my surprise, I had a $17.01 gift certificate in my account for which I have no explanation. With my Amazon Prime membership, it arrived disturbingly fast.

After a few minutes of unboxing and setup, I was plunking away at the tutorial. After a few hours of straight play, I got my first five star rating on easy.

This will be a very bad thing.

While I’ve been in front of a computer for a good chunk of my life and been online for a great subset of that, I’ve always been fairly lax in the social aspects of the modern computer age. Primarily, I read. I consume large amounts of mostly useless data on a daily basis. Now, with the iPhone, I have the ability to feed my compulsive reading habits constantly. At the same time, I’ve reached the edges of my tried and true sites are devoured in mere minutes. Like the gold farmer, I race back and fourth waiting for news items to respawn in their feeds.

But while I take all of this in. I don’t contribute in kind. Like a torrent leecher, I read others blogs without commenting. I rarely post on my own blog, let alone tweet, upload to flickr or youtube. With all of this social networking, I am the wraith like anthropological researcher, observing but not interfering. My Second Life is about as dead as my first.

I’m not sure what it really means, but I not fully engaged in the technological life that I embrace. I have no excuse with my constant connection. Two thumbed typing should become as natural as the home row.

I need to interconnect. I need to let go. I need to speak now, while the time is right, without overthinking.

I need to take on the world.

On Tuesday, Google added additional cities to their Street View from within Google Maps, including Milwaukee.

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Our house and my now defunct Mazda can now be seen in a virtual panorama. You can explore the neighborhood, head over to my office, just a few blocks away and see the sights of Milwaukee right on the computer. It sure was a nice day when they were filming.

One of the great things about Street View is that you can get a look at your destination if you’ve never been there and look for landmarks when Google’s directions aren’t clear enough.

We’ve had conflicting reports on the amount of snow that has fallen over the last 24 hours, but the sidewalks had at least a foot of dense, wet snow and some drifts were 18 inches or more. The street isn’t even close to being clear.

And to think that just a week ago we were on a beach in the Caribbean.