Work Smart

Here's the thing, humans can't truly multitask. We can take in information about up to 4 things at once, but we can't do 2 things at once. You can be reading but still aware of the score of the game on TV, but your attention is devoted to one task at a time. It's just how we're wired. But there are ways to make it seem like you're multitasking everything, even if your brain isn't cool enough to do it on its own.

Generally, tasks have active time and passive time. The trick is to multitask the passive time.

Let's try an example:
Every morning, when I first wake up, I have 3 immediate tasks: make coffee, cook waffles for Jack, and change the date on the whiteboard on the fridge. Now, I could concentrate on one task at a time. But there's lots of passive time up for grabs here. The coffee takes time to brew. The waffles take time to cook. I choose not to do one task at a time. It goes something like this: Get the coffee working. While that's brewing, drop the waffles into the toaster. At some point in this, I need 3 things out of the fridge, 1 for my coffee and 2 for the waffles. WORK SMART says get all 3 at once, which sounds like it should be common sense, but if you're only focused on making one of those, you can very easily wind up making 2 trips into the fridge, which wastes your time and also energy. I pull all 3, and then change the date while the coffee finishes. The coffee is too hot to initially drink, so I add my flavorings and set it aside to cool slightly. Slather the waffles with butter and syrup and serve. Then my coffee is ready.

This is a basic example. Your time is valuable - you know this by now. But how many times have you impatiently sat there and watched something render or load? Does the water boil faster if you're watching? Nope.

WORK SMART with your motions as well. Say you have a box you wanna put in your attic. It's in your way now, so you have two choices: you can move it out of your way, perhaps closer to it's destination, or you can put it where you know eventually you will have to. Say it takes you a minute to cross your house to the garage with the box. Sure, you could set it down and come back later and put it the rest of the way into the attic. But then you just burned 2 minutes of your life for no reason walking back to do it later, rather than just doing it when you moved it in the first place.

If you've been paying attention, you should have a really awesome To Do list with the time allotted for each task. The update on your phone is gonna take 15 minutes, and you could passively stare at it willing it to finish updating, or you can pick a 15 minute task and maximize your passive time. If you're not accustomed to trying to WORK SMART, it can take a while to get used to. You'll have to remind yourself constantly. But it applies to every aspect of your day, in one way or another. And a minute saved is a minute earned. Time is the most valuable thing we have, try not to waste yours watching a timer tick down.

How To Properly Make A To Do List

Since I like to endlessly emphasize the importance of staying organized and having a To Do list, I thought I'd show you exactly how I make mine.

Supplies: Paper, Pen, & Highlighters. Also, probably stuff you need to do.

Title your list. Ideally, with a rough idea of the due date you intend. Next, add categories. I used Money, Family, Career, and Groundwork. Feel free to change these according to your personal needs. Assign a color for each, and create a key in the corner. I use Groundwork for things that are impeding me from completing another item on the To Do list in another category.

Make your list. Try to be as specific as possible. If necessary, break down one item into steps, probably on a new sheet of paper.

Color code your list according to your categories. If one doesn't fit into any of the categories, no biggie, we'll deal with those next.

Those ones that didn't fit anywhere get a new category: Extra. Assign a color. These are Extra because most likely, it doesn't matter if you get around to these anytime soon.

Estimate the amount of time each task will take. For shorter projects, guess as accurately as you can. Longer projects never estimate over 2 hours, just add a plus sign. This is indicative of projects you should be working on periodically without getting discouraged by it saying 12 hours or some ridiculousness next to it, even though it could totally take that long. Pro tip: If you have kids, add extra time in for distractions and interruptions.

And now you have a fully functioning, really organized To Do list. Generally, I get the Family stuff outta the way first, cuz those are the ones that will have other people bugging you if they don't get done. Money should always be next if possible. Sometimes Groundwork has to come next. Prioritize the categories how you see fit. Try and complete a whole category before you move onto another one. This is also useful if you have a chunk of time and aren't exactly sure what you should start. Pick a project you can finish in the time allotted, even if that means jumping out of order. The more you get done the more accomplished you'll feel, thus making it more likely you'll keep being productive.

Now get to work!

And More New Music

Alkaline Trio - My Shame Is True (Album)
Get It Here

Rilo Kiley - Rkives (Album)
Get It Here

Password is: mp3crank.com

I really can't wait the 3 minutes until this new Rilo Kiley is done downloading... might be the only thing to get me off my Tegan & Sara - Heartthrob kick.

Marriage Equality

I'm going to take a moment to touch on this while my child is occupied watching youtube videos, since it's everywhere right now.

Here's the thing, one of the biggest arguments against same sex marriage is defending the institution of marriage. But when you consider the facts - that they have a lower divorce rate than the 50% of traditional marriages, isn't that just improving the sanctity of marriage? I barely even believe in marriage to begin with, but we really gotta stop trying to tell other people how to live their lives. If straight couples can go to Vegas and get married by fake Elvis to someone they've known for an hour, it's kinda insane to act like marriage is some sacred thing that everyone takes so, so seriously. Marriage is supposed to be about love, and the nerve of people to tell you who you can and cannot love is simply barbaric. Live your own life, stop worrying about what everyone else is doing, and let them do whatever they want if they aren't hurting anyone.

Liberty for all, remember?
Oh, plus that whole separation of church and state thing, for those of you religiously opposed. (Tip: Remember that whole 'he without sin cast the first stone', thing? Maybe when your church officials aren't child molesters we'll take your opinions a bit more seriously.)

Anyone that gets married has pretty decent odds to contend with that they'll wind up getting divorced. So let's just stop acting like marriage is one of the 7 Wonders of the World and gays are trying to piss on the museum of life experiences by wanting to throw a party, sign a piece of paper and get some sparkly new jewelry.

Mostly though, stop being a bigot. It's not cute.

Family > Free Time

Spring break is so not a break once you have kids. Kinda the opposite, really.

And then life gets in the way...

It's been a hectic few days. I'm trying to get over here, but when I'm busy I'm not exactly being inspired. Here's the thing, if you're anything like me, trying to complete multiple projects at once requires a certain degree of organization. Personally, I find that everything functions better when you know where everything is that you need, and then you don't waste time hunting.

So on that note, here's a few tips for your multi media mogul status to keep you productive:

1) You must have a to do list. It should be saved in the cloud and also ideally a paper version, if you get that self satisfied feeling from crossing things off like I do. Plus no worries if say, the internet goes down while you're working. Bonus points if you sort the to do list by priority.
2) Your computer files should be organized. Ridiculously, if you're me. Folders within folders and sorted and so on until you don't even have to think to find what you need.
3) Everything should have a home. Projects should not migrate from room to room. You should have an organized work space, preferably as far away from a TV or other distractions as possible.
4) Speaking of home, get your house organized. Eliminate superfluous prep time for everything non-workish that sucks time out of whatever you'd like to be working on. Closets especially, I like to keep mine sorted by item in color order. You should also not have piles of papers anywhere. If you're old enough to have bills, you're old enough to keep all that stuff organized so you can find it when you need it. There should be no, "where the hell is my social security card? I need it in an hour."
5) Anything you're not interested in losing should be backed up somewhere. Imagine your house is on fire. What are you going to lose that's irreplaceable? Make sure these things are safely saved on the internet somewhere.

And that's pretty much the idea - list/prioritize, organize, backup. It'll make your life a whole lot easier when you can seamlessly move from task to task without the "what the hell am I doing?" hesitation. I can't help you keep track of the remote, though.

Just a Reminder

It was a late night. But the one thing that I always take away from seeing bands live...

You have some kind of dream. Some real passion that moves you and motivates you. Maybe you decided at some point to work in the field without going completely after what you know you love. Laying the groundwork, you might have said. I'm here today to say - fuck that. The time is always now. You have the choice to be a supporting character in someone else's dream or the lead in your own. Stop pretending you'll get there eventually. Later is for pussies. Get to work.

Dueces for the day.

MIAMI!

Never Settle and other accurate cliches

Every day I see people doing the one thing I hate the most - settling. I can almost picture them saying to themselves, "it's not perfect. but it's okay, and it's something." Well guess what? That's not good enough. The biggest problem is that our whole lives we're conditioned to expect disappointment. Souls grow weary and desperate for anything bordering on fulfilling. The solutions are never easy, but first things first - adjust your expectations. Let's say you want something out of your reach, is your go to reaction to take the closest version of what you want that's attainable? That's settling. You know you deserve better. You know you could have better if you wait. So why downgrade your desires? No one ever reaches satisfaction by deciding that something is okay enough to substitute for what you really want.

There are two words you need to acquaint yourself with heavily if you expect to get exactly what you deserve - patience and persistence. Nothing good ever comes easy, you must stick with it, plan, and get your shit together enough that when the time comes you're ready. I understand that patience is hard for people, we especially live in a generation where we expect instant gratification. Again, adjust your expectations. There's a good chance that now is not the right time for what you want. Are you going to make life long decisions assuming you'll never have it? Not if you ever want to get what you want. You'll do the smart thing, and get your ducks in a row, and choose not to take what's good right now over what could be infinitely better.

If you find yourself settling, you need to stop and think about what it is that you really want. The ONLY time it's okay to downgrade is when you realize you've been fantasizing over something unattainable. Example: your whole life you've wanted a Lambo. While it's okay to plan for that, and try to make it happen, at some point you may have to crunch the numbers and realize that it's never going to happen. Guess what? Time to get a new dream. Some dreams like that are unavoidably just not realistic. Maybe you made mistakes along the way, but we all do. Don't waste your time on something you'll never have. And that choice is not settling, it's called growing up.

Music As Therapy

I still don't wanna talk. I'm going to anyway. I have this tendency to get lost in my head, and it never helps, only makes the situation worse.

Over time, I learned a trick that helps me days like today. My first instinct is always to pick music appropriate to what I'm feeling, I'm great at that. But the problem with that is, it ends up digging you further into your mood than you should go. The real challenge comes with listening to the exact opposite of what you're feeling. It seems obvious, right? You're in a bad mood, put on some happy music, and you'll snap out of it. All those sad those are great and sometimes completely on point, and wallowing can help -- to a degree.

When you realize that wallowing is no longer facilitating your recovery from what-the-fuck-ever your issue is, you have to switch things up. Try a new method. Create a bubble to exist in for a moment. I suggest having a playlist on standby for this occasion. Songs that you have loved for years, ideally with only good memories attached, so when you need the attitude adjustment it's there waiting for you. Keep the beats per minute up. Avoid songs you have associated with specific instances of anything less than perfect. If you are in a pinch, get the Moodagent app. It'll create a playlist from your music collection based on sliding mood scales you can adjust until you find the magic combination that strikes you as soothing.

Hopefully it helps. Sometimes it won't, because life is messy and people tend to suck. But it's better than replaying sad songs all day and feeling sorry for yourself.

I'm taking the day off.

I was gonna explain today that I don't actually hate everything or everyone, but things happen and I'm not an optimist today. I'll be keeping myself busy and spending extra time with my cute offspring today. See you tomorrow, friends.

I'm not Irish, nor am I going to pretend to be.

I hate St. Patty's day. Really, I hate all holidays based on virtually nothing except somebody died, which if you consider, is almost all of them. St. Patty's day is especially stupid. Let's consider the man in question. Personally, if a country enslaved me for almost a decade, I wouldn't be in a big rush to head back there once I was freed, and yet Patrick did. He was really into shamrocks, and was basically a glorified missionary. I'm not sure why that warrants a holiday. I get that most Americans will take any day as an excuse to drink (frankly, there's better reasons to get trashed than this dude) and I don't begrudge you that. But maybe we should have some holidays that aren't totally morbid.

Let's check out some of the widely accepted holidays:

New Years Day - Okay, so obviously New Years gets a pass. Celebrating a new year is obvious.
MLK Day - MLK day, while he was great and all, still celebrating a dead dude - half credit for being a productive member of society.
Groundhog Day - Really, I shouldn't have to explain why this is a completely stupid holiday.
Ash Wednesday -  The ashes for Ash Wednesday are considered a reminder of human mortality - totally morbid.
Valentine's Day - St. Valentine was executed this day for being pro marriage, yet another dead guy. I only don't totally hate on this because I'll reluctantly embrace anything that's a celebration of pink.
Presidents' Day - I'm okay with patriotic holidays, even though 95% of these guys are also dead.
Palm Sunday - considered the celebration of Jesus triumphantly entering Jerusalem. Last time I checked, that trip didn't turn out so well for him...
Good Friday - cuz yea, then he died.
Easter Sunday - Too cool for death. Half credit. How bunnies & eggs got involved, I don't even care enough to Google.
Arbor Day - Yay trees! Too bad nobody particularly bothers to celebrate this totally legit, not about death holiday.
Cinco De Mayo - THIS IS NOT MEXICAN INDEPENDANCE DAY. Mexico won an unlikely battle against the French. Good idea in theory, but minus points because people care more about drinking than even knowing what the holiday is about.
Memorial Day - All the dead military folks day.
Flag Day - Cool, we picked a flag. Pass. Even though we also created the army that day, and ya know, that obviously helped facilitate some dying.
4th of July - For the record, our forefathers decided to declare independence from Britian 2 days prior. They just finished writing down why they felt that was okay on the 4th. Also, 3 presidents died that day. Plus the whole war thing involved with that.
Labor Day - Everybody works. Holiday win.
Columbus Day - Dude, he didn't even discover the country. Fail.
Halloween - Festival of the Dead.
Veterans' Day - I'm okay with this. Thanks for serving, guys & gals.
Thanksgiving - White people slaughter indians. Cool, more death.
Christmas - One of the only days we celebrate someone being born, instead of when they kicked.

So here's the thing, maybe the next time we make a holiday, it can be for something positive instead of being like, Oh - that guy was pretty cool, sometimes... when did he die? Okay, that's a great holiday. Maybe we could celebrate more of the birthdays of these people instead. Because really, holidays in general are about celebrating and enjoying life, so it seems awfully ass backwards to have these parties because somebody died. It's like a series of century plus long wakes, just totally doing it wrong. Sure, when I die, I'd rather everybody party instead of mourn - but if you're really trying to celebrate someone's life, maybe try not to fixate on when it ended. Or enjoy your green beer and mild racism and pretend it doesn't matter, your choice.

 

I'm gonna give all my secrets away...

Fine, maybe not all of them, but I'll go ahead and blow up my spot on how I always have the freshest music as soon as it leaks.

My personal favorite site for fetching new music is mp3crank.com. They exclusively drop albums, which I've grown to prefer over dealing with accumulating music track by track and hoping you have the mastered version and there aren't tags all over it. They drop mixtapes and ep's too, so it's usually a good first stop for most of everything you'd want.

Another good one is blog.audioloot.com , also mostly albums, but sometimes they have things the first does not. They ad the shit outta their download links, so if you aren't well versed in getting around those, proceed with caution.

Newmusicpop.com puts up everything once it hits itunes, so those are all gonna be m4a, which is useful as long as you don't wanna do anything that itunes cockblocks outta use.

My fave for new hip hop etc is hear-that-first.com, updated almost daily with new tracks, and they warn you when they're dj tagged and so on. Just don't fall in love with any and expect them to be on the album, cuz many are future bsides and buzz singles.

Enjoy, kids. I'll, of course, let you know when something super awesome drops, as soon as I'm done overplaying this Tegan and Sara - Heartthrob album and actually bother to listen to anything else.

XO<3B

Productivity & Such

I'm a procrastinator and a perfectionist. This is about the most limiting and absurd combination of traits to have when it comes to everything I do, but these things are ingrained in my nature by now, so it is what it is. I have a hard time following through on what I start, mostly because I either get behind the 8 ball of overwhelming to do's or because I can't get something just right to the iota and get frustrated and give up. I'm persistent though, so I always end up coming back to the same thing, the same projects, and eventually, I find the balance.

As some of you may or may not know, I recently bought an iPad. (Yay tax return!) I did this with the sole intention of using it majorly to have a convenient way to process all of my follow through. I disregarded the bulk of the social apps, and use it as the home base for making myself get busy with all the things I'd like to be doing. Which is easier said than done, of course, but yet here we are so obviously I'm doing something right. (That could be entirely related to how much I miss writing, but I digress.)

I've posted on this before, the finding ways to accomplish what you want to do with your life. You need a plan, you need to stick to what you planned, and you need to hold yourself accountable when you don't follow your own plan. I'm good at most of this, most of the time. As much as I'd like to claim that I woke up today and knew I had to kick myself in the ass and get back to business, that's not exactly what happened. Really, I went and checked my to do list and saw the self assigned due dates passing me by and I can't live with that anymore. I have so much to say, and writer's block be damned, I will find a way.

And this way is mostly thanks to the App Store, for having such thoroughly enticing apps designed to help those of us who struggle with the follow through. Awesome Note, for example, houses my to do lists and everything else under the sun I need to complete the endless lists of tasks I make for myself. Evernote still holds its own, allowing me to save things for later, so when I have a bright idea in the less internetly enabled areas of my life, it's not lost forever. Unstuck is quickly becoming a favorite, cuz well, I have a habit of getting stuck.

I could thank the fellows over at Apple, or the people who continuously inspire me (I'm sure you know who you are) or even the people that doubt me. But I choose to thank myself. I'm out here, doing my thing, moving forward no matter what, whether or not I bother to get it all done, I know I'm trying.

And that, friends, is the point for today. If you aren't trying, the only person you have to blame is yourself. If you are trying, give yourself a pat on the back and maybe some well deserved playtime, if you feel inclined. But mostly just remember that today is today, and you are in charge of what you get done today.

No excuses, inaction is deadly.

Cuz We Need A Little Controversy....

GUESS WHO'S BACK?

Why yes, my little pretties, that would be me. Slow and steady, at least to begin.

First, I wanna clarify that the new music portion of this site is indefinitely removed, thanks to a DMCA complaint I'm obeying. You know you're doing something right when you get that cease and desist, though. I will however provide some links at a later date to provide you with all the new music you can handle.

Frankly, I don't even really know what this blog is about anymore. I know I miss doing it, but I can't handle all the structure I tried to thrust upon myself in the original/reboot. I hate guidelines, Ima do whatever the fuck I want, because well, I can. If you know me in real life, none of this should surprise you. To those that don't, let's keep it rolling.

With that in mind, yes, I will try and create some kind of content for you daily. I make no promises. I have a life, and my life is not entirely comprised of the internet.

But again, if you know me at all, you know it'll be worth the wait.