The apparition of these faces in the crowd; Petals on a wet, black bough.

Just as a reminder to myself:

XLR Pin 1 = TRS Shield (I use ground wire)
XLR Pin 2 = TRS Tip (red)
XLR Pin 3 = TRS Ring (black)

I’ve been thinking for quite a while now that, while I continue to aspire to accomplishments that I feel I am perfectly capable of, as of late I have:

• Not been making very much progress toward these goals, and
• Feeling like I have less and less time in which to accomplish them.

I have since come to the conclusion that this is my own damn fault.

Shocking, I know.

The problems I have realized which keep me from accomplishing my goals seem to fall into three categories:

• Lack of focus
• Distractions
• Being disorganized

The more astute reader may note that these are actually all the same problem.

The upshot of what I’m about to enumerate is that being disorganized (whether physical or informational) keeps my brain distracted enough that lack of focus becomes near-permanent. Heck, I’m so scatterbrained at this point that I can’t help but think that maybe meditation would help, and then I think of a scene about meditation in the audiobook I’ve been listening to lately, Variable Star (by Spider Robinson, writing from an outline and notes by Robert A. Heinlein) and am distracted by that thought just long enough that I start to think “ooh, I wonder where I left off; did I fall asleep to that last night? I can’t remember if I finished disc 5 or not; maybe I should go check,” before catching myself and mentally shouting NO! YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE WRITING THIS BLOG ENTRY, DAMMIT!

Sigh.

Let me go into exactly how this is so. Now, obviously, this column is more for me than for you, dear reader, but I know many folks who have the same afflictions as I (or at least, I see similar symptoms), and perhaps may be able to benefit from the knowledge gained from my mistakes. Not you, of course. You are undeniably smarter, better looking, and at least 20% more productive than I.

I’ll warn you right now, this is a really long blog post. It’s more of a white paper on my dysfunctional brain, and how I think I might be able to tweak it to work slightly better, than a tidy little post to solve what ails you (and me). Still, if your brain is as scattered as mine is, you may still find it useful.

[click to continue...]

I was involved in making this really awesome, smart, fun, geeky history show with a strong science bent and a maker ethos. I hope you all watch the the show tonight, because it really deserves to live on as a series (and there’s a dearth of smart, fun, geeky shows on the air)!

From History.com:

Meet Nikola Tesla, the unsung genius behind the most miraculous advances of the Age of Electricity, and Hacker-extraordinaire Bre Pettis who will break the history of electricity down to its nuts and bolts. Bre will show you how to build your own versions of Tesla’s greatest inventions and takes you on a journey from New York City’s ultra modern power plants, to one of the world’s most advanced satellite research labs, and then onward into the future of energy…unlimited wireless power.

If you want to know more about it, check out these links:

• History’s listing for the show, they’re calling it “Hacking History” for some reason.
• MSNBC.com: History reveals: Tesla totally awesome!
• Bre’s Behind-the-Scenes photos and viewer photo group on flickr
• Help turn History Hacker pilot into a show!
• DAN JOHNSON - HISTORY HACKER SOUND RECORDIST
• HISTORY HACKER - DAY OF SHOW

By the way, you’re welcome to grab the image above (or click through to get the bigger one on flickr) and use it on your own blog or wherever to help promote the show. Go History Hacker!

I realize I haven’t written much on here lately, and much of my time has been taken up by, in turns, coming to grips with the fact we have to move (our landlords decided they want to move back into the house we were renting), finding a place to move to, cleaning, sorting and purging items from our current domicile, and preparing to move.

We won’t actually be finished moving until the end of August and the very next weekend (September 5-7), I’ll be traveling to Chicago for the C4[2] Mac indie developer’s conference, so… I wouldn’t necessarily expect any regular updates until after that point.

I am still posting to my tumblog fairly regularly with links from the day’s reading, and even more often on Twitter, so check those out in the meantime if you want your daily dose of my craziness.

This is the boston shaker glass that I inherited from my great uncle, reconstructed after I recently broke it by dropping a bottle of Bärenjäger on it. If you have any idea where I could get a replacement, I’d love to hear about it.

Note, this is a QuickTime VR of the glass, so you can click and drag to the left or right to rotate the view.

See the full QTVR.

The Zombie, originally uploaded by bobtiki.

3/4 oz Fresh lime juice (about 1/2 lime)
1/2 oz Grapefruit juice
3/2 oz Unsweetened pineapple juice
1/4 oz Falernum
5/4 oz Gold Puerto Rican rum (J. Wray & Nephew works well, Bacardi is so-so)
1 oz dark Jamaican rum (Appleton Estate Extra (NOT V/X))
1 oz 151-proof Demerara rum (Lemon Hart 151 is best, Bacardi 151 is an unsupported substitute)
3/4 oz Maraschino liquer
1/4 tsp Grenadine (or pomegranate syrup - anything but Rose’s)
2 dashes Angostura bitters
6 drops (1/8 tsp) Pernod
a handful of crushed ice

Put everything in a blender for ≤5 seconds.
Serve in chimney glass with extra ice to fill, and garnish with a sprig of mint.

(Recipe adapted from “Sippin’ Safari” by Jeff ‘Beachbum’ Berry, attributed to Donn ‘Don the Beachcomber’ Beach in a 1956 issue of ‘Cabaret Quarterly’.)

NOTE: When I type things like 3/2, that is not a typo - that is three halves.