Give yourself time to learn something new and good, and cease to be whirled around.
—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
This website has seen a lot of documentation on tools, workflow, and productivity. I would rather not have a workflow, I don’t want to talk about it anymore and just do something rather than talk about the process or the tools used to achieve it. Less talking and more producing because I want to create.
Moreover, I, oscillate between digital and analog based on however I am feeling on any given day 1or hour, honestly Do I grab a digital camera and notate with Bear Notes or do I grab a film camera along with a pen and journal?
Of course, we all know that I will waffle and then proceed to discuss my tools, workflow, and productivity. This helps me understand the thought process when I look back through the Archives and to track progress.
The iPod is a discontinued 1(as of May 10, 2022) portable media player designed by Apple in 2001. At 20 years, the iPod brand is the oldest device to be discontinued by Apple. It’s the end of an era, that’s for sure.
Apple iPod Classic (5th Generation, 2005)
I fondly recall my first Sony Walkman that had the ability to not only listen to AM/FM radio, but play 90 minutes of music on cassette tape. We maxed in as many songs as we could on that tape drive, but it was never enough, so we had collections of cassette tapes lying around to keep track of.
And when Steve Jobs promised “thousands of songs in your pocket”, most of us were amazed and just.had.to.have.it. It was portable music freedom. I’ve owned three iPods, the original (sadly lost forever, a 5th generation classic iPod (shown below) and an iPod Touch that closely resembled an iPhone. My toddler daughter quickly assumed ownership of that last one.
The iconic iPod adverts
After this month’s announcement, I decided to grab as many compact discs as I can find to then load onto my MacBook and transfer my songs to the iPod. It’s a multistep hassle for sure, but they are there. They are mine. I don’t have to pay a monthly subscription for them. I don’t need Wi-Fi or cellular connection to play them. There are no notifications or interruptions when I have those wired earbuds in. I’m amazed at how much I have relied on Bluetooth wireless AirPods and streaming music.
This 5th gen iPod was the first to play video, review photos and still retain the classic, iconic scroll wheel. Podcasts, audiobooks, videos, and photos are all synced to the device when plugged into my computer via iTunes. Can a podcast still be called a podcast without iPods? What do we call them now, “Netcasts?”
This iPod projects me back in time, and I am overwhelmed by the nostalgia. It feels less like a novelty item, but a more pure form of music ownership and enjoyment.
When students confront complex problems, they often feel confused. A teacher’s natural impulse is to rescue them as quickly as possible so they don’t feel lost or incompetent. Yet psychologists find that one of the hallmarks of an open mind is responding to confusion with curiosity and interest. One student put it eloquently: “I need time for my confusion.” Confusion can be a cue that there’s new territory to be explored or a fresh puzzle to be solved.
The “I need time for my confusion.” quote is brilliant. How can we make time for our confusion? What are some ways we can process the information and then apply it when it is all sorted? Journaling or blogging is a good start for me because it assists me in reflection. It is based on experience and driven by knowledge. Writing what I know or have learned about is refreshing. Even the fictitious Sherlock Holmes needed time to sort out confusion:
“It is quite a three pipe problem and I beg that you won’t speak to me for fifty minutes.”
Sherlock Holmes, The Red Headed League
That does it for me the next time I have confusion. I’ll grab my tobacco pipe and have a think while I walk for fifty minutes to sort it all out.
“Being a writer is like having homework every night for the rest of your life.”
– Lawrence Kasdan
This quote could also be used for any hobby endeavor we choose such as photography, crochet, micro electronics, Ham radio, etc.
A hobbyist is constantly researching techniques, going over best practices and learning how to apply them. You don’t just sit down at your keyboard and start cranking out paragraphs without research on the topic. You learn to see the world through the lens of your hobby and wonder how your craft fits into it, or what you can glean from the world to use it. A hobbyist is always shooting, writing, sewing, tinkering and noticing. A photographer is constantly tilting their head looking for angles and composition or color coordinating. Then act on it. A writer is frequently attaching verbal descriptions to a situation and then document it.
“To write, I first must world”
– Laurel Schwulst
Any experience that can be seen as possibly mundane suddenly has meaning, such as grocery shopping, sitting in traffic or walking through the streets. This means they are alert, focused, awakened and deliberately taking their findings to be applied later as homework. Though this homework is not graded, it does help advance our self-induced education, and we are all the better for it.
“There is now a little question that how one uses one’s attention, moment to moment, largely determines what kind of person one becomes. Our minds, our lives are largely shaped by how we use them.”
Sam Harris
In other words, we are what we consume. I want to create a monthly1 maybe? log of my media consumption that tracks my passivity, and cultivates my creativity. Example: If I go further, I could map how reading a book sparks a desire to see a show based on it for a broader perspective. A podcast could point me towards a book I otherwise would have passed up.
I’ll attempt to track the shows and movies I stream (no cable service for me!), books I’ve read, podcasts/music I’ve listened to and the rare YT video I watch. Don’t judge me. I’ve been in bed for almost three weeks nursing an ankle issue(!) I may even expand this log to web links I’ve enjoyed and favorited for future use 2eventually. To kick off, I’ll just log what I can remember from April and May of this year.
Viewed
Suspicion- Apple TV
The Machine That Kills Mean People- HBO
Severance- Apple TV
Outer Ridge- Amazon
Devs- Hulu
Tehran- Apple TV
Frasier- Hulu
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds- Paramount
Star Trek: Picard season 2- Paramount
Star Trek: Discovery- Paramount
Star Trek: Generations- Paramount
Reservoir Dogs- HBO
The Book of Boba Fett- Disney
The King’s Man- HBO
The Batman- 1/2 in theater, 100% on HBO
Strange New Worlds
Read
Ghost Fleet
You Are An Artist
The Nowhere Man
Orphan X
Reliquary
Kaiju Preservation Society
The Return
Jurassic Park but bigger critters
Listened
Not Lost
iPhoneography Podcast
Dialogues
Focused
Mac Power Users
Music- I borrowed a lot of compact discs from the library to transfer music to my iPod. Remember those?
