Photo walk around Kendall-Whittier district in Tulsa, Oklahoma
See these and more on the photography website- Photo Denbow
Extra Extra!
This website has a newsletter subscription. Now you too can get infrequent, rambling and just a tad insightful commentary on anything I feel like sharing in your e-mail inbox.
What will not be shared is your personal information, privacy, or advertising. I detest these violating practices and promise not to violate your trust.
So why a newsletter and why now? An easy question gets an easy reply: I am not on social media or writing to other publishing firms like I have in the past and therefore need to expand my “reach.”
The newsletter is a first effort hosted through my website and server host so it is def on the cheap. There will be a lot of learning, tweaks and formatting along the way.
The invitation to receive a newsletter <— can be done by clicking that link, will be at the bottom of every post (see below), and on the page footer (see even further below.)
This is a third option in an effort to connect and communicate using the tried and true internet protocols: e-mail, RSS and newsletter. Thanks for your interest!
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Overthink Before I Act
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.
Whirled About
Give yourself time to learn something new and good, and cease to be whirled around.
—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
Just Stop
Disingenuous and insulting. Te tracking and selling of our data just for reading a website has got to stop.
Exhaust
“O my soul, Do not aspire to an immortal life, but exhaust the limits of the possible”
– Pindar Pythian III
Long Live The iPod
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.
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.
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.
Long live the Apple iPod.
Think Again
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.
Homework
“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.