Runester

I figured out a nice little hack for my Blackberry, and I thought I’d share.

Problem:
1) I’d like to be able to quickly take notes on my BB, but I’d like them backed up online. (So the built in “Notes” app isn’t that great.)
2) I’d like to be able to quickly send notes from my desktop or laptop to my Blackberry without syncing.
3) I’d like these notes to be segregated, so they are easily findable, not lost amongst the flood of emails.

Solution: Gmail, Aliases, Filters, and Labels.

So, it occurs to me that I could just email the note to my GMail account. The only downside to that, is that my inbox is full of junk that needs to be cleaned, archived, or deleted. Having ‘notes’ sitting there, day after day, is annoying. I like to keep my inbox as close to zero as possible, but the very nature of notes is that they are useful and need to stick around. At least for a while.

Now, I could just email myself, stick something in the subject line to remind me that it’s a note, and then save this in a folder (or “label” in GMail-speak) … but that’s very manual, and we have computers to do that. Furthermore, GMail has this cool built-in feature that allows you to create a nearly unlimited number of aliases just by appending a plus sign “+” and a string to your username. Here’s an example of what I mean. Say your GMail address is “snappy13@gmail.com”. Then you are free to use aliases such as “snappy13+party@gmail.com” and “snappy13+mybank@gmail.com” etc. You can use as many of these as you want. There’s nothing to configure! Incoming address in that format automatically get routed to the mailbox of “snappy13@gmail.com” and that’s that. The primary advantage of this is to create aliases for sites that you suspect will spam you if you sign up with them. So, if you are going to a blog site and they require you to provide your email address, you can throw in one of these aliases instead. Then, if they start sending you spam, you’ll know who handed out your address and you’ll be able to create a filter to send any incoming mail to that alias directly to trash.

Of course, my idea is another use for both aliases and for filters. So, first I create a new filter for all email sent to “<myusername>+notes@gmail.com”. I have the mail tagged with the “Mobile Notes” label, and I check the “skip inbox” option. That’s it!

Now, when I send myself an email to that address, it automatically gets stored in a “Mobile Notes” folder (”label”) and is not cluttering up my inbox. Furthermore, I can send to that address right from my Blackberry, and have the note I just created stored online. I have access to these ‘notes’ via the GMail website from my desktop or laptop or any other Internet connected computer, and I have them on my mobile device. Nice, easy, solution.

“But wait! There’s more!” I don’t just want to store quick notes, like the address and phone number of a store I need to visit during my lunch break, or a list of things I’m supposed to pick up on my way home … I’d also like to jot dot ideas for stories and blog posts I’m supposed to write. OK, I could just send them to the same “Notes” folder … or I could create another filter/label combo and send to another alias, like “<myusername>+ideas@gmail.com” or “<myusername>+write@gmail.com” and they will be stored, segregated from other email, backed up, and available from multiple places.

This may seem like an obvious idea, but it’s taken me this long to figure it out. Further, I’m confident that if you try it, you’ll find it is quite superior to just jotting down a note in “Notes” or trying to get (yet another) note taking app to work, or just emailing yourself the info. The primary advantage isn’t just getting the info into a handy place, it’s the built-in organized-the-way-you-want convenience.

Have ideas and hacks of your own? Share the goods! I’d love to see what you’ve come up with.

For whatever reason, I looked up Oubliette in WikiPedia. I’ve always been fascinated by the concept. The beauty of the word itself - and the horror behind it’s meaning. As is often the case with WikiPedia … once you start, it’s hard not to keep finding something that catches your attention and one click after another and you’ve lost half the morning reading and learning.

Well, not a total waste, then!

The article on Oubliette lead to an article on Immurement - to be sealed up within a room or cave and left to die. While this is, itself, terrible to even consider what really struck me was the reference to immurement as a way for a mason or archetect to successfully complete a construction project. For example, a challenging bridge would keep collapsing until the master mason agreed to sacrifice his wife by sealing her into the stone bridge  - and then it stands firmly ever since.

What does this mean? On the one hand, these are not virgins being sacrificed or random women but specifically the wife of one of the men charged with building the project. Is this some kind of metaphor for the level of committment required of the builder that he sacrifices his marriage to his project? I’d like to think so, because while the dissolution of a marriage is sad, it’s not nearly as bad as bricking your wife up in the bridge or tower you were paid to build.

So, I am REALLY hoping that these stories are just very striking metaphors for men who lost their marriages to their jobs and of the (sometime) necessaty of doing just that in order to be the best at what they do. On the other hand, I have this nigling sense that there is more to it then that and that I am (perhaps) missing something obvious.

What do these stories mean? Why would a man be required to sacrifice his wife in order to complete a project? Why do the stories stay with us, generation after generation? Other then the striking and strikingly disturbing images, there must be something deeper that they touch.

Do we sacrifice our spouces to our pursuits? Is this a warning, something we should avoid at all costs … or (more disturbing still) is it a sort of promise that those that are willing to make that sacrifice are the succsessful ones that complete the great projects and live on in the glory of what they’ve accomplished?

Well, I just got back from having a very pleasant lunch with podcaster (or is that PodgeCaster?) and author, Joseph L. Selby.

[Sophistic & Man-About-Town]

We discussed his work (media associated with college textbooks), his commute (a long one), his writing (especially the plot for his novel-in-progress Jehovah’s Hitlist), and even a little about his association with the PodgeCast and the other PodgeCast hosts.

It was a lot of fun for me to meet in real life, someone who was little more then a voice over my car speakers and an online presence. Among other things, it reinforces the “there are people in there” feelings about the Internet. Further more, the world is a smaller place then we suspect and the RPG hobby is smaller still.

Unfortunately Joe will not be able to attend JiffyCon this year, but if you’re going you’ll see Tresi and I! (Maybe Joe can go during a JiffyCon held in his industries off-season.)

PS: Thank you, Joe, for being gracious and taking time to talk to a total stranger. When you’re rich and famous I can tell everyone “I knew him when …” and when I end up on America’s Most Wanted you can point and exclaim “that was a close call!” (Just kidding )

OPEN LETTER TO PODCASTERS

Hello, podcaster. I really appreciate the work you do, honestly. If I’m listening to your podcast, then it means that I’m spending my most valuable commodity on something you’ve produced - time. More then time, I’m spending attention, memory, and even a measure of involvement. Those that know me, also know that I tend to get involved in the communities I care about and join. It’s not enough to listen - I’ll join your forums and post and write emails or send in voicemails or any of a number of things to help support you and the community you’ve created.

That’s the kind of guy I am - I’m a joiner.

I’m also a little hard-of-hearing. My hearing isn’t so great, and I need to turn things up. I’m not deaf (yet) and I don’t know why my hearing is poor. It could be the tinittus in my ears, or the years of listening to Simon and Garfunkel on my Sony Walkman … or more likely it’s just a genetic condition I inherited from my mother, who also has to turn the volume way up on TV’s and radios. Just one more less-then-pleasant aspect of aging and genetics that I have to deal with. You know, like the hair growing out of my nose.

So, I’m writing to ask you to PLEASE check and correctly set the levels of your podcasts. I’ve had a hard time recently with certain podcasts having extremely low sound levels. By low, I mean that if I turn the volume on my iPod all the way up to max, and then turn the sound of my car stereo all the way up to max - all I hear are quiet mutterings that are just barely above the background noise and static that also gets amplified. This is incredibly frustrating. I may really want to hear what you have to say. I may be really, really interested in the subject you’re discussing. But, I cannot listen for an hour while straining to make out your words above the static and background noise while driving to work. At some point I give up, and just turn you off.

That’s not what you wanted, is it? I mean, you didn’t put all that effort into recording your content, editing it, adding bumpers, and then uploading it just to have someone shut it off five minutes in and never return … did you? Because if that’s not what you had in mind when you began all that work, then perhaps it would be best for both of us if you adjusted your volume levels.

Now, before someone mentions my crappy listening equipment (and I’m not talking about my ears, this time) I’d like to point out that: 1) I use a good condition 5th gen iPod, 2) an excellent quality FM re-transmitter, and 3) a great car stereo. Further, the majority of podcasts I listen to are correctly levelled and I have no problem listening to them at all. Week after week, I enjoy their content because I can comfortably hear them. Even when I have to turn my stereo volume waaaay up, as long as I can hear them I can learn something and enjoy them.

So, what are you doing wrong?

While we’re on this subject, let me please point out that some of the damage to my hearing may well be from the massively unbalanced sound levels some of you produce. One person is either using Skype or sitting too far away from their microphone, or is whispering - and I can barely make out what they’re saying. So, I turn up the volume. Then, the next person in your round-table-discussion formatted podcast is sitting right in front of their mic and is speaking loudly. Guess what? My speakers start popping! So, I have to either turn down the volume to comfortably hear Mister Loud, and then miss entirely what Mister Mumble is saying, or I turn the volume up to catch Missus Whispery and then get my speakers blown when Miss Bellows starts up. Or, I can just throw up my hands and turn you off.

Now, I know that being a sound mixer is it’s own technology / art and that people go to school to become sound engineers and that you’re free-to-the-masses podcast cannot afford anything like that. I got it. This is a labor of love. Even so, I’d like you to know that your skill and ability to balance and level your recordings, as unsexy as that is, makes a HUGE impact on my ability to hear much less enjoy the work you’ve done.

Please, give a care and try to do it right. Listen to it afterwards, the way we do; we don’t all listen with high quality headphones. Listen in a car or over a home stereo. Can you hear everything? How are the different people speaking, balanced? How high do you have to turn your stereo before you can hear what they’re saying? While content remains king, technique and quality are queen and knight errant.

Thank you, Sincerely;

~runester~

On my way into work I saw a turkey, on the street, picking a fight with a delivery van. The turkey was standing in the road and the delivery driver was getting exasperated waiting for the turkey to move. So, the driver climbed out and started waving his arms to scare the bird away. The turkey just walked around the corner of the van, and as soon as the driver climbed back into the drivers side, walked back in front of the van!

So, the driver climbs out again and waves his arms and starts shouting to scare the bird away. The turkey walks over to the side of the van and starts hissing and pecking at it’s tires. Honestly. The damn bird is pissed and attacking the back-end of a delivery van. The cars nearby are honking their horns - probably to try and help shew the bird away, and in frustration at having to wait at the light. The turkey ignores everyone and keeps hissing and striking at the van’s tires.

Eventually the van just drives away, and the rest of the cars make a careful circumlocution around the turkey. What an interesting commute it’s been!

Watching Frontline’s special, Ten Trillion and Counting, about the ever growing national debt & the current economic crisis. It’s fascinating & totally disheartening. Summary: we’re screwed. Start storing canned food in a remote cabin or get eaten by the zombies.

And by ‘zombie’ I mean all of your friends and neighbors that are desperate, losing their jobs, cars, and homes … and looking to cling to or take what they need to survive. Prepare for a zombie apocolypse and you’ve prepared for most disaster situations. It just makes good sense.

It’s a beautiful day, today and I’d been in the office non-stop since I got in. In fact, I’d spent six (6) on the same floor of the same building. I needed to get out! So, I went for a little walk, down the street to the next major intersection, picked up an indie news paper The Boston Phoenix, and then walked back.

Crossing the road right in front of me, and walking to the same parking lot I had to enter, were five (5) turkeys. They must have been domesticated, because they didn’t mind walking in front of cars or beside me. Here are a few snaps I took. Nice way to wrap up a walk!

Have you ever had one of those days? You know, where everything seems to be harder then it needs to be, where you drop your keys into a mud puddle while running late or forget your lunch at home, or remember - once you do get to work - that you had that important meeting this morning and you’ve missed that as well? A million and one things seem to go wrong and as your frustration level rises, even more things begin to fail. Some days, you just wish you could stay in bed.

Then, there are the days quite the opposite. Things seem to work, you feel fine, and any small issue either gets resolved or passed over and you’re just happy to be alive. Yeah … I’ve been having a lot of days like this lately.

Not sure why … not sure it matters. Maybe because Spring has sprung and the weather is beautiful, day after day. The sun is shining, the sky is clear, and even with a cold nip in the air, at least there is no more snow on the ground. Maybe it’s because Lisa and I have jobs when many others are unemployed and looking - and we’re thankful for what we have. Maybe it’s because my head is “in a good space” … but that’s sounds pretty left coast.

Or maybe, it’s because my new job is so different from my last one. As much as I liked my ex-coworkers, the constant drama placed a kind of oppressive stress on me and now that I don’t have to carry that around, everything feels lighter and easier. To be fair, I’ve had lots of jobs and none of them are “nirvana” … they all have their politics and problems and injustices and drama. But this job, here, now, is so refreshing that I’m going to enjoy it for as long as I can.

So, “Fear the Con 2″ is all over, and I’m heading home today.  I was able to upload the photo’s I took over the last two days and post them to Flickr - see them here.

Fear the Boot" hosts, during their "live recording" of an FtB episode. Chris, Dan, Chad, and Pat ... now joined by John at the far right side.

Gamers playing in the main room (Chris Hussey)

Examining the map and making a plan during "And a child shall eat them: one year later", an "All Flesh Must Be Eaten" game, Slot Three, Day One

In retrospect, I probably should have skipped “Watchmen” - it just took too much out of me and zonked me out during Day Two. Further, I wasn’t prepared for how hard I was going to be hit by allergies. Finally, I should have DEFINITELY volunteered to run at least one, if not two games during the convention. Not only would it have been easier then I assumed (especially based on the discussion topic of the FtB live recording) but also to get access to the amazing prize support table!

I did have a lot of fun, and the most amazing thing was how friendly, open, and congenial everyone was. If they ever read this, I want to send a very special thanks to Hyrum and Josh, up from Salt Lake City. They hauled my butt around in their rental van for three (3) days and were great company. Thanks, guys! Also, it was great playing Earth Dawn with you two.

I was pretty excited to attend FtC, and now that I have, I have some great memories. I’m also seeing some of my own limitations - of age and health and interest. Will I attend next year? I’m not sure. I’ve spent more then I planned and just couldn’t keep up with the young people. Even the sudden influx of caffeine into my system didn’t help much. If I do come back next year, it’ll be with a better plan, my own vehicle (probably a rental) and definitely my own games to run.

Now, though, I’m just looking forward to getting home and back into the routine of my own life with my own loved ones.