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February 28, 2005
The Gates - Saturday February 19, 2005
NYC has been all a flutter these past few weeks over The Gates, a large installation by Christo & Jean Claude in Central Park. I came across a post about an evening walking tour that sounded pretty interesting on my weekly Nonsense NYC mailing, so Michelle and I decided to check it out. It was being put on by Derek Lomas at Cognitive Culture. (I'd later learn that Derek was not even a New Yorker - he's from Columbus, Ohio - , and that he was pretty surprised when all the folks from Nonsense showed up for his little tour.)
We bundled up, downloaded the soundtrack into my I-Pod as instructed and headed for Central Park. There was a group of about 60 people gathering at the Alice statue. At the designated time we all started our soundtracks and ventured further into the park.
It’s difficult to articulate what “The Gates” really are. (I’m sure they're something different for every person…). For me the evening was almost cinematic (maybe it was the soundtrack…). The Gates seemed to focus my experience of the world around me. It was almost as if they created rooms and corridors in an outdoor space. The park at night was extraordinary. Around every bend was a new thing to see and experience. There were breathtaking and magical scenes that were brought into sharper focus by the darkness.
Thanks again Derek, for providing a live action real time shared movie-like experience!
Here's the evening through my eyes...
Here's an article on The Gates by Anna Quindlen, taken from Time magazine.
Posted by Thomas at 11:19 PM | Comments (2)
February 19, 2005
"The Pile" - Project Complete
I cleared away the last remaining papers in the pile last weekend...
and found a local non-profit that would pick up my books... They came this past Thursday night.
Here's a slideshow of the process from start to finish.
Thoughts on the process:
The public nature of this project (blogging about it...) provided an incentive to finish the job. That this blog is still in beta, and only a few people know of it's existence is irrelevent. Also, the process of documenting each step along the way helped to break a potentially overwhelming task into manageable chunks, as well as provided me with visual incentive along the way. (I really looked forward to presenting that Flickr slideshow of "beginning pile" to "no pile".
One of the goals of this project was to analyze my clutter to see exactly what was in there, and find ways to eliminate the need to blog about another pile a month from now. The biggest thing that I learned was that it's terribly important to have an effective collection system in place for all of the stuff in our lives. "A place for everything and everything in it's place" so to speak. This is especially true in NYC, where every bit of square footage is at a premium, and we don't have garages or attics to hide our junk away. One of my biggest issues is paper clutter. I discovered is that there are specific "meta-tags" to my piles of paper:
Teaching Notes
Book Notes
Personal Notes/Concepts
Acting Notes
Bills & Statements
Receipts
Phone Numbers/Addresses (usually scribbled down on bits of paper or in the form of business cards)
Junk Mail
Alot of these notes tend to end up on legal pads, wire binders, or miscellaneous scraps of paper. Usually in no particular order, which left me with a bunch of stuff that I couldn't throw away because there might be something valuable in there and would have to sort thru later. (Which never happened, because it was such a mess that I avoided it and created another pile...).
To keep this from happening again, I've begun keeping all notes of value in a single Moleskin notebook, which I keep in my bag at all times. These are great little notebooks...They fit well in your bag, open up flat for easy writing, and look quite handsome on a bookshelf when you've filled them up with all your master plans. (There seems to be quite a buzz at the moment about Moleskin notebooks... either that or I'm way late to the party. It's quite fashionable in the GTD set.) I also meta-tag each entry so that it's easier to locate ideas later.
Receipts I keep in an accordion file in my newly redesigned studio space (possibly more on that later...). They're stored right next to my binder for Bills & Statements. Phone Numbers I enter right away into my computer and trash the original. Any websites scribbled onto pieces of paper go to del.icio.us. The thing that seems most necessary for me is to develop the habit of putting things into my collection system(s), and then be ruthless in the application of this habit.
All in all a very illuminating process!
Posted by Thomas at 09:58 AM | Comments (2)
February 09, 2005
Why Does Windows Still Suck?
Ah, the age old question... "Why Does Windows Still Suck?".
As I'm posting this I can hear a co-worker on the phone with IT troubleshooting her laptop...
Posted by Thomas at 10:18 AM | Comments (0)
February 07, 2005
"The Pile" - pt. 6 - Less paper in the pile
I eliminated about 3/4 of the stack of paper in "The Pile" tonight. You'll notice that I waited to address this stack until last. These stacks of paper haunt me and have until now vexed me in my search for organizational zendom. I've been trying to "metatag" (for lack of a better word) the contents of the pile as I sort through it in hopes of finding places for this stuff so that it doesn't end up creating a brand new "Pile" next week. I'll present a summary of my findings when I finish. Until then, revel with me in the gathering SPACE!
Posted by Thomas at 11:02 PM | Comments (0)
"The Pile" - pt. 5 - Couldn't Sleep...
Couldn't sleep last night, so I decided to knock out the "old journal" part of the pile. These were notebooks that may or not contain useful information. (Really all I did was tear out the content, staple it together and put it in the "paper pile", but it's good to have only two things left to knock out.)
Progress is a beautiful thing!
Posted by Thomas at 10:10 AM | Comments (0)
February 06, 2005
"The Pile" - pt. 4 - Clothes-B-Gone!
I bagged and carted the clothes off today to Riverside Church.
Nothing earth shattering. One of those "Just Do It" moments. The result?
3 more parts of "The Pile" to eliminate. Nearing the home stretch! See the progression.
Posted by Thomas at 05:55 PM | Comments (2)
XO Cafe & Grill - Tribeca
Michelle and I went Tango dancing last night at Lafayette Grill & Bar in Tribeca. The plan was to have a late dinner there and then go dancing, but when we arrived they told us there were no tables. (Which was quite annoying, as there were very obviously 3 or 4 tables for two clearly unoccupied...Surly hosts at restaurants piss me off...). Cranky and famished we wandered the desolate streets of Tribeca until we stumbled across the "XO Café & Grill". When I googled them later I found the cuisine described as "a modern interpretation and fusion of Western and Chinese cooking" which seems pretty accurate. There were over 200 items on the menu to choose from, some pretty exotic... ("Salted Baked Head on Shrimp" was one of my favorite odd titles.... ). The food was absolutely delicious and the prices were extremely reasonable. I had the Sea Scallop w. Black Pepper Corn Sauce (not sure if this meant "black peppercorn sauce", or a sauce that had black pepper and corn...) which at $13.95 was the most expensive thing on the menu. Most items were $6.95-$7.95. Michelle had the "Udon Noodle Soup with Mixed Seafood" (which oddly enough was listed under the "Prime Ribs Udon Noodle Soup" section. So wacky!.) Both were delectable!
Alas I hope to some day post beautiful mo'blogged pictures of the food from my travels ala Mie at Kokochi (Mmm... Cuban... looks tasty!), but I've not yet purchased a camera phone, nor found a decent provider in NYC who supports mo'blogging. One day, though!
Posted by Thomas at 12:57 PM | Comments (0)
February 03, 2005
"The Pile" - pt. 3 - Wayward CD's & CDR's
Went ahead and knocked out the CD portion of the pile...
No big secret here. Just a matter of digging in and "Just Doing It". I returned the wayward audio CD's in cases to their original home (I have five large Case Logic crates that hold most of my collection...). The other loose CDR's (some .aiff, some .mp3, some software...) were redistributed to existing Case Logic folders and then moved to my Studio. Most of this part of the project was deciding which CD's to keep, which to throw out, and which to archive.
One of the goals of this little exercise is not only to eliminate "The Pile", but to also examine the processes that brought the pile o' junk into existance in the first place. I'm hopeful that a good bit of the need for these CD's & CDR's will be eliminated by my new I-Pod, which I can use for moving software around. I may even pick up a cheap jump drive at some point for times when the I-Pod isn't convenient. I think the biggest thing that I'm learning right now is to go thru the "Review, then Keep, or Throw away, or Archive" process much more often. Just as important it seems is to have effective archiving/storing options available at all times. If you don't have empty places for those CDR's (or Cassettes, or whatever...) they're going to end up in the junk pile.
See the progress on my Flickr site.
Posted by Thomas at 12:57 AM | Comments (0)
February 02, 2005
"The Pile" - pt. 2 - Cassettes
Started the day by stubbing my toe on the cassettes in the "Staging Area"... Enough of this crap!
Problem: Ever multiplying cassette tapes from my weekly voice lesson
Solution: 3 shoe boxes from The Container Store, Chelsea location
Cost: $4.47
Storage Capacity: Each box holds 29 cassette tapes
The full box of cassette's I stored under my bed, keeping the other boxes at the ready for future lesson tapes.
The result? "The Pile" is a little bit smaller!
See the progress on my Flickr site.
Posted by Thomas at 09:25 PM | Comments (0)