Two days ago I took a fairly long walk with Ebbe on the ice of the lake just outside our house. I was rolling him in his stroller so that he could take his daily nap but instead of making as short a trip as possible I decided to keep walking in the beautiful whether and just enjoy myself. During the walk I found out that a few of the very small islands in the lake actually has houses on them, which was news to me. I also started thinking about the year that was almost over, and things to change for 2019.
New Year’s resolutions, or
Yearly themes if you are C.G.P. Greyish.
More fun at work
One thing that has been quite clear this year, especially during the fall semester is that I’m having less fun at work than I’ve previously had. I think much of it comes down to the fact that this August marked my tenth year as an employee of Dalarna University. I’ve had a lot of fun for those ten years, I’ve learned a ton of stuff and I’ve been able to work on a lot of cool projects. But I’ve also done a lot of the same teaching for most of those years. As I actually started thinking about the fact that it had been ten years, I probably got more sensitive to the daily grind and bore, and the fall are the more dull part of the year at work.
So I feel a strong need to do something about this, to make sure 2019 is a more interesting year at work. The yearly theme, if that’s the way it’s supposed to be framed, is therefore more fun or less bore or something. Please note, not less routine. Routine is important, especially for a one and a half year old and an almost four year old. So it’s not about throwing out routine or make dramatic changes. It’s about making room for fun stuff, even during the boring parts of life.
The first actual thing to do about this is probably also the simplest. It’s something that I’ve done before that I just need to get back into doing and that is making sure I work from home at least ones a week. When I work from home I approach work differently and it’s also very nice having the house to myself for a few hours. Some weeks it won’t be possible scheduling-wise, so it’s not a definitive promise but an important thing to aim for.
Another thing to do to make life, especially at work, more fun is to to make sure I set aside at least three hours every week to do something fun at work. It can be things like making a drum playing robot, making a silly guitar effects video, testing out things for VR/ambisonics, maybe building a midi pedal, fiddling around with our Eurorack synth or any other kind of thing that I have no idea about right now. Things that I technically aren’t payed to do but that tends to benefit my work in one way or another in the long run. I now I can make my schedule work so that I can do this, I just need to actually do it.
Outside of work
I also constantly want to get back into reading, so consider it a resolution that I should read at least once every week, preferable fiction. I am currently reading through Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series and am loving it. Hopefully I might get through a few of those books during the year.
Finally I want to get better at posting pictures from my life, so another resolution is that for the month of January I’m going to post a photo every day. It doesn’t necessarily need to be a photo of something that was a big part of the day, but at least it should get me into the habit of posting more photos.
In short
- Work from home at least one day every week
- Set aside three hours in my schedule every week to do something fun
- Read at least one evening/night every week
- Blog a photo every day for the month of January
©
canion
2 januari, 2019 16:42@MrHenko Does the Raspberry Pi cope with the rigours of being a Plex server? Obviously it couldnât transcode, but is it fast enough for other purposes? I have a Pi I use to run Pi-hole, but maybe it could be my Plex server too.
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MrHenko
2 januari, 2019 16:44@canion So far I haven’t run into any problems with the Pi as Plex Server, so fingers crossed. If you have a Pi lying around, give it a try!
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fcy
2 januari, 2019 17:17@canion @MrHenko Iâve been almost buying a Pi to run Pi-hole for a while now. What I really wanted was to run it as Docker container on my Synology but it is too much of a hassle. It is getting to the point that having to deal with yet another power outlet, and system to update is less work than the Docker container.
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oyam
2 januari, 2019 18:59@MrHenko That’s a messy network equipment shelf? Yikes, I fear what you’d think of of my mess then!
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cn
2 januari, 2019 19:15@oyam or indeed what @MrHenko would think of mineâŠ
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MrHenko
2 januari, 2019 19:25@cn @oyam Please note âpartial viewâ. This is the mess in its full glory. đ http://blog.henrikcarlsson.se/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/IMG_6286.jpg http://blog.henrikcarlsson.se/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/IMG_6287.jpg
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oyam
2 januari, 2019 19:30@MrHenko Ok, that’s more like it, but still not too bad, haha.
btw: You missed
_in the filename, betweenIMGand6287via micro.blog
cn
2 januari, 2019 19:35@MrHenko which fs did you format your Drobo with? (how many bays?)
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cn
2 januari, 2019 19:40@MrHenko @oyam of course, my network is multiâsite (I spread out the messiness).
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canion
3 januari, 2019 10:33@MrHenko I gave it a try, but trying to get the Pi to connect to my NAS via the network was way too much hassle so I have given up! Plex can continue to exist on my MacBook for the time being.
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MrHenko
6 januari, 2019 22:11@cn No clue about the filesystem. It’s a five bay Drobo that’s served me well as my main off computer storage for at least five years but these days it’s a very expensive paperweight. It’s currently not even plugged in to power.
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MrHenko
6 januari, 2019 22:13@canion Connecting to the media disk was the part than almost broke me as well. The way my setup work is that the media disk is a USB drive connected to my MacMini and shared via SMB/AFP. (The reason the MacMini isn’t used as the Plex Server is because it’s a very old model, so it can’t run 64 bit and therefore not a Plex Server that’s new enough to work with the client apps.)
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cn
6 januari, 2019 22:50@MrHenko I have a couple of versions of the fourâbay (almost paperweights) ext3 was a bad choice for OS, since it appears full sooner than data on it would suggest, I have screenshots from attempts to copy insignificant files and failing despite oodles of space. đ€
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cn
7 januari, 2019 10:50@MrHenko http://www.flickr.com/photos/cd...
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MrHenko
10 januari, 2019 09:15@cn I didn’t know that about the Drobo’s filesystem. The reason mine’s a paperweight now is that it’s just too slow compared to a USB disk attached to the MacMini that acts as a server.
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