The Writing Beast
Tuesday May 15th, 2012
Tap, tap, tap on the keyboard or peck, peck, peck on the glass screen.
The quintessential tiny beast sits on top of my screen staring down at my letters on the screen. He waves at me to make me acknowledge that it will be correcting my writing.
I waved back with a symbol of ‘wait there until I finish’.
Typing away, cranking out the words, sentences, backspacing, forward, back, up, right, hold the screen, what was that noise, back to the screen.
The beast disappear, where did he go? I tense up at the thought of it looking at my screen from behind. “Don’t think about it, keep writing…”. Shoulders relaxed, pecking at the keys continues.
Words flows like water, sentences falls into place slots itself magically, right hand stretches towards the cup of hot liquid to fuel the mind.
Time winds on, typing comes to an end.
Looking around, where did that beast go? When is it going to happen? The correction madness that that tears myself apart injecting paranoia of what other people would say about my writing? Will I be mocked? Will I ever be at the top of the mountains screaming that my writing is the way I write?
The beast is in me, etched next to my writing mind. All in my head creating all this fake scenario.
Correcting the work by looking at my grammar. The ‘s’, the ‘ed’, hang on… Does that flow correctly?
Hannah, my wife, walks in resting her hand on my shoulder. I flinched in a tiny distress. She knows the torture that I put myself through. The dark perfection of writing something good. Doesn’t matter if it is big or small. It got to be right. She gives me a kiss on my head which induce the goodness in me knowing it is going to be okay.
We go through it together. She becomes my editor-in-chief and help me to go through my writing. Sometimes it is face to face, sometimes over e-mails, tweets. Once she read it, I could either go mad or learn how to be better at it.
After a few minutes of correcting. The work is done. The beast vanish.
Until next time. I know you will be waiting…
–
This is my way of saying that English is the most difficult language in the world. It is a big statement of myself to say that since it is international but passing my GCSEs at a miraculous B and C grade. I am always dancing on the fine line of writing. I have read countless online articles and from my eyes, I wonder how they all managed to write so well.
Writing is about expressing oneself.
Writing is about stories you want to tell.
And writing simple one liners can make a difference in this world.
Retro Wall Decal
Monday May 14th, 2012
This is utterly awesome.
Found via Swiss Miss.
Twine + Pebble Watch
Monday May 14th, 2012
This is exactly what I have been dreaming about for so long. The ability to use the watch for information updates with this little device hooked up somewhere.
Stick it on the door and somebody knock on it, your watch buzzes you.
This is great for me who is obviously not highly aware when a doorbell or somebody knocking on the door during a coding/gaming/reading/my-hearing-aids-are-turned-off session. Going further, I would love to know if it can detect when the baby is crying, temperature difference in a room, oven timer going off or has the dog decided to wander around the house at 3am.
I can’t wait!
Link: Supermechanical – Twine
The Kernel
Monday May 14th, 2012
This is what tech journalism should be. Straight talking and to the point.
Go and read it now. Yes. Right now.
Link: The Kernel
Star Wars Weather
Monday May 14th, 2012
A new take on the weather if you are a Star Wars fan.
Right now, it’s like Kamino around here with a significant chance of unconvincing CGI aliens.
Link: Star Wars Weather
Snap, snap
Monday May 14th, 2012
Leica M Monochrom
Friday May 11th, 2012
It is yours for a cool £6120 and it only shoots in B&W.
Steve Huff got example shots and they are absolutely gorgeous to look at.
Link: Leica M Monochrom
Seven iPad Keyboard Tricks
Friday May 11th, 2012
I knew there are some keyboard tricks but seeing all of this just left me dumbfounded. This is the beauty of Apple’s products, you will run into little cool niches.
Apple’s 1984 spoof of ‘Ghostbusters’ goes after IBM.
Thursday May 10th, 2012
Something tells me that the Apple had a lot of fun making these videos in the 80s.
The Back Cover Book Club
Thursday May 10th, 2012
The Back Cover Book Club is a social project that encourages people to talk to each other in public spaces by using the shared activity of reading to facilitate the conversation.
What a neat idea. I remember talking to a few people on public transports exactly the same thing years ago. Nowadays, everyone is in their own bubble. This simple book wrap will kickstart this to get everybody talking again.
Also, bonus points to whoever selected the photo on the front page of the website. That is one of my favourite books – in case you couldn’t see, it is Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut.
Link: The Back Cover Book Club