On notebooks

There’s nothing quite like it. The click of a lid as it pops off, the scratch of the nib on the page, and the slow progress made through a notebook. Over the summer I’ve turned more and more toward the analogue than I have the digital and I’ve come to the realisation that what they say is true. It really is easier to think on paper than it is on screen.

I’ve always had a notebook with me since my later years at school, back then it was called a sketchbook, but it equated to the same thing. I used it to explore ideas and to work out problems, since then my use of it has evolved and it now includes a journal like element as well. In fact I’m slowly developing my own version of the bullet journal, but that’s for another post.

What I wanted to talk about today is how using my fountain pen and notebook make me feel. There’s a steadiness about it that I find difficult to put in to words. A feeling that I am creating something more lasting, even if most of what goes into my notebooks is fleeting, it feels like a body of work is building. Like I’m part of something bigger.

One of my favourite artists I Leonardo Da Vinci, not for his paintings, but for his notebooks. I first came across them in senior school and I’ve been fascinated by them ever since. How he used them to explore ideas, to think, to draw, to document, to do keep a record of everything he did astounds me. I think in some way that is what draws me to the idea of keeping a notebook. It’s why each day I turn to a fresh page, write the date, and begin using it throughout the day. Almost every day something gets written down, and on the rare days nothing gets written, that’s ok, tomorrow is another day and there will be something to go in it then.

Blogtober

I discovered this morning that there is a thing called Blogtober and it got me thinking, perhaps I should try and take part this year. I might be a week late in finding out about it, but if I can take part for the rest of October then why not?

One of the things I seem to struggle with regularly, is a desire to blog but never actually doing it. Most days pass by with me thinking I should write for my blog today, but then I never do. I don’t know what the block is, whether it’s a feeling of not knowing what to write, thinking that what I have to write is a bit bland and meaningless, or simply hiding from what I want to say. Whichever one it is, I don’t think it’s worth while.

I’ve been blogging in some form or another for roughly 20 years now, in fact I think my very first blog would’ve been setup in the summer of 2005. That means I missed an anniversary this summer. The first post I have a record of is from 2006 I know I was posting long before that, I’m sure somewhere I have a proper archive of those early posts which I should try and dig out. It would be fun to look back on.

This is a very roundabout way of saying that I plan to try and post every day for the rest of October in the hope that it will help me build something of a habit again. When I first started blogging I used to post multiple times a day, that tailed off when I left university and social media took over, but now that I’m largely off all the major networks I’m more interested in reviving old habits and seeing where things go.

Manu hits on something that I often struggle with, rating books. I rarely do, and most of the books I rate are 4/4.5 stars, I agree with him when he says

I think Netflix got it right with its thumbs-up, thumbs-down system, with the extra option to give something two thumbs up if you really liked it. Anything more complex than that feels a bit like overkill to me because what’s the difference between 3-star and 3.5-star books?

I also don’t know the difference between a 3 and 3.5 star or 3 and 2 star book. If I didn’t like a book enough to give it a low rating, chances are I haven’t finished it and never will. That says enough to me. I either liked it and finished it, or I didn’t and I abandoned it.

Started to write a blog post about my frustrations with the current Prime Minister and his government. Unfortunately I can not see the point in finishing it, it will make no difference and I will end up more frustrated by their inane decisions than anything else. I’ve never felt so unrepresented.

This article is everything that’s wrong with places like The Verge. It’s full of links, but all to their own articles with not one link to product the article is about. It’s lazy.

Out of Office is on, notifications turned off, a week in South Wales begins!

Dribbble has really descended in to a bunch of pretty work. Does anyone have other recommendations of where to look for people doing effective UI design?

I think I like the idea of vertical tabs in a browser, but apart from Arc all the implementations don’t feel right.

For the first time in years I’m actually on track to hit my reading goal for the year. It’s modest but it’s great to be reading more.