Ignant
This is the title of a Screamin’ Jay Hawkins song on Black Music for White People (it’s the one with Heart Attack and Vine used in the jeans ad). I was standing talking to someone and another person (the one from the club whom we fell out with over capsizing our daughter) pushed in and started talking about something over the top of me. I left the ignorant bastard to it: you can tell from the way his kids behave that he has no manners and all this did was prove it. He loiks to play the country bumpkin, being from Somerset, but I think it’s just ignant and shit. Rosie says that we shouldn’t let him define what we do, and she’s right, but I nearly lost it with him.
To be fair it’s not his fault I’m in such a foul mood. Things have been getting me down and I’ve been having trouble sleeping, plus some old petty addictions (chocolate is the most benign) have been bugging me. An addiction is like a wave breaking, you don’t have to swim in it but it can feel very good. I need to think some more about how to deal with it.
Brain Software
I’ve been using some software called the Brain (http://www.thebrain.com/default.htm?thoughtid=49). It sits on the side of the screen and allows you to organise the relationships between thoughts, dragging documents and folders and breaking the windows hierachy. The only problem I have had is that I used to use the Enterprise Edition of Mind Manager(http://www.mindjet.com/) it would let me plan documents as mind maps, exporting maps to HTML or word documents. The brain has horizontal relationships across hierachies and is better at focusing on the thing you are thinking about and I prefer its interface, but all it has is a utility to turn a selected Brain document into an XML document.
XML to HTML
You guessed it: I’m writing a utility to change this exported XML into something I can usefully paste into a word document.
It is work related in that I have put a lot of the notes into it and need an easy way to get them out with the structure preserved. Of course, once I have done this I could write my own system, which as long as I don’t sell it might mean I could use it. Thing is, I could write this but I don’t want to steal their IP. They have a good product and deserve success. I think it more honest to give them the HTML dump as a thank you.
GOALS!
Reading a book with this title. The chapters end with lists of things to think of. The most scary is saying the words I am responsible, and not allowing yourself to pretend to be a victim. Very hard but very worthwhile. Will post more later.