Om Malik:

I have known the truth about social platforms. I quit Facebook and Instagram years ago, and candidly I am better for it. I don’t need 5000 friends — 15 good ones will do.

I don’t need 5000 friends — 15 good ones will do.

I read this article today, and this line has stayed with me since. I never deleted my Facebook or Instagram accounts, especially after writing my thoughts on social media platforms on my website, but for a while, I either had my accounts deactivated or I simply didn’t login to them. That changed this summer. In this post, I described how I shared one of my posts on Facebook. In truth, I’ve shared many of my posts on Facebook this year, and the entire experience has been wonderful.

I have such a love/hate relationship with Facebook. The hate part is easy. If you have paid attention to what that company has done over the years, it’s hard not to hate them. Disinformation. Zuckerberg. The Metaverse. I get it. But I’ve had a Facebook account since September 2004. That’s 18 years, or half my life. For half my life, I’ve been on Facebook. I don’t think I have an active account that’s older than this, and that’s crazy to me. At the end of 2020, I downloaded all my data, then I spent a few days deleting as much as I could from that site short of deleting my entire account. I deleted all my posts and photos and likes and comments and anything else I could see to delete, but I never deleted my account.

With that said… I believe that Facebook is a fantastic tool to keep in touch with friends and to even know what’s going on in my community. Here in rural Montana, where all our towns have more bars than schools, more churches than grocery stores, Facebook is where everything happens. Somebody lost their dog? Sure enough, if you post it on the local community group, someone will help to find them, and most of the time, they do! It’s amazing. Somebody needs help with paying for medical bills? More than likely, the community knows the family, and the community will pitch in what they can to help this family. Hell, I donated to a family I know through Facebook because I would not have heard of it in any other way. In this sense, Mark Zuckerberg has succeeded in connecting people in a way no other tool has done before.

And for me? By posting many of my essays on Facebook, I’ve been able to grow closer to more of my friends, and I truly value that, and I hate to say it, but Facebook helped in that. Ever since I first heard about friend circles, or some optimal number of friends that people can realistically “have,” I’ve tried to keep my “friend” number on Facebook at or below 150 people. That means I’ve both unfriended many people and haven’t accepted many friend requests from people, even from people I know. If I met you at a party once, that’s not enough for me to accept your friend request, sorry.

I can’t count how many times someone I know, either a friend or a coworker, has come to me or contacted me and told me how much they liked this essay or that essay that I posted on Facebook. Many times, this has sparked conversation, and sometimes, these conversations have turned into regular contact, either at work or through text messages. I cannot disregard the fact that Facebook had a hand in this. Even today, a coworker came up to me and asked me if I was a “professional writer.” I said no, and she said I should be because I have “such a way with words.” It was heartwarming and amazing, and this 50-60 old woman would not have had a chance to learn about this part of me without Facebook. Hell, the day after I shared my essay on how I secretly like to dance, a friend of mine jokingly started dancing with me, and that was adorable as hell, too.

Sure, I’m on other social media platforms, most notably Micro.blog, but as much I value that community, they are not part of my life in the same way my friends on Facebook are. I see my friends regularly, and they now know something more about me because of my website, because I share them on Facebook where they are more likely to see these posts. I don’t personally know those people on Micro.blog or, now, Mastodon, and that’s fine. But like Om says, “I don’t need 5000 friends — 15 good ones will do.” And my 15 good ones are part of my regular life, but they are also part of Facebook, and Facebook helps connect us in ways that no other tool can.

However. I’ve had to setup rules around my social media usage, and these rules have changed everything for me. If you have noticed me be more active on social media lately, it is because of these rules. I will write about them soon. But for now, I’m not deleting my Facebook account anytime soon, not when it has proven to be a valuable tool in my life.

And yes, I truly cannot believe I wrote an essay defending Facebook. But here we are.

I have a secret.

Sometimes, when I’m listening to music, and I’m really feeling the sound, I like to dance.

Not full-on dancing or anything—just a shake of the hips here, a rocking of my shoulders there.

I like to dance when I’m cooking dinner or when I’m cleaning the house. Sometimes I like to dance when I’m driving. Again, not full-on dancing, but you know, what I can. Head bobbing, foot tapping, hand drumming on the steering wheel.

I like to sing to my favorite songs. I cannot sing, but who cares? I’m not belting out lyrics as loud as I can. I sing at a somewhat normal volume. Well, it’s more like singing a word or a phrase here, then mumbling a good chunk of the song, then going back to singing the few words I know. I’m good with choruses. Sometimes I make robot noises when I’m listening to electronic music.

I’m sure I’m not the only one who does this.

In my head, I’m a good dancer. No, I’m a great dancer. The best dancer this side of the Mississippi. Natural talent, I tell myself. That’s what I have. And when I sing in the shower? Oh man! The next big thing right here.

But I know that’s all in my head. I don’t care. Dancing and singing makes me feel good. Dancing and singing makes me happy. Dancing and singing makes me feel alive.

Dancing or singing in front of people, though? No way! I can’t do it. I can’t shake my hips in front of my friends. I can’t sing karaoke in front of complete strangers. Well… load me up on shots of bad vodka and I’m backing my ass up all night long! I’m blowing my voice out singing the lyrics to All the Small Things. I’m waking up the next morning with a sore throat and a throbbing headache.

But I’m happy because I sang and I danced to some good tunes, and good tunes make life worth living.

So—dance like nobody’s watching. Sing like no one else exists. Because sometimes we all need to be reminded to have fun and to not take everything so seriously.

I know I do.

I’m trying something new. Here are some notes from today, this 11th day of November, 2022:

• I slept for 9 hours and 8 minutes. 9 hours and 8 minutes! I woke up fully rested and ready to go. I have been happy all day. I wish I could sleep in every day.
• I bought an annual subscription to Capture One. This was something I was thinking about earlier this week, and I decided to go for it this morning. Consequence of getting a good night’s sleep? Yes, I think. Now to migrate from Lightroom…
• Earlier this week, Affinity released version 2 of their creative suite of apps. I had purchased version 1 of their apps, but I found myself not using them too much. The one app I used the most was Affinity Designer, and I enjoyed that app when I needed it. As long as it still works, I’m keeping version 1. That means missing out on their 40% launch discount, but that’s okay. Now that I’m moving away from Adobe, I’ve been using Pixelmator Pro on my Mac and Pixelmator Photo on my iPhone. These apps satisfy all my needs for now. They are fast, beautiful, and just powerful enough.
• The one thing I love about Affinity are their educational videos. They are so well-done and produced. I remember going through all their Affinity Photo and Designer videos back in the day, and I nerded out so hard on them. Good times!
• Along with a Capture One subscription, I bought this SanDisk 2TB Extreme Portable SSD. I wanted this to act as a middle man between my SD Card and my long-term storage, something to load all my photos into while I processed them and something to then backup to my other hard drives later. Its rugged nature is what drew me in. This will be something I toss in my bag and not something that lies stationary on a desk.
• Cultured Code, the makers of Things, has a really cool link builder on their website. I wanted to create a custom url scheme to create a specific type of task that I could fire with Shortcuts whenever I needed to, and this tool helped me build it easily and quickly. A great find and a great resource!
• My ArticRisk name is Mario Extreme Winters Villalobos. Fits!

• Batman died today.
• Atlanta aired its final episode.
• Mythic Quest is back!
• Finally, I purchased Debut by Björk last night, and I listened to it today while working around the house. Just as good as I remember.

I’m not sure how many of these I will do, but I always liked the idea of collecting links and other tidbits from my day and aggregating them into a post. I can finally cross that off the list.

Happy Friday, everyone!

Another night of subpar sleep, another uninspired day lived. Going to sleep isn’t the issue. It’s waking up at 3am and not being able to go back to sleep. My morning coffee helped until I went out onto the road and cautiously drove to work on slick and icy roads. Cold weather drains everything out of me. My eyes were heavy all day—still are—but I can’t call it a day yet. Dinner is baking in the oven, and I have to write some words before I can close my eyes.

On the 1st of November, Sault released 5 password-protected new albums on their website, and I downloaded them and added them into Doppler. I’ve been enjoying these albums so much, so last night, I bought their album Air on Bandcamp, and I started to listen to that on my drive to work. Unsurprisingly, it’s good.

A few hours ago, I purchased Blue Rev by Alvvays and Endure by Special Interest. I’m listening to the latter now, and I’m enjoying the hell out of it. I’ve yet to listen to Blue Rev, but I have it queued up next. I hadn’t listened to either of these bands before, but they came highly recommended, and predictably, I’m enjoying them a lot.

Over the weekend, I purchased Fossora by Björk, but I’ve only listened to it a few times. It’s definitely a Björk album, and I love Björk. Did you know she had a podcast where she breaks down all her albums? I did not until today, so I added the podcast into Overcast, and I will listen to it once I buy a few more of her albums that I don’t own yet. For my own records, I still don’t own Debut, Medulla, Biophilia, and Utopia. I’ve listened to them before over the years, most likely on Apple Music, back when I subscribed to that. I love filling in holes in my discographies. I might actually buy Debut later tonight. I’m too tired to know any better right now.

Also on the 1st of November, I purchased The Loneliest Time by Carly Rae Jepsen and Midnights (3am Edition) by Taylor Swift. I’ve enjoyed both, but I agree with most critics—it’s neither of their best. If I had to choose, I’ve enjoyed Carly’s album more than Taylor’s.

Finally, I sold my FUJINON XF18–55mmF2.8–4 R LM OIS lens on mpb.com for a reasonable price, and once I accepted the payment, I purchased the FUJINON XF16-55mmF2.8 R LM WR lens to replace it. This means I’m actually going to take more photos now, right?

Right?

I’ll think about it once I listen to more music.

Winter is in full swing here in Montana, and it is both beautiful watching the snow fall and annoying. On my way to work yesterday, I was stopped on the highway for about 40 minutes because up ahead, there was a severe car crash blocking the roads. Earlier today, we had an emergency alert ping our phones telling us to expect flurries throughout the day and to stay home if we’re able; otherwise, to drive slow and safely. On my way home from work, I pulled over to the side of the road multiple times as emergency vehicles drove past us, no doubt because there was another accident somewhere behind me. I saw a tow truck pulling a pickup truck from out of a ditch on the side of the road. Yesterday, I donated to a fundraiser started by a family whose daughter was severely injured in a car crash a few weeks ago. The daughter? A former student of my school, a girl I found sweet and kind, a girl I really liked. Now she’s on life support somewhere in Washington. A few hours ago, a friend of mind texted me, “I hate winter!” Another texted me two vomiting emoji when I told her that this weather sucks. My hands are dry and cracking, and I do not have enough bandages to cover all my open wounds.

But the kids? The little kids at school? They love winter! A bunch of us were watching them play on the playground while the snow fell, and we were all so tickled to watch them run around in the snow, make snow angels, make snowmen, eat the snow, and whatever else kids like to do when it’s snowing. I did not grow up with snow. I was telling my friends earlier how I saw snow for the first time when I was around 18 years old. But, I said, I grew up near the beach, and some people can go a whole life without ever seeing the beach. I have that, at least. Other than enjoying the sight of falling snow, I do not envy these kids for growing up here in Montana. The beach sounds so good right now.

I admit, National Blog Posting Month is kicking my ass.

Part of the issue is finding the time to write. Here’s a rough accounting of my daily routine:

• Wake up at 5am
• At my desk with a cup of coffee and writing in my notebook at around 5:20am
• Finish writing at around 6:20am-6:30am
• Study German and Japanese until 7am
• Leave for work at 7:10am
• Work from 7:10am to around 4:15pm
• Come home 15 minutes later, change into my workout clothes and start my workout at around 4:30pm
• Shower, make my post-workout shake, and relax by watching TV, starting at around 5:15pm and going until dinner
• Cook dinner and eat it, 6pm to 7pm
• Write???
• Go to bed at around 8:30pm to 9pm

It’s a bit after 7:30pm as I’m writing this now, and my eyes are heavy, I’m tired, and I want to go to bed. It doesn’t help that I didn’t sleep well last night. I’ve been having trouble sleeping all year, and I’ve been trying to make a concerted effort to go to bed earlier and earlier so I can get as much sleep as I could. Frankly, I need 8-9 hours of sleep a night or I’m miserable. And I feel miserable tonight.

I’m trying to build this second writing habit, and quitting now isn’t going to help me. I. Must. Keep. Going.

Warren Ellis wrote about the zero draft last week. The zero draft

is the draft you will never show anyone. It’s the draft you know is wrong but which contains the bare bones and meat-scraps of the story you’re trying to write. Get to the end of the zero draft, wait a day, and then go back and make it readable to other humans and fix all the egregiously wrong stuff, and that’s your first draft. Zero drafts are always too short: they fill out in the process of revising into a first draft. Stop thinking about your first draft as a first draft, call it a zero draft, and you give yourself permission to just slap everything you’re thinking about on to the page, knowing you can fix it before you have to inflict the draft on some other poor bastard.

I like this a lot. This is my zero draft. All the posts I’ve written for NaBloPoMo thus far feel like zero drafts to me. Sitting down at 7pm to write something and posting it online an hour later doesn’t feel like it deserves to be more than just a zero draft. Am I being too hard on myself? Maybe.

Did I mention I’m tired?

Maybe I’m being too hard on myself. Maybe I’m trying to bite off more than I can chew. I did give this project very little thought, after all. Writing is something I love, though, and I want to work on being a better writer. But when I have bills that need to be paid and a life that wants to be lived… it’s tough. It’s really tough.

Earlier today, I opened Capture One on my Mac. Capture One is a photo editing application, very similar to Lightroom. I am and have been a Lightroom user for years, and I haven’t had any inkling to change that, but when I opened Capture One, I decided to play with it. I don’t remember why I opened this application or the circumstances that led to it, but I have to admit, I had fun with it. I grabbed a random Fuji RAW file from my hard drive and played with the tools, learned the interface, made my edits, and in all, I found the entire experience to be nice. Thoughts started swirling around in my head, and I started asking myself, Should I switch to Capture One from Lightroom?

Concurrently, I had been toying with the idea of incorporating Obsidian into my workflow in some way. Obsidian is a very powerful tool for those who keep and work with Markdown files, like I do. I had been and still very much am a loyal user of iA Writer. iA Writer, in my opinion, provides the best writing experience of any writing app I have ever used. I am using iA Writer to write this post right now, and it’s the app I have used to write every blog post I’ve written since my return to blogging in 2020. Quite simply, I love this app.

But…

Obsidian is so nice! I love how it displays my Markdown files with its own “Live Preview” editing mode, I love how fast it is, and I love its vast amount and variety of community plugins. It’s a really nice app, and I really like it, but unlike with Capture One, I don’t have to migrate from iA Writer to Obsidian. I can use both concurrently, and I really like that. The only change I had to make was with my folder structure, and that was because my document folders were scattered all over the place, and that didn’t quite jive with Obsidian’s “Vault” concept. So I reorganized my files, and neither Obsidian or iA Writer cared.

My toying around with both Capture One and Obsidian had got me thinking about my tools again. A few months ago, I returned to using Scrivener because I missed a few of its more powerful features, something iA Writer didn’t have, and that experience has been fine, great even. I use Panic’s Nova to write all the code for this website, and I use Things to manage all my tasks. All these apps—these tools—are great and all, but at the end of the day, I have to sit down and do the work.

I’m a nerd, and I love playing around with new tools, with old tools, with tools in general, but these tools are meant to help me get work done. I can’t be like Julian Simpson and obsess over my tools, but I can be like Julian Simpson in the sense that he gets so much work done. Switching over to Capture One isn’t going to make me a better photographer, just like switching back to Scrivener isn’t going to make me a better novelist. At the end of the day, I have to use my tools to get work done, and I want to get work done.

In a lecture titled The Deteriorative Power of Conventional Art Over Nations, John Ruskin had this to say about art:

Wherever art is practised for its own sake, and the delight of the workman is in what he does and produces, instead of in what he interprets or exhibits,—there art has an influence of the most fatal kind on brain and heart, and it issues, if long so pursued, in the destruction both of intellectual power and moral principle; whereas art devoted humbly and self-forgetfully to the clear statement and record of the facts of the universe, is always helpful and beneficent to mankind, full of comfort, strength, and salvation.

I admit I’m not one who reads John Ruskin in my free time (though I have read a few of his books). This section was quoted in Emerson: The Mind on Fire by Robert D. Richardson Jr., a book I finished last month and loved. Around that time, I had been thinking about the role of writing in my life. To be more specific, I had been thinking about this tension I had between writing in my journal versus writing the novels and essays I considered to be more serious, and thus more worthy of my time. I hesitate to call it easy, but I can easily make myself sit at my desk with my pen and notebook and spend the next hour writing pages and pages about anything—about what’s in my head, what I’m feeling, what’s going on in my life. But once I intend to write my novel or work on an essay, I struggle. I struggle to make myself go to my desk, to open my notebook or my laptop, and simply write.

Why is this? Is it that one is something I do just to do—as John Ruskin says, practised for its own sake—and the other is destined for a bigger purpose, which is to be read by other people, to be judged by people like John Ruskin?

What is my best writing?, I remember asking myself. I used to think that writing something personal, something from the heart, will be considered “good.” That I might consider that my “best” writing. But then I started to question things. Personal doesn’t mean good, but something good can be personal, I wrote in my notes. Something honest doesn’t mean good, but something good can be honest. And on and on my thoughts went. Instead of getting to the bottom of it, I think I binged another TV show and went to bed.

And now I’m here.

I don’t know the answers, but what I do know is that I disagree with John Ruskin. Art practiced for its own sake is “helpful and beneficent to mankind,” even, or especially, if it’s just me. Journaling is something that has benefited me in ways I can’t measure, except in this one way: it has kept me alive. That is not hyperbole. I would not be here if it wasn’t for my writing. I do agree that “art devoted humbly and self-forgetfully to the clear statement and record of the facts of the universe” is important, but it’s not everything.

I’m going to end it here because I don’t know where to take this. That’s okay because this is just an attempt, something I can come back to later and revisit. After all, I’m not perfect.