It's time for another music log. I skipped a week because last week was too busy; think group of software developers locked in a room until a new feature was implemented. Anyway it's good to be back online.
Let's start off with “All the Same” by Sick Puppies. This is a pretty old song that for some reason eluded me during my college years. Or at least I don't remember hearing this song back then. I only heard it this year and I like it a lot. I love how it starts slow and builds up to a point when the vocals and instruments come to life.
Having a 1 hour or so limit on playing video games, really forces me to think about what other leisure activities I can engage in. Ever since I started the digital declutter phase and even after it ended, I only really had two options: playing the guitar or reading a book. Last Sunday I added another one to the list; board games.
Note: I'm using “board games” as a catch all for all types of board and card games.
I have a decent amount of board games that can be played solo or co-op. Lord of the Rings LCG is my favorite. It is also the one that keeps breaking my heart.
So I just watched the pilot episode of this new show, Formula 1: Drive to Survive on Netflix and I am really impressed with it. I used to be a big Formula 1 fan back when I was in college, but have not been keeping up the past few years. Watching the pilot episode has rekindled in me the desire to watch the races again.
I am not even sure how they filmed this. It looks like a movie, like a fictional movie, but it is not. They managed to take real life footage and make it look like a movie. The part in the episode where they were building up to the start of the race was very cool.
I'm used to watching races live. You have the commentators talking with each other, you have the race data on the screen and you see the drivers racing. You never get to see what happens behind the scenes though. And that's what you get to watch in this show.
Update: I initially had embedded code for the first two songs I shared but I realized the album cover might be NSFW, so I just took them out and replaced them with links.
It's Friday, so it's time for another music log entry. This entry is going to be focused on music from the band Stand Atlantic. I just recently discovered this Aussie pop-rock band in Spotify. They seem to be an up and coming band. They remind me a lot of the pop-rock/punk-pop bands from my college years, like Simple Plan or All Time Low. Either way their songs are pretty good.
First up is “Skinny Dipping”, which is my favorite song from them so far. If you search for “Stand Atlantic” and “Skinny Dipping” on Youtube, you'll find an acoustic version that is really good.
Skinny Dipping
Next up is another good song, “Toothpick”.Toothpick
Last one for today is a surprising one. I'm used to rock bands making covers of pop songs, but not the other way around. This one is a cover of Taking Back Sunday's “MakeDamnSure”. I would call it a rock goes pop-rock cover. I love it!
Trying a new format for sharing good music that I just listened to today. Depending on how this goes, I might make this a weekly post. Anyway, as I said in my About page, I like listening to rock music. So if you are a fan of the genre, you might find some new songs to listen to from this list.
Here are 3 songs that gave me some much appreciated frisson today. I discovered them from a “Punk Goes Pop” playlist by some dude in Spotify, so they are all cover songs with a punk rock twist.
First up is “Soak Up The Sun” by the band Sincerely, Me. I am familiar with original song, but have never heard of the band before. Very nicely done cover though.
There is a saying that goes, “out of sight, out of mind”. That is the basis for the first productivity tip that I'm sharing on this journal. As you can tell by the title though, I added “Out of Reach” in between. The reason for that is explained towards the end of this post.
My usual routine when I got to work was to take out my phone and place it on my desk, right in front of me, between the keyboard and my monitors. The idea being that I would easily spot any notification and can act on them.
To the old me, this setup was perfectly fine. Years ago, I was so into apps and staying up to date on my notifications, that I didn't mind having a phone right in front of me. This was partly the reason I switched from a Windows Phone to an iPhone; the notifications system on Windows Phones were subpar and it just didn't have any of the cool apps available on iPhones.
I originally started this site as my personal, somewhat anonymous online journal. The plan was to write journal entries about the daily happenings of my life. It would serve as some sort of historical record of my life, shared online.
However, as I was going through the digital declutter phase, I've had a few realizations that convinced me to change the focus for this online journal.
I realized that writing journal entries to my Bullet Journal, a real paper notebook, was a much more fulfilling and relaxing experience. I didn't have to filter myself when writing to it. I could be as candid and personal as I want to be, and I didn't have to worry about who would read it. I wasn't worried about writing something that might offend someone, or jeopardize my career. It was simply a much better writing experience compared to writing online journal entries. This made me question why I needed this online journal in the first place.
I bought the Digital Minimalism book to try and find more ways to curb my smartphone addiction. It is an attempt to regain control of my attention and time.
Okay so here are my notes, findings, revelations, thoughts, etc... on how it went:
I had so much extra time to read books during this phase; I finished reading 3 books and I wasn't even trying to finish books. Finishing 3 books in a 30 day period is amazing to me, I never thought I could do that. Here are the list of books I finished reading during the digital declutter phase:
These are a list of rules that I'm going to be following during the 30-day digital declutter phase. I'm already trying to follow some of the rules on here, but I think I will officially start it on the 20th for a good round number.
Messaging Apps:
Text Messages/iMessage: Allowed
Facebook Messenger: Not allowed
Groupme: Not allowed
Emails:
Mobile Phone Apps:
Outlook: Allowed (needed for work) but can only be used during daytime, except on support calls.
Yahoomail: Allowed (needed for two factor authentication) but can only be used during daytime.
The art of Vocational Friendship, you see, is to keep your contact with friends only to those points where you’re mutually sympathetic. With some friends you may find many pleasant points of contact, with some only a few. But almost every person you meet has at least one quality that you can enjoy. That is the way I think that we should look at our friends. Focus on the quality you like best.
