Uni-Tasker

Our office went multi-monitor a few years ago, shortly after the flat panel price crash made it economical for everyone, even the lowliest assistants, to put two or three monitors on their desks, making us all look like masters of the universe trading currency futures.

To the extent there was any thought behind this move to surround us with pixels, that thought went something like this: “In this multi-tasking age we need to craft a desktop cockpit environment that enhances the end-user’s multi-usability by presenting multi-graphical interfaces with an always-on click-operable inter-utility.”

And indeed there was a certain click-operable inter-utility to the set-up, what with my emails open on the left, my internet phone interface to the right, my task list floating above somewhere, and my various documents scattered all over the place. My whole digital life splayed out in full multi-monitor dimensionality in front of me—a data cornucopia!

The problem is I was incapable of resisting the allure of the flashing pixels. With all those windows open and active, something was always flashing, seeking my attention, pulling me away from whatever had distracted me the minute before. I wasn’t getting things done like I used to. More troubling, I wasn’t thinking much either, just lots of pointing, clicking, navigating and noting, signifying nothing.

So I unplugged the extra monitor. I resized my default windows to full screen, so now I can only see one at a time.

That helped, but I have to say it wasn’t enough. It was still too easy to switch back and forth between programs, toggling with the ALT-TAB combo, so I had to take a more drastic step: I returned to the land of paper.

Now I can’t eliminate the computer from my work life, and I don’t want to, but I have come to the realization that my little mind is incapable of multi-tasking and, more importantly, incapable of realizing that it is incapable of multi-tasking. So to avoid getting sucked into the void I have to treat my computer like a limited-purpose tool, basically just a card-catalog to the library of the world and a communication delivery device.

Each time I find something to read, or receive an email I need to read, I print it out. Once I am finished finding and printing, I have a stack of paper I can read offline, preferably far from the blinking allure of my computer screen.

It’s old school, and it’s not environmentally friendly, but I find reading on paper suits my uni-tasking mind very well. I have no problem focusing on one page at a time, and when I look up from my reading material I see a blank wall, which is much more conducive to reflection than a flashing screen.

It helps to have access to a good printer, preferably one that can print out two-sided sheets, as there is so much good stuff to read that transporting it can be a problem.

Another practical problem is typography. Simply put, articles you print from the web look terrible. Many websites, such as Outer Life, are formatted exclusively for the screen and provide no printing tools at all. Those that do allow for printing rarely pay much attention to the formatting.

My solution was to cut-and-paste these articles from the web into Notepad, a program that strips them of their formatting, then cut-and-paste the raw text into a pre-formatted template in my word processor designed to produce easy-to-read text that looks professionally typeset. My template is anchored by Adobe Caslon Pro, a typeface specifically designed to look good when printed (unlike the fonts included with your computer, which are designed to look good on the screen). I widen the side margins so that the column of text I read is a little more than five inches wide, which I find optimal for avoiding eye fatigue. A few search-and-replaces ensure that quotes are curly and dashes are wide enough. All this takes me about a minute per article.

Now I realize we are all in the process of figuring out how to manage the cognitive challenges of the information age, so my challenges with multi-tasking aren’t particularly unique or interesting, and I also realize that my reducing the content of our digital age to a sheaf of personally typeset printed documents is an eccentric response to these challenges, one that probably says more about the limitations of my mind, formed as it was in the days before any monitors, let alone multi-monitors, than it does about computers or the common human condition, but I have to say, leaning back in a reclining chair while leafing through a pile of articles typeset to please my eye, my computer blinking away behind my back, out of sight and out of mind, I feel an inordinate pleasure, as if I’ve recaptured a piece of my mind from the machines.

The Purity of the Tune

I love music, but I find it difficult to write about music. There is the whole “dancing about architecture” difficulty in reducing anything so sublime yet ineffable to mere words, but for me the problem runs deeper: music sneaks its way into my brain at a sub-analytical layer, effectively evading my higher analytical processing centers.

And that’s why I love it so, I think, because when I listen I don’t think.

I suppose I could sit at the keyboard and force myself to describe in words what I am hearing, but in doing that I fear I’d break down the barriers that have for so long protected music from my higher reasoning centers.

So I generally avoid the topic.

One thing did occur to me today, though, what with all the hubbub surrounding the death of a pop star, and that was to marvel at the sheer amount of interest in that person that had nothing to do with that person’s music. In fact, with all those extracurriculars to contend with, it is doubful anyone could even listen to that person’s music as music.

One music area I gravitate to is pre-war (WWII) American rural music, a category that includes blues, folk and country tunes. Lacking a better descriptor, I’ve decided to refer to it by the acronym PWARM.

Anyways, listening to Dick Justice’s “Brown Skin Blues,” a PWARM song that’s currently worming its way deep into my brain, it occurred to me that I know nothing about Dick Justice. All I have is his song, his voice, his guitar. So there’s a purity in his tune, a listening experience unadulterated by extraneous information.

This is common with PWARM artists, most of whom recorded a few forgotten tunes before disappearing. When you listen to them, there’s nothing to distract you.

Except news reports about a recently deceased pop star.

We Are Not Amused

Okay, so things have been awfully quiet around here for a while. A long while. Three years since I posted with any frequency, but, hey, who’s counting?

I miss Outer Life. Many times I’ve tried to start it up again, but my attempts would end in failure, either a stillborn piece that went nowhere or, worse, a piece that got posted but should have been stillborn.

While trying once again to reignite the spark, yesterday I did something I haven’t done before: I scrolled through the archives and re-read some of the posts I wrote back when this place was humming.

I liked most of what I read. Some of it made me cringe, but a lot of it held up well, if I may be so immodest. I remembered how easy it was to write these pieces, that wonderful feeling of a long piece flowing from my fingertips in real time. A feeling I haven’t had in three years.

And reading these pieces, it became clear to me why I can no longer write them: I am no longer the person who wrote those pieces. When Outer Life started I was more self-absorbed than I am now. I’d spent much of my first four decades trying to figure out the world around me. Then, right around the time I started Outer Life, my curiosity turned inward. What fascinated me was me. While that lasted, posts flowed. Then I turned away from the mirror and went back to looking out the window. And the posts stopped flowing.

My muse left me. Very unamusing.

It’s a bit odd that a website called Outer Life doesn’t work when its author looks outside his life. But then that title wasn’t chosen because it made any sense.

I’m not sure what to do. I have the desire to do something, but I’m not sure there is anything I can do. Scrolling through the archives I noticed that my earliest posts were, if anything, even weaker than my more recent posts. Perhaps, I thought, if I embraced my current awfulness, made peace with the rudderlessness, and just got the site going again, maybe I’d find that groove again. Or at least another groove.

I also did something very uncharacteristic for me: I started an Outer Life Twitter account. I have no idea what I will do with it, but being desperate I’m willing to try anything to kick-start the creativity.

So, I’m loathe to promise anything, but if there’s anyone out there still reading this, I’ll beg your indulgence as I start throwing words at the canvas, hoping some will stick.