Does my brain look big in this?

So, I’ve been asked to be part of a panel at a thing. Which is nice. However, I have nothing even remotely resembling a professional ‘trust me, I’m clever’ photograph. So, a quick trawl through facebook gives me these gems. Believe me, there are none better.

So, please let me know which one I should use.

Picture 1

Picture 2

Picture 3

Picture 4

Picture 5

Picture 6

Picture 7

Help!

Desktop Distractions #3: Ghost Notifiers

Apparently, there is a market for short distinctive sounds, less than a second long, which can be used to inform you that some moment of great moment has passed.  It must be a market, because my laptop appears to acquire new ones on a regular basis. Maybe it operates a double life as a trader in honk futures.

It constantly emits sound, whether I am sitting in front of it or not. Chimes, chords, marimbas, barks, boings, crickets, quacks, strums, klaxons, pings, whistles, bells – on particularly bad occasions it sounds like a perambulating one-man-band. Honk, clash, honk, clash, paaarp! I’ve considered taking it out busking.

Desktop Distractions #2: Tab Breeding

There are, in essence, three ways you can navigate ‘in-text’ links:

1. you can ignore them, in which case, there is no problem;
2. you can click them one by one and read (or reject) the opened page before going ‘back’ to the main story, but this makes parsing the original narrative somewhat tricky;
3. you can ctrl-click them all into new tabs and read them later, after finishing the piece you are currently reading.

If you’re of even a mildly obsessive compulsive sort, this latter approach is the most logical approach to the media form and you will do it without thinking – I often forget to click without my pinky on ctrl.

Desktop Distractions #1: Click Amnesia

Similar to #2: Tab Breeding, Click Amnesia is the circumstance of finding a browser tab containing a pageful of content you have absolutely no memory of opening.

This can be particularly bad if you are in a shared office environment and the page is of an unsavoury nature – the look of perplexed surprise comes across as a comic over-attempt to hide your browsing delinquencies – a kind of “what the hell? Oh my good, you think I… how dare you!” pantomime.

Desktop Distractions

Every day, one single thought dominates my mind. I think it all the time, with startling regularity.

No, it’s not a lust for sex. It is not a religious zeal or a patriotic urge. It is not a narcissistic preen or an inconfidant whine.

“What was I just doing?”

I started a blog…

… which set the whole world indifferent.

I’ve been told that I really should start a blog. No, really. I don’t understand, it seems, how dreadfully important it is that I start a blog.

Why would I do such a thing? What do I have to say that could be so fascinating? Who on earth would want to read it? I have been assured that that is not the point. Unfortunately, I have not been told what the point is. So I’m actually no wiser, only slightly less confused.

This, so far, is it. Impressive, huh?