Some thoughts on time, and a new visualization

2020.05.25
Time Thing One: a new era! Tomorrow I start a new job at Monster Worldwide, the jobs board folks. (Not to be confused with Monster the energy drink, Monster the audio cables, or Monsters, Inc.) Grateful that the job search was not all that bad - full of anxiety and self-doubt, and in more of a "buyers market" for hiring companies than in a while, but also reassuring that there are still plans Cs and Ds left untapped, ways I could still make a living even if they didn't meet my usual work preferences.

Time Thing Two: my most consistent ritual is making since quarantine started is making coffee, filling two mason jars and putting them in the fridge every other day. There's this niggling point about the repetition of it and I found I was well-served by reframing the rhythm of it- it's hard to describe concisely, but I was getting worn down by thinking "every other day, I'm finishing up the coffee, have to make some more" but then realized it was much more satisfying to think "oh, I'm going to make iced coffee for the next two days". Somehow looking at it as preparing for an enjoyable future vs having to restock since I ran through my stockpile feels much better, even though the situation is absolutely identical.

Time Thing Three: Looking at my stockpile of old video games, and also thinking about the change of rhythm from looking for work vs the ol' 9-5. How did I ever have time for games? How did I ever have time for band? How did I ever have time for techie projects, especially when I was working?

Time Thing Four: The other week I supplemented my old Timelines project with a small addition, time is relative. Timelines are traditionally a single line, but I wanted to see what it would look like if I stacked up all the periods in a column, inviting comparisons. I further made it so that if you mouse or press on the bars, the amount displayed is not the amount of calendar time, but what % of my life it represented up to that point. (So, I was born in Philly but only lived there 3 months, but that 3 months was 100% of my life that far. The proportional display didn't grant me too many new insights, but it was kind of interesting to see.

Making a Squirrel "American Ninja Warrior" course: Y'know s'funny that for both "Gladiators" and "Ninja Warrior" the American version says "American". (Also almost surprised you can have "Ninja" in the title of "Ninja Warrior UK" given how they made Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles.)