I really wanted to write something about motivation but I am not able to motivate myself to think about what’s buzzing around in my head. To be honest, I am beginning to think that my ability to compose sentences and string together words is leaving me. It’s not that I have any difficulty thinking about the things I would like to write here but I have difficulty actually writing it. My head is full of random thoughts but I am not managing to get them into anything coherent. Failing in this way is actually proving to be quite depressing to be honest.

I wanted to write about a post over at Strange Little Boy which talks about using a wireless connection in a public place – but I can’t get to the point of that one.

I also wanted to write about the development of online technologies and my personal frustrations seeing a lot of the technologies I am interested in being developed outside of the UK. Again, I am suffering some kind of block.

So, I am off to meet a friend for pizza this evening. This will allow me to clear my mind with friend-pizza-eating-trivia and, also, to avoid the television which, after last night’s Dawson’s marathon, will be no bad thing for my brain. Perhaps I shall welcome tomorrow with a clearer mind.

On this day…

2003: Today On The Creek
2002: Hope I Haven't Missed Your Birthday

A regular Tuesday morning in London. Like millions of other commuters around the capital I head for work in something of a daze. Londoners are not known for striking up conversations with each other on commuter trains. Today, however, I witnessed two real-live conversations between strangers. As a result of the derailment on the Northern Line the Bakerloo Line was packed. At the bottom of the escalator at Piccadilly Circus two women had a row about who was pushing who as they tried to get to the top before each other. It wasn’t a deep and meaningful exchange but it was a conversation (of sorts) between two strangers – which was certainly different. The second instance also took place on the escalators but this time Waterloo. The advertisements on the walls were for O2’s lower-cost calls from home service. They are a series of postcodes. A family riding up didn’t understand the message and another tube-rider chipped in with his opinion on the ads. He too failed to understand the message. I guess there’s something in that for O2’s ad agency but for me it was an eye-opener that people are, perhaps, not so self-involved on the London Underground.

On this day…

2005: links for 2005-10-21
2002: Wasted Weekends

I have been away on holiday for a week and am moving into catch-up mode.

As a child I frantically wrote letters the week before going on holiday so that I would have a nice pile of unopened mail upon my return. Yesterday, there was, of course, a mass of mail on the doorstep but most of it was corporate mass-mailings or junk of some description. My email inboxes were the same but where are the communications I actually want?

Back in the office, most of the mail is not junk and has to be dealt with but, as ever, procrastination gets the better of me. I’ve read it all and acted on the urgent. The rest is delayed for the “catching-up” excuse can last another 24 hours. Shameful, wasteful and it will be – ultimately – frustrating for me but that is the spirit of putting-off.

On this day…

2003: Marriage Protection Week 2003
2002: Starmaker, Dream Breaker

As the British tend to do, we will look back on this past summer with joy. We’ll talk about it like we did that of 1976 – a long, hot, lazy, crazy summer. I was more likely to be playing in a paddling pool than worrying about shortages of the plastic pools back then but I do remember the heat and picking the fruit from my father’s fruit bushes while sitting in the back garden. Sadly, the topless lads playing football on the green behind my house has given way to to the Sunday morning rugby matches. This is a sign of the on-coming winter as the fields turn from their burnt golden grass to a dark-brown mud bath. Still, autumn comes first and it’s my favourite of seasons. I think it’s time I got the camera out to start recording some of it.

On this day…

2004: Shrewsbury Town
2002: Nearly There
2002: Ultimate Boy Band CD (1)

I’ve mentioned elsewhere that the addition of SkyPlus into our household has transformed my television viewing. I appreciate this does make me sound like all the TiVo fans out there but I think it really does make a difference to some people. Nonetheless, fads in television viewing still exist. This time last year I was a big fan of The Shield on Channel Five – I thought it was quite innovative – but it quickly became another formula driven cop-show. On the other hand, Channel Four’s Teachers, now showing it’s third series on Wednesday evenings, remains one of the sharpest programmes on screen at the moment and more surreal by the week. I’m starting to walk past real life schools looking for donkeys in the playground and teachers smoking around the back.

On this day…

2004: The End Of September
2002: Morally Ambiguous Cop