We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.
One example that instantly comes to my mind is high school and maths. Planning to take an entrance exam we were put in a special group taught by one of the most notoriously strict teachers in the school. With one exception none of us were really special though, not what you'd call a natural born talent.
Classes were spent working from start to finish, no idling was allowed, and we were usually given a tremendous amount of homework. Often we devoted breaks between classes to discussing the solutions or what might come up next. And somehow by our senior year we became quite good. I can't speak for the others but never since then have I felt so confident in my maths knowledge.
It was slow and almost imperceptible, too. I only noticed the effect when my then-girlfriend was doing her homework with me looking over her shoulder: she was at a loss how to solve something really simple whereas I was nonplussed how she couldn't. After all, I knew, I wasn't supposed to be better than her.
Similarly every article or guide about writing starts the same: it's not all about talent, and even talent cannot achieve much without defiant diligence. If you want to be good (or get better at it) write every day, no exception.
This is one of the reasons I can come up with when asked why I still bother writing here: even if it was only me (or no-one) reading, it's still practice. And in the process, slowly, silently, I may improve.
I'd be surprised if I won't catch a cold after today; basically all my clothing below the waistline (not covered by the raincoat) is soaking wet. Jeans are not particularly fast to dry out either.
I guess the second best would be the time when I was getting home from class, still in Japan, and it was raining so heavily that the downhill roads turned into little streams of steadily flowing water. At one point I realized that the white stuff on my bare-feet sandals was my own skin, drenched and peeling.
The update system has never been the strong suite of Windows. I suppose everyone remembers fondly the pop-up dialog windows of XP prompting you to restart that came back right away when you closed them. The Windows 7 version is similar but at least you can specify a 4 hour grace period (at most) until which time the notification does not come back to pester you.
What happened today on my work PC was really annoying, though. I was happily typing away closing in on the end of a paragraph, ready to smash 'Enter'. At this precise point the god-forsaken pop-up reared its ugly head and it stole the focus from the then current window. As a result my 'Enter' went to the default selection on the dialog window, which was, you can probably guess: 'Restart now'. I could only watch helplessly as the system closed down all my open applications one by one, severed the remote desktop connection, and commenced updating itself.
I understand the problem that users are reluctant to restart to update so they need to be educated, but really, dear Microsoft, really, a focus stealing pop-up? Do you call this UX?
Due to the nature of the event the performers were almost exclusively Hungarian bands, to which I rarely listen. I just went for the company. Regardless, two performances really came as a surprise.
Firstly, following my brother I ended up at Supernem. Their energetic pop-punk-rock music had the audience jump by the second song. This gig also proved that with a bit of luck the Nexus S can take semi-decent photos even in such low-light conditions.
Secondly, locally famous they might be, I haven't cared much for Quimby before. However, they were pretty amazing live. Thanks to radio stations I knew about two-thirds of the songs but even the rest had something extra to them: a jazz-interlude or megaphone-vocals, etc. One may not like these musicians but it would be silly to question their professionalism.
It's like a garage sale for city dwellers. On a set date you can throw out all your unwanted junk in the street to be collected. Of course, before that, hordes of people who make a living out of this scan through the heaps, collect anything that's remotely usable and argue over the more precious loot. More often that not you'd find a corpulent gypsy male sitting in an armchair battered beyond recognition (most likely extracted from the junk) next to every deposit doing guard duty.
This one came from my newest last.fm-ified friend, Midnite. Poets of the Fall play really pleasant alternative rock and are from Finland. Their single Late Goodbye appeared in Max Payne 2 as the title song. Check out Maybe Tomorrow is a Better Day from Carnival of Rust.
[audio:http://sesam.hu/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Poets-of-the-Fall-Maybe-Tomorrow-is-a-Better-Day.mp3|titles=Maybe Tomorrow is a Better Day]
I was told to see them live one has to travel North, because they won't do gigs elsewhere other than Scandinavia and Russia. Prepare your ushankas.
"You know that day-dream you had as a little kid? The one where you and your friends got together to battle the evil dragon? Well, these guys are kind of doing that. Every night."
The Raid looks like a really interesting project I just found out about: filmmaker Kevin Michael Johnson teamed up with some people from TankSpot to produce a full-length documentary on raiding in World of Warcraft.
The film is aimed at the general public to let them share - and maybe understand more - the excitement and feeling of this kind of experience. Hopefully it would even help with improving the general image of people who play MMORPGs.
The filming was done in 2010 so the newest expansion, Cataclysm, is not included. The footage has scenes from Icecrown Citadel from back when The Lich King was boss.
For starters I recommend reading through the project's initial Kickstarter page. There is also a trailer for the documentary that will premier streamed on 6 August.
Say hello to my kids is a post-rock / indie band from Belgium. Their single You've become is used by filmmaker Ramon Haindl as a soundtrack for a photo-shoot documentary short.
Their latest EP, Victims, is free to stream on Bandcamp but for sale only on iTunes. Several tracks from their previous two EPs are available to download on Last.fm, though.
Much like Maybeshewill, the DIY spirit is important for them as well: during their first two EPs they produced, recorded, mixed and mastered everything themselves.
