Posts by Russell Brown
-
Up Front: Home is Where the - Ooo, shiny!, in reply to recordari,
With Anti-Social, you’ll be amazed how much you get done when you turn off your friends.
I have such a weird job. Ducking between Twitter, here and other forums is actually part of the description. At the least, it fills in the time between my short, intense spells of creative productivity.
Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.
-
Up Front: Home is Where the - Ooo, shiny!, in reply to BenWilson,
Being a computer programmer, I long ago gave up on ever even agreeing to deadlines. I’m sure there are programmers who regularly meet deadlines, but I’m also pretty sure they do it by massively overestimating how long things will take.
Different gigs, though, bro. Journalism deadlines generally involve smaller jobs, and considerably less challenging engineering issues.
-
Up Front: Home is Where the - Ooo, shiny!, in reply to Scott A,
But, yes, this does also mean I utterly respect braver people who can do the whole hog and say “screw working for the man, I’m gonna spend all day wearing no pants to make my money!”
Ahem. Some of us wear tracksuit pants. Comfy ones.
-
Hard News: A Work of Advocacy, in reply to Stephen Judd,
Morgan Godfery has what appears to this Pakeha to be an excellent blog on Maori politics over at Maui Street. Today he posted two articles very relevant to this thread (1, 2), in which he passes on rumours of planned Operation 8 style raids on Te Whanau a Apanui
It's really good blog: literate, connected, relevant. And there appears to be a good source for the tip on a raid.
But I would be more than astonished if there was anything like the October 15 action. In 2007, the police had people on tape talking about killing (yes, probably the kind of bullshit people talk when they're out of it, but still ...) and considerable evidence some had been been obtaining weapons -- and even then they learned a big lesson about overkill. I genuinely struggle to imagine they have evidence of that kind about Te Whanau a Apanui.
I'd hate to be proved wrong ...
-
Up Front: Home is Where the - Ooo, shiny!, in reply to Andrew G,
I’m exactly like you in this respect, Danielle. If i don’t have a deadline it doesn’t get done; if I do it gets done really close to the deadline.
That's kinda how it is being a journalist: you hit deadlines. So long as you do that, and produce quality work, it doesn't matter so much how you get there.
-
Are you switching on your computer before your coffee machine?
Both are very rarely switched off. It's not good for them, you know?
-
Something else that works for me: identify your own productive and non-productive times, and work to that.
I hit the computer almost immediately I get up, work (with the usual commenting and tweeting distractions) through till noon or 1pm, then head out for a ride or to the supermarket or the fish shop or something. My mojo's usually back by about 4pm and I get a surprising amount done 4-6pm. Wine can help the flow after 5pm, but we all need to be careful about that, don't we?
-
Up Front: Home is Where the - Ooo, shiny!, in reply to BenWilson,
I’d like to stress the “go out sometimes” point. Even if you consider yourself to be not naturally sociable, you’ll be amazed by how nutty you can get after being alone for too long. Other humans form anchor points of reality around you, and regular contact with them is good.
I have to leave the house to work a couple of times a week, which is certainly good.
But what I’ve found really beneficial is getting out for exercise. Don’t want to be too much of a bike bore, but 30-60 minutes of aerobic exercise is a really good thing for us home desk jockeys.
Also: Invest in a bloody good chair. I spend a lot of time in my Formway, and I have never regretted spending the money on it. (Disclosure: I discovered the product when Formway provided the Media7 chairs and was able to get a deal for one at home.)
-
These are not the biggest dangers, though. The biggest problem with working your existing office job from home [ha, look, a 2000 year old ad for a male prostitute, that’s awesome] is your job eating your life.
Abba-solutely. People sometimes ask me how I avoid slacking off. The reverse is more often true: that you lose track of when to goddamn stop.
-
Hard News: More Secrets and Lies, in reply to Caleb D'Anvers,
This morning’s Australian suggests that Hicks simply told the Americans what they wanted to hear to secure his release from camp. At the very least, he can argue that any statements he made were obtained under “duress,” to use the parlance of our times:
And no one will ever be able to prove any different, even if there was something to know, because the case is irrevocably tainted by what was done to him. Glover's description of the "cold, incompetent stupidity of the system" is very apt.