Questions you want answered.

I need to try this on an old mouse I have. Think I have had it since 2009 or so and the rubber is starting to degrade. I have replaced it as my daily driver but it is useful to toss in my bag with my laptop.

Anybody have favorite books, guides, videos, etc. on productivity?

Specifically, I struggle with procrastination. Just getting myself to focus on things at work has been a challenge lately, partially due to a job I stayed in too long while it undermined my mental health (long story short). Some of it comes back to perfectionism, while others have other mental challenges associated (e.g., avoiding grading two projects because it's terrifying to be the final arbiter of work quality). Been working with a therapist and she didn't have specific recs so I thought I'd see if you all have any favorites.

I've heard of bullet journaling, which doesn't seem to solve my particular problem. Trello does pretty well for me as far as keeping tasks organized. I know what I need to do - I need help putting myself in the mental space to tackle it. I do have an app on my phone called Forest which helps remove that as a source of distraction, but I just move on to the next distraction, making me feel like there's a core thing to be tackled there.

I really liked Triggers by Marshall Goldsmith, but it's less about productivity systems than mindfully looking at your environment and what causes the triggers that cause you to get distracted (and how to actively put in place triggers to cause to act more productively). I got something out of it but with all these things your mileage will vary.

Rykin wrote:

I need to try this on an old mouse I have. Think I have had it since 2009 or so and the rubber is starting to degrade. I have replaced it as my daily driver but it is useful to toss in my bag with my laptop.

I pulled out my old mouse today and I have found that a magic eraser is about the best thing to get the sticky stuff off. Rubbing alcohol, a microfiber cloth, and q-tips were all helpful as well.

Won't it kind of depend on what type of plastic it is? Or are most of the more malleable plastics kind of in the same group and produce the same basica type of residue?

ActualDragon wrote:

Anybody have favorite books, guides, videos, etc. on productivity?

Stephen King's On Writing. Kind of a odd suggestion I guess because it is about how he writes and his life. However, I think his writing method can be applied to anything you want to be better at. His life history might not be as helpful except for the problems he overcome. If you don't give a F about King it might be a horrible choice.

A better choice might be Getting Things Done (GTD) by some guy. Oh David Allen. Anyway he goes over a workflow process designed to get Sh$t done. I used it for a couple of years.

I think if putting things off is the main problem teaming up with another could help with a GTD system. Kind of like it is easier to go exercise with another person.

Baron Of Hell wrote:

Stephen King's On Writing. Kind of a odd suggestion I guess because it is about how he writes and his life. However, I think his writing method can be applied to anything you want to be better at. His life history might not be as helpful except for the problems he overcome. If you don't give a F about King it might be a horrible choice.

You mean it isn't just the word "cocaine" repeated over and over again for 291 pages?

iaintgotnopants wrote:
Baron Of Hell wrote:

Stephen King's On Writing. Kind of a odd suggestion I guess because it is about how he writes and his life. However, I think his writing method can be applied to anything you want to be better at. His life history might not be as helpful except for the problems he overcome. If you don't give a F about King it might be a horrible choice.

You mean it isn't just the word "cocaine" repeated over and over again for 291 pages?

Nope, he does talk about his drug use though. Now that I think about it people that also suffered from addiction might find in especially meaningful.

It's the day after the election. How do I deal with hating the majority of my countrymen?

strangederby wrote:

It's the day after the election. How do I deal with hating the majority of my countrymen?

Remember that most of them are quite nice when you meet them in person and that they are working from false information rather than malice. It's not much but most people are generally decent.

Also the full UK electorate is 48 million and only 13 million voted for the Conservatives. That nowhere near the majority. ^_^

P.S. Apologies if you aren't talking about the UK election as a whole.

DoveBrown wrote:

I really liked Triggers by Marshall Goldsmith, but it's less about productivity systems than mindfully looking at your environment and what causes the triggers that cause you to get distracted (and how to actively put in place triggers to cause to act more productively). I got something out of it but with all these things your mileage will vary.

I’m more than halfway through Triggers and I would second this motion. I want to become the type of person who can implement into my life the lessons in this book.

Dakuna wrote:

Won't it kind of depend on what type of plastic it is? Or are most of the more malleable plastics kind of in the same group and produce the same basica type of residue?

I have a trick that works like magic for getting sticker goo off. There are probably different types of sticker goo so it might not work with everything. I had gotten most of the goo off of a hard cover book with a faux leather cover. There was a blurry smear of goo that wouldn’t go away. I worked a tiny bit of canola oil, the kind you cook with, into the goo, then used a tiny bit of dish soap and water and it got rid of all of it.

Thanks for the suggestions - I'll take a look at Triggers and Getting Things Done. Perhaps On Writing, but being a scaredy-cat I've never picked up any King.

Any good parody accounts worth following on LinkedIn?

LinkedIn itself is the parody.

Is there a good website or location to find backgrounds for my monitor.

mudbunny wrote:

Is there a good website or location to find backgrounds for my monitor.

Yep.

fake edit: oh, you probably wanted me to tell you what it is.

The bing home page has amazing HD photos every day and they’re usually screen sized. But also just go to google images and click HD. You can also put in a minimum DPI in the search options.

RawkGWJ wrote:
mudbunny wrote:

Is there a good website or location to find backgrounds for my monitor.

Yep.

fake edit: oh, you probably wanted me to tell you what it is.

The bing home page has amazing HD photos every day and they’re usually screen sized. But also just go to google images and click HD. You can also put in a minimum DPI in the search options.

If you using Windows, you can use Bing Desktop to automatically rotate the Bing images (and set genre). Alternately, if you are on Windows 10, you can find numerous applications in the Microsoft store, but YMMV.

Also try:
Astronomy Picture of the Day
National Geographic Nature Photography
Reddit Wallpaper Community
Wallpaper Engine (something a bit more dynamic for Windows)

I've found a lot of nice ones here also.

http://wallpaperswide.com

It has all different aspects including ones you can stretch across two monitors.

Do an image search for "rule 34" followed by the name of your favorite characters. Lots of wallpaper options.

ClockworkHouse wrote:

Do an image search for "rule 34" followed by the name of your favorite characters. Lots of wallpaper options.

This also reminds me of one of my favorite games, do a search for: Your name "the hedgehog". Endlessly amusing.

My question is, what, specifically, is the difference between an Arquebus and a Musket? Wikipedia sez that the two terms were used kind of interchangeably after the 16th century (especially since early, pre-flintlock muskets were basically just huge f*cking arquebuses) but I just want to make sure i'm not missing anything.

Prederick wrote:
ClockworkHouse wrote:

Do an image search for "rule 34" followed by the name of your favorite characters. Lots of wallpaper options.

This also reminds me of one of my favorite games, do a search for: Your name "the hedgehog". Endlessly amusing.

My question is, what, specifically, is the difference between an Arquebus and a Musket? Wikipedia sez that the two terms were used kind of interchangeably after the 16th century (especially since early, pre-flintlock muskets were basically just huge f*cking arquebuses) but I just want to make sure i'm not missing anything.

Weight and size of shot. The Arquebus being the lighter firing the smaller bullets. What is missing is the improvements in metallurgy and gunsmithing that allowed people to fire the musket sized shot from firearms of Arquebus weight, and these better guns tended to be called muskets rather than Arquebus, so musket became the general term.

mudbunny wrote:

Is there a good website or location to find backgrounds for my monitor.

alpha.wallhaven.cc

Careful, there's an extensive nsfw section, it's opt-in.

maverickz wrote:
mudbunny wrote:

Is there a good website or location to find backgrounds for my monitor.

alpha.wallhaven.cc

Careful, there's an extensive nsfw section, it's opt-in.

Lots of cool stuff there! If only I could filter out 75% of the content. I know the female form is captivating, but holy cow people!

Is it possible to tell Google Photos to only backup videos?

Chairman_Mao wrote:

Is it possible to tell Google Photos to only backup videos?

Maybe, definitely by folder, so if you can place them in the right folder it would be simple.

Dakuna wrote:
maverickz wrote:
mudbunny wrote:

Is there a good website or location to find backgrounds for my monitor.

alpha.wallhaven.cc

Careful, there's an extensive nsfw section, it's opt-in.

Lots of cool stuff there! If only I could filter out 75% of the content. I know the female form is captivating, but holy cow people!

Yeah, it's kind of frustrating. There is some REALLY great wallpaper and image content there. Most of my desktop and phone wallpapers are from there. But, like you said, some people take the nsfw stuff too far.

Wow, that's really nice!

Note that if you click a category like "Toplist", the result pages show detailed filter controls in the top center that you can use to get portrait images for phone backgrounds, etc., sort by date vs. random, etc.

For me, deselecting "anime" and "people" cut things down to maybe 10% anime tiddies, as opposed to the 80% it was before

maverickz wrote:
Dakuna wrote:
maverickz wrote:
mudbunny wrote:

Is there a good website or location to find backgrounds for my monitor.

alpha.wallhaven.cc

Careful, there's an extensive nsfw section, it's opt-in.

Lots of cool stuff there! If only I could filter out 75% of the content. I know the female form is captivating, but holy cow people!

Yeah, it's kind of frustrating. There is some REALLY great wallpaper and image content there. Most of my desktop and phone wallpapers are from there. But, like you said, some people take the nsfw stuff too far.

I really just meant the stuff that isn't explicit just.. so many images of attractive females. I haven't run across any nsfw stuff yet.

I wasn't really paying attention before, but this site sounds better and better the longer this conversation goes.