eMarkLee

My mate KokoBWare recently gave me a personal productivity book called Getting Things Done by David Allen. It was actually pretty enlightening. I had been in search for such a system for some time but was never able to find it. A system that captured all tasks in my life, from creating Powerpoint presentations, doing my expense reports, to purchasing the toilet paper to wipe my arse with…and wiping my arse. Everything captured in one trusted reviewed list. I’m digging it. KokoBware: you’re not getting that book back.

As I reached out on the web this is a system many techies have been following religiously for the past few years. It’s been documented on many enthusiast sites like 43Folders, which is a tech/email look at GTD. In particular, there’s a talk that the author, Merlin Mann, gave at Google that gives you a good feel for what the system is all about.

Since productivity is a personal hobby of mine, I will share my adaptation of the system, called Getting Shit Done in the next few weeks as I implement it.

Yesterday I ran in the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge in Battersea park.

The race was a 5.6km race, which translates to 3.48 miles. I think this was the farthest measured distance I have ever run. In high school I remember getting on the treadmill for 30 mins on 6 but didn’t particularly enjoy it. This time around I ran for 33 minutes at a rate of 9.5 mins per mile. This is actually better than I expected, considering I have not been training or running. The only running I’ve been doing has been running out of toilet paper.

The finish line was my favourite part, I would say….sprinting that last 100 meters and not having to run anymore. I don’t know if I have it in me to do a marathon. Some people are made for running, others made for running out of toilet paper.

If you are loyal to Yahoo Mail for whatever reason, they have opened up a couple of other email domains for use: ymail and rocketmail. It’s a move to improve their registration rates I guess so if there’s a coveted id like “rockitwithyourcoccyx” that you’ve never been able to get, you can try again.

Still, not sure why someone that isn’t married to an existing Yahoo Mail account wouldn’t just create a gmail account. I have a couple of old arse Yahoo Mail accounts that I am totally married to. And by marriage, I’m talking love….and getting told to clean up after my crap….

I have a long history with my PS2.

Golden Era
It first came to fruition when Nelly purchased it as a Christmas gift for the Grandview apartment back in the Golden Era when Workmonkey, Nelly, and I were all living together in the same San Francisco apartment 8 years after graduating from high school together. Reliving our days of youth, if you will. This was during a time when all three of us were laid off in the midst of the dot-com bust. There aren’t that many times in your life where you are able to drink beer, play video games, and have a rowdy time all while not working and getting paid unemployment by the govenment. Ok, so many people do that all their lives…but for us, we knew the time was limited.

So after a period of playing games on Workmonkey’s Sega Dreamcast, Nelly brought us to the next age of gaming by buying the PS2 for the house. Suffice to say, it was well received and played constantly for a period of 6-9 months. There were many nights of endless James Bond: Nightfire battles that ended with Workmonkey throwing the controller, muttering to him self while going to his room, slamming the door, and drinking Grey Goose alone. Generally this occured after I kill his character with a shot to the head with a Crossbow, or after I excrete gases from my arse on his forehead. Not sure why he didn’t receive that one all that well.

Tech Era
Roughly a year or two after the golden era I decided to investigate the innards of the PS2 so that I can play my backup games. This involved taking the PS2 apart and installing a new case for it. I used it for a while to play DIVX movies using the Reality PS2 Player but ultimately it proved to be inefficient and not compatible with all codecs. It also did not read DVD-RW discs and therefore required that I burn lots of DVDs to play DIVX/xvid movies. I ultimately purchased a Phillips DV642, one of the first DVD players to decode DIVX/xVID. I used it to watch movies burned onto rewriteable DVDs for the remainder of my time in the bay area with much success.

Puerto Vallarta Event
Of course, all of these skills came together when I put my PS2 disassembly skills to use and fixed Koah’s PS2 at their Puerto Vallarta wedding. Koah had brought the PS2 out to Puerto Vallarta along with a series of Karaoke Revolution games to have a big karaoke night. When we turned it on, we realised there was a problem and that it would not read any of the discs. I proceeded to take the PS2 apart, down to its soul to fix the issue and allow a loud and fun evening of drunken, tequila laden, karaoke. Highlight of my PS2 hacking career.

London Era (now)
The PS3 is now out, and the XBOX 360 has been out for some time. Everybody is basically selling or throwing out their PS2s these days. The PS2 actually got shipped over with me to London as a means of playing games, both networked and non. It was intended to serve as a DVD player as well. PS2 is still played out there, but usually with games like Guitar Hero, Karaoke Revolution, and Singstar.

I have just recently changed my PS2 into a PS2 Media Center. This requires the following items:
1. PS2 Network adapter
2. Modchip or Swap Disc
3. SMS Media Player

Basically, this allows me to play movies and shows on my TV through my PS2 Media Center in one of three ways:
1. USB Drive
2. Streamed through the network. I can access the share on my computer through the network adapter and play movies and music off of my computer.
3. Burned CD/DVDs.(old school).

As the SMS Media Player is an open source project, it will continue to be updated with the latest codecs, which now cover around 90% of video files available. Pretty amazing how much this PS2 has been able to go through and continues to allow me to stream movies like Hannah Montana to my TV. Brilliant!

If it’s good enough for Tiger Woods, it must be good enough for me!

Maybe…or you could be the small minority of people(5 out of 100) whose vision is forever ruined. As a business person, I like to figure out the cost benefit of this transaction…let’s take a look:

Cost: $2000/eye
Benefit: Not needing to wearing contacts anymore. 30 years of contact lens solution(4 per year at $10 per bottle) and $100 in contact lens costs per year = $4200 saved.

Now…of course, there’s risk:
Risk: Forever ruining your vision. The very thing that you use to see the world around you. Um…

Bottom line is: are you willing to risk your vision for life just so that you don’t need to put contacts on in the morning and take them off at night?

I sure am not, especially using Acuvue for Astigmatism with Accelerated Stabilization Design, which allows for better positioning of the lens for my football-shaped cornea. Yeah, life’s a bitch. Instead of a traditional hydrogel material, these contacts are made from Galyfilcon A, or silicone hydrogel. Basically, my previous contacts were unwearable because it dried my eyes out. These have been 100% more comfortable and less drying. So if dryness is what is making you consider Lasik, you should test other kinds of contacts. I have no cure for dryness in other areas of your body.

For all those people that have had Lasik and claim “I love waking up and being able to see the alarm clock.”, I can too. It’s because my alarm clock has digits that are huge and right next to the bed. So, there. FACE!

I been wondering about this new drug these kid on the street corner keep talking about while listening to their rap music. I don’t know what it is, but I reckon it is some form of designer drug these kids are all about these days. Will let you know when I find out. I bet it smells nasty and gives you bad breathe.

This one keeps on giving, like 8 years later…

It wasn’t all that bad…

Shit is expensive in London. As such, I have set a personal high yesterday on the amount spent on a meal.

Dinner for two at Ume. Sushi. Sake. Waggyu Beef. 463 quid before tip. Good night and good luck.