I’ve been futilely struggling to clean my office/studio so that Gina and I can record our next Live @ Rehearsal disc (and also so I can make good on promises to Vicky and Nate to record them).
I realized the futility of my struggle was connected not to the level of mess or lack of places to put things. Instead, it is due to my obsessive need to collect tiny flecks of information that I might at some point have a future use for.
This collection takes the shape of back issues of Wired with folded over pages, old business cards with words scribbled on their backs, and old notepads with a few last clinging pages. Occasionally, an url makes it all the way into my bookmarks file – making it even less likely that I’ll ever visit it.
I am throwing them all out.
Below is the net results of my trash haul – the bits of information that seem worth remembering.
If you know anything about any of them please feel free to chime in, as clearly I still haven’t gotten around to looking into them too deeply.
37signals (Small business software.)
Dymo DiscPainter (Only $279 – could be worth it.)
The Motels. (Will I like them?)
The Annotated Watchmen. (I finally sat down and read it last weekend, so maybe now I’ll have a use for this one.)
Boost Your Bottom Line (butt exercises)
City Chase (Amazing Race without a television; Elise and I both bookmarked it to show each other, but haven’t got much farther than that)
Sheepskin Sandals (I think I wanted to buy these for Jack?)
The Pirate Bay (I don’t actually like torrents; I must have been looking for something specific.)
Birth of Rocker Venus (I use this a lot on mix CDs; not sure why it’s still bookmarked.)
BitPim (Allows you to manipulate data on your cellphone.)
The Rainy River Record (I have no idea.)
Entertainer’s Secret Throat Spray (I’m happy with my Vocal Eze, even if it’s just a placebo effect.)
Lark’s Tenor Guitar (Still tempting, but I wouldn’t spend more than $300)
Electronic Frontier Foundation Staff (Elise and I loved Fred Von Lohmann in a documentary – maybe This Film Is Not Yet Rated? If I ever went to law school this is what I’d want to do.)
Tune Tech Clip-On Tuner (Gina has this one; I still prefer my Intellitouch.)
How to convert a DVD for iPod (I’ll need a bigger PC and iPod to make this useful. Maybe next year.)
Better Living Through Design (Ikea for rich people.)
How to use space in a presentation (Just now cribbed from MLarson; if I remember this exists I will use it dozens of times a year)
Ma.tt (Love this design; fodder for the pm.com redesign.)
There might be more…
“obsessive need to collect tiny flecks of information”. Me too. A blessing and a curse. *sigh*
This inspires me to throw out all my tiny flecks of information, too.
I don’t know why I’m inspired to keep so much of it as various flotsam in my room; I’m much more likely to be able to relocate something if I just blog it.
BitPim is for people who don’t have fancy “smartphones” but still want to make their own ringtones or transfer pictures to and from a PC. It doesn’t support every phone (my motorola V551 is sadly not supported), but if it does support your phone, it’s a free alternative to potentially expensive proprietary software (like “motorola phone tools”).
“How to convert a DVD for an iPod” – I haven’t looked at that particular link, but there are a dizzying number of free software apps to do this – any combination of “DVD Rip” and “Video Convert” software would do the trick. It’s convenient even if you don’t have an iPod: you can get a feature-length movie down to 500mb and keep your DVD collection on a portable hard drive (if you don’t mind watching on a laptop).
Man, you are a font of knowledge this morning.