Before you ask, no, this won’t devolve into a rant about the “attention economy.” At least, I hope it won’t. Paying attention is a bit of a trigger for me these days. After being knocked off my motorcycle by an inattentive driver who ran a stop sign I started seeing more and more examples of…
Author: Jesse
Writing Processes, Side Projects, and Time Sucks…Oh My!
Update: I started this draft as something to end ’22 with, and it ended up taking on a life of its own. Then my company had what’s euphemistically called a RIF, or Reduction In Force, and my team went from 6 to 2—me and the social media guy are the only ones left standing. So…
Who decided we all needed to have our collective shit together, anyway?
A lot of ink, digital and otherwise, has been spilt discussing the cult of busyness in society these days. So if you think I’m going to spill more in an attempt at muddying the waters with yet one more opinion…you’re right. You know me so well. Despite my best efforts, all too often I find…
Ditching the iPad-first setup
I’ve reverted back to laptop first for most things. Don’t get me wrong, I love my iPad Air. What I don’t love is the hand/wrist cramps I got while trying to use the “Magic” Keyboard or the eye strain from working on a long piece while the iPad sat on a stand on the table…seemingly…
Liminality as a State of Being?
(Ed. Note: there are no answers in this essay, just thoughts and ideas) I’ve been feeling an increasing sense of what I can only describe as liminality recently. I don’t mean that in any sort of dystopian way, like the world is becoming one big waiting room for Armageddon or something—rather it’s a feeling that…
Earworms as memory triggers
Is anyone else’s earworm kind of an asshole? After having the intro to a particular Grateful Dead song (not going to name it for fear of it making a repeat performance) on repeat for nearly a week, I started to think about how certain songs can come to be tied to very specific memories, complete…
Know Your Why, Part I
If you don’t know why you’re doing what you’re doing—how can you counter someone who says you’re doing it wrong? My grandma used to say something that drove me, and the rest of the family, nuts. “You’re right, I can’t.” That is one of the most deceptively simple-sounding, yet incredibly complex and, the more you…
Freewill? Determinism? Entropy?
Quick heads up: this one got away from me, but I like the point I eventually get to, so I’m leaving it as is to give you an idea of how these things swirl around and eventually come out as written essays whether the words are in the right order or otherwise. “The ability to…
Yes, and…
This simple heuristic comes from improv theater (among other places, I’m sure) and is used to keep a scene going. When it looks like a scene may be coming to an end prematurely, one actor can say (or think to themselves) “yes, and…” and this often spurs the group to find a new direction to…
What’s the common denominator?
I’ve found myself using this expression a lot over the last two years. It generally pops up in a conversation when someone is moaning about how they were wronged over and over in relationships, personal or professional. Somehow, magically, it’s always somebody else who did the thing that caused the bad result. But what’s the…