Author: Doug McCaughan

Every year in December, I plan the next year of my life. I write poetry in my Hobonichi Techo, note the holidays and important dates, set an annual goal and monthly goals as well as defining 100 things to accomplish during the calendar year. It’s February and this hasn’t happened yet. Truly need time to slow down a bit. At this rate, I feel like I should simply begin planning for 2025. Maybe it is time to switch to a 5-year techo. Now, I’m going to clean up my tasks and projects in OmniFocus.

You will find yourself trying to automate everything in your life. And this is good.

I use a Google spreadsheet to track all my professional time and projects. That sheet keeps evolving so that I can type less and get more information from it. Every enhancement makes me smile. Today’s was as simple as automatically showing the day of the week based on the UTC day and time entered. The next step will be to automatically calculate a subtotal of hours worked on that day (remembering that I could be working at 11pm at night which in UTC time would put that at 4am the next day…can’t show that as the next day) and break it out by different clients. That’s a non-trival task.

Once again, living on a prayer…

New personal rule. Every time the dog asks to go out, I have to juggle while she does her business. I’m returning to my passion while watching my dog poop. Somehow I suspect this will lead to therapy later in life. “Yeah doc, every time I walk by a restroom I get the urge to throw something.”

Today is deep cleaning the bathroom. Every surface, nook, and cranny is getting scrubbed and sanitized including the ceiling.

I type for a living. There is a point in the day where Buttercup, one of our cats, demands my attention by climbing into my lap and headbutting my hands. You know how hard it is to type with a cat head butting your hands?! But it’s cute.

That’s it. This cannot be reality. I’m in a psychological torture experiment, a simulation run by sadists, or in purgatory. 

As a young child, I always thought adult conversations would be rich, deep, philosophically stimulating, intellectual, and well thought out.

Instead, those conversations are a lot more like:
“Eh. So, like, maybe we could spend less money for a while?”

We need to have a serious discussion about witches titties.

Dog says while she’s really like to she is not pooping in this stuff

Me staring into the bedroom.

Cathy: “What’s wrong?”

Me: “I think I need to carry a second flashlight.”

Cathy: “you are just walking upstairs!” *shakes head*