Today and yesterday were a bit unusual days at work. For some reason, the mood felt all holiday-like. Slow, relaxed, almost a bit dreamy. I enjoyed it a great deal, and like to think I still got a decent amount of stuff done. Considering how my Christmas holiday is starting next week, the feeling is not exactly out of line. Perhaps it had felt more natural if my mind felt caught up to Christmas being in a week. As it is though, no way. Inside my head, we are still lurching through some nameless dark period of not-autumn and not-quite-winter. The winter solstice can not pass soon enough.
I can use all sorts of things to explain that odd mood shift, but it occured to me just now that a fun one to put it down to is this: the two odd days are right after the evening i watched Rogue one. Watching a good movie can really affect how things feel. It felt even more immediate when I was younger, but the effect is still there for sure. And the film has been on my mind in a whole different way than The force awakens was. I intend to discuss the film to death with as many co-conspirators as I can get within microphone range, so for now I think I will just keep chewing on my impressions. I look forward to seeing it again, which probably says everything needed.
Perhaps as a result of the unusual mood, I sat down this afternoon and did a little bit of blind typing for ther first time in ages. That is, writing on a computer with the screen off and/or eyes closed. I used to do that regulary a couple of years back, and whike I can still do it I notice I am woefully out of shape. My fingers feel uncertain about the key positions. I keep stopping, keep looking down, keep turning the screen on and otherwise checking my precision. There is a lot to get back to. And typing blind is a skill and experience worth getting back. It is very rare that I do something with great focus which does not involve my eyes, Typing quickly with your eyes out of focus in the distance just feels … special. But now I hesitate too much. What I want is fingers in motion whilke the eyes relax, not thinking about going back or editing, just a stream of thoughts being tapped down as they appear in my mind.
And there are so many threads.
Like how clear focusing on my fingers makest it which hand got all the important and frequent keys … I may not see the big win of Dvorak layouts, but now I can clearly feel how they are intended to be different. Qwerty is a main left with very secondary support by the right. I imagine proper Dvorak would be a much more even experience. Fun, this is the most enticing image I have ever had for trying a different keyboard layout.
Blind tyoing also produces a slight worry: maybe, just maybe, I am not just out of the habits of proper touch-typing. Maybe these ultra-flat keyboards are also part of the problem? Maybe things feel a little too unresponsive? Perhaos I would type better with more distinct keys? But taking a serious look at myself, I think I am making this up as an excuse for being so out of shape. Whenever I make bad mistakes and take a look at what I did, I find my fingers in some truly incorrect and contorted positions. Thinking moe about hand placement improves everything tremendously. I think I will be able to stay friends with the Macbook keyboards. If I regain some proper typing skills and ergonomy, so much the better. My right arm and right side of the neck felt kind of bad this morning. Perhaps that in itself was a spark to try anf get back into more ergonomic writing?
Mmm, at least proper positions come back rather fast too. Hands are raised above the computer, fingers loose, relaxed and hovering over the home row. We can do this.
(Right, time to read it all through and check my spelling.)
Another early Christmas
Christmas has come many times for me this autumn. A part of me still thinks I should feel bad about buying too much fun stuff. Most parts of me, though, are simply full of joy over the fact that I can buy four kilograms of roleplaying material every once in a while and get great reading while supporting a great hobby at the same time.