I think my favourite childhood birthday present was a set of jeweller's screwdrivers. Over the years, I had accumulated a pile of worn out and broken down toys with frozen joints or keys that didn't wind. Of course, I didn't throw anything out - I come from a long line of obsessive hoarders. Instead, the old and worn out toys were consigned to the darkness at the back of my wardrobe.
Then one year I was given the tools to open up all the old toys, find out how they worked, and put them back together again. Often, the problems weren't easily fixed - cheap plastic gears that had worn down, or parts that had shattered after a fall. I learned a lot about how gears and springs made things work, though, and I salvaged enough spare parts to re-build most of the fallen toys. Just not all of them at once...
Today has been one long stretch of procrastination, of the most productive kind. I made some good progress on a website yesterday, tinkering with CSS for hours. I think I have a workable template to start filling with some content. Does that mean I've spent today taking the logical next step, and filling that template with StuffTM?
Hell no. I've disassembled and rebuilt a vacuum cleaner (twice!) to make it work better, and then I launched into my best Hannelore impersonation by starting to clean everything in sight. I probably won't have a new virtual home by the end of today, but I'll damn well make sure the physical one is shiny by the time I'm finished...
Then one year I was given the tools to open up all the old toys, find out how they worked, and put them back together again. Often, the problems weren't easily fixed - cheap plastic gears that had worn down, or parts that had shattered after a fall. I learned a lot about how gears and springs made things work, though, and I salvaged enough spare parts to re-build most of the fallen toys. Just not all of them at once...
Today has been one long stretch of procrastination, of the most productive kind. I made some good progress on a website yesterday, tinkering with CSS for hours. I think I have a workable template to start filling with some content. Does that mean I've spent today taking the logical next step, and filling that template with StuffTM?
Hell no. I've disassembled and rebuilt a vacuum cleaner (twice!) to make it work better, and then I launched into my best Hannelore impersonation by starting to clean everything in sight. I probably won't have a new virtual home by the end of today, but I'll damn well make sure the physical one is shiny by the time I'm finished...