I can’t believe it’s only Wednesday. The week is passing by at a snail’s pace. I’ve been overwhelmingly busy and exhausted.

So far, I have 11+ gigs and 1650+ photos on my hard drive for the exposition alone. I’ll be using about ten of them. As the show is about a month away, I’m trying to wrap up the photography by next week. That should give me enough time to work with the photos, then get them printed and framed before they’re hung in the gallery.

The rest of this week’s schedule is as follows.

• Thursday: Tai Chi class
• Friday: Show at Irene’s Pub (Krista and Shane are in town again)
• Saturday: Getting some photos printed, meeting Shirley at her work, photoshoot with Jaimee
• Sunday: Extra-curricular Tai Chi practice, photoshoot with Jaqui

And some miscellaneous pictures I’ve taken in the last little while that I never had the time to post.

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Introducing the tenth version of equivocality.com.

Surgical Style

When approaching 10.0, I knew I wanted a notebook feel, so I used a grid background to give the hint of paper. The idea was minimalism. Single column, no more icons, and super stripped-down meta data.

It’s still based on the good old 480 pixel-wide column, although it’s broken down into a grid with two main columns, which is used for the footer and other varying pages. The dates on the left side are bullets that break out of the grid to help visually separate entries, and for a bit of style. Otherwise, it can be a little boring.

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I saw her there again. She was sitting in a corner of the coffee shop, head on the table. Last time she was still carrying her grocery bags. This time, there were no bags, no Dora The Explorer hat. Only a thin, hooded winter coat, and salt creeping up to the shins of her sweat pants.

Occasionally, she would prop her head up, as if to reorient herself to her surroundings, and her matted hair would fall about her face. She never seemed to notice. She was gone again.

But was she lost to the world, or was the world lost to her?

It was one of those days at work. Things weren’t exactly going wrong per se, but it was stressful enough as it was. People were all over me, wanting this or that, undermining my decisions, interrupting my conversations, running around like their heads were cut off.

I kept reminding myself to breathe deeply (from the feet, as the Taoist sages are often described as doing) and calmly, kept thinking about the word tattooed on my wrist, and it worked for a while.

By 3:15, I had to get out of the building. It was supposed to be a three-song walk, but it ended up being nine. I didn’t even bring my coat; I was burning so much inside, that I didn’t need it. The winter slushed creeped up my jeans by six inches, but thankfully no one noticed.

Tyler was leaving as I was stepping back into the office. He invited me to an art show at Bablyon tomorrow¹. I told him that I’d think about it, knowing in my head that I wouldn’t go.

I had to stay late to work on the server. Fifteen minutes later, Tyler walked into my office (he must have walked part way, then turned around) and asked if I was alright. Admittedly, I’ve never been able to hide my moods very well, but I thought I was doing a decent job of it². He told me he could feel that my energy was low, so he asked if I wanted a hug. I politely declined, not because I didn’t appreciate the gesture, but because I didn’t think it would have helped. He gave me a firm pat on the back anyway and stepped out of my office.

And it helped more than I ever would have expected.

1. Which is strange, because the last thing I went to see at Babylon was a Dwarves concert [↑]
2. Something of an old habit of mine. Not being able to hide my moods is often a blessing in disguise for me, because it communicates to people that something is wrong. Otherwise, they’d never know, and it would never be fixed. [↑]

I’ve officially retired my old notebook, the one I’ve been using since 1999. Starting in my first year of university, it went everywhere with me. Long trips, short trips, camping, in the bath, you name it. I even included it on my list of what I was bringing to Hong Kong. It’s filled with so much randomness: doodles, code, thoughts, quotes, lyrics, bad poetry (my own, of course), lists, ideas. One day, I’ll scan them in and document them.

But alas, it’s full.

As a replacement, I bought a set of three Moleskine Cahiers. They’re thinner and lighter, which is exactly what I’m looking for; it took me over eight years to fill my last one, and I didn’t need something that would last that long.

I do have several pocket size Moleskine notebooks scattered around the house and in various bags for use in situations such as riding the bus, but those are rather difficult to write in unless sitting at a desk due to their small size.

These cahiers are a little different. From the insert:

THE MOLESKINE CAHIERS are journals with heavy-duty cardboard cover, in black and buff with visible stitching on the spine. The last 16 sheets are detachable and there is a wide pocket for loose notes.

The pages have a delightfully smooth feel to them, and absorb ink without bleeding. I’ll be keeping one in my backpack, one in my shoulder bag, and one in my camera bag. I need them now more than ever.

There’s so much to write and so little time.