Portrait of the Man as an Artist

Virtue wrestler.Chief chemist for BunnyRope.com

[abmann]

The idea is that, while pain is bad enough, we create something much worse—suffering—by trying not to feel pain when it’s present, or by yearning for pleasure or relief when they’re not present. Therefore it makes sense to practice opening to whatever is present, pleasant or not. via Feel The Air Fully https://ift.tt/2AoCbdP

https://www.raptitude.com/2019/09/feel-the-air-fully/

[abmann]

Whereas self-oriented perfectionism consists of the standards I place on myself and other-oriented consists of the standard I place on my peers, socially oriented perfectionism is the standard to which I perceive others hold me. Basically, young people care a lot about what others think of them and are growingly self-conscious of their perceived inadequancies via The Millenial Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism https://ift.tt/2VkNdJT

https://graphitepublications.com/the-millenial-work-ethic-and-the-spirit-of-capitalism/

[abmann]

The presentation of a linear path to success as the model to which each individual must strive if they are to be recognized as valuable, has led to a reorganization of the life choices of the individual. To be inefficient at any point in this process, to divert from the prescribed linearity, is understood by the subject as an act of self-sabotage – it is not conducive to the notions of the ‘good’ which have been constructed before us. via The Millenial Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism https://ift.tt/2VkNdJT

https://graphitepublications.com/the-millenial-work-ethic-and-the-spirit-of-capitalism/

[abmann]

if you choose not to use the native element, you’ll need to reimplement that native behavior and functionality yourself using JavaScript. But who would want to create a brittle implementation of features that are provided to them by default by the browser when they can save both time and effort using a simple , right? ;) via Accessible Icon Buttons http://bit.ly/2YI9F0P

https://sarasoueidan.com/blog/accessible-icon-buttons/

[abmann]

5. Develop the trial themes. The LGA must develop trial themes that fit the facts and target the expected key decision points. Common offensive themes are that the property owner’s appraisal testimony is based on unwarranted assumptions, poorly selected comparable sales, unreasonably negative judgment calls that require seeing the property in the worst possible light, and the suggestion that (when supported by the evidence) the owner has made prior representations of higher value of the property in other contexts. via Defending Real Estate Tax Assessment Cases | Gentry Locke attorneys http://bit.ly/2PLcDi0

https://www.gentrylocke.com/assessing-the-assessor-practical-points-for-defending-a-real-estate-tax-assessment-case/

[abmann]

Developing the attack on a property owner’s appraisal is among the most entertaining work a LGA gets to do. via Defending Real Estate Tax Assessment Cases | Gentry Locke attorneys http://bit.ly/2PLcDi0

https://www.gentrylocke.com/assessing-the-assessor-practical-points-for-defending-a-real-estate-tax-assessment-case/

[abmann]

so long as the assessment comes within the range of a reasonable difference of opinion when considered in light of the presumption in its favor. via Defending Real Estate Tax Assessment Cases | Gentry Locke attorneys http://bit.ly/2PLcDi0

https://www.gentrylocke.com/assessing-the-assessor-practical-points-for-defending-a-real-estate-tax-assessment-case/

[abmann]

the subject property is assessed at more than its fair market value or that the assessment is not uniform in its application via Defending Real Estate Tax Assessment Cases | Gentry Locke attorneys http://bit.ly/2PLcDi0

https://www.gentrylocke.com/assessing-the-assessor-practical-points-for-defending-a-real-estate-tax-assessment-case/

[abmann]

Fair market value is the actual present value of the land, with all of its adaptations to general and special uses, and not its perspective, speculative or possible value based on future expenditures and improvements. via Defending Real Estate Tax Assessment Cases | Gentry Locke attorneys http://bit.ly/2PLcDi0

https://www.gentrylocke.com/assessing-the-assessor-practical-points-for-defending-a-real-estate-tax-assessment-case/

[abmann]

Minuet

Minuet has taken to burrowing in the winter. It is disgustingly cute.

[abmann]

Portrait of a Grumpus

I’m attempting to post more to my own domain rather than send things to social media (and only social media). Slowing down and taking the time to do a thing well - like edit a photo and write up some text to go with it - is more meaningful and satisfying.  Even, or especially?, when it’s “just a cat photo.” 

 We don’t always choose the things that are meaningful to us but invest time with them will always pay out more in satisfaction.

[abmann]

What would a user manual look like for me?

I’ve been thinking about writing this for a while, writing a sort of user manual for myself. I like understanding the Why and How of what I do in order to be as good and happy and productive as possible. Since it’s a new year and I’m re-viewing 2018 while I also define what my theme for 2019 will be, I figured there’s no time like the present to do this.

So below, for the curious, is the TOC and introduction I wrote up for it. I’m certain this will change a lot and never actually be done. But I’ve already written something in my various journals for literally everything below.

I’m just going to start pulling it all together.

Working on this for an hour-ish and I’m at ~1200 words.

BEGIN DRAFT

Table of Contents

What are we here for?

Important Principles and Code of Ethics

Issues/Causes I care About

People important to me

Personal Heroes

How I interact with humans

Bad Habits

What makes me happy

Things I want to learn/Skills

How I work

40,000 Feet: Drive and purpose

30,000 Feet: 3-5 year vision

20,000 Feet: 1 year themes

10,000 Feet: Projects

Runway: Task management processes

Past year themes and assessments

Creativity

Exercise

Error Codes

Appendices

What are we here for?

This thing is a combination of ideas - a user manual as described by CPG Grey on episode on Cortex #79 , a work manifesto like Rands’ “How to Rands”, and sort of a aggregation of process related stuff I’ve been maintaining for years.

It is also an attempt to mark a point in my life where I feel like... me. I have an identity, people and principles that matter to me and, for the first time in a while, I’m really content with the vast majority of the areas of my life. Seeing how this could or will change in the next few years, especially as I intend to separate the Horizons sections, which is taken pretty much directly from Getting Things Done by David Allen, and keep it updated every years.

I feel like I should be able to give this to a person who asks why I do what I do, or give them at least a portion, and they get a good idea of how I work.

This is probably unlikely and this is going to be pretty weirdly organized. And probably out of date in reality.

END DRAFT

For the extra curious my 2019 theme will be “Cultivation.” More on that later. Probably.

[abmann]

But he slept in his workshop. Not because she didn’t love him, but because she did. She loved him, and if they slept in the same bed together, these two people who had crossed an ocean together, had built a life together after getting out of Poland together, they’d have sex. And because cheap, reliable, universal birth control wasn’t available then, and she was terribly fecund, apparently, she’d become pregnant again, inevitably. My great-grandmother was TIRED of being pregnant. via Feigning Adulthood http://bit.ly/2Ai9lfv

https://formerlyknownasemily.tumblr.com/post/181430122413/bkst-tutu1b-scribbleowl-vaspider-my

[abmann]

Poets use words (and silence) to change things. They care about form and function and most of all, about making an impact on those that they connect with. Every word counts. Every breath as well. via We are all poets now http://bit.ly/2PYuHDD

https://seths.blog/2018/12/we-are-all-poets-now/

[abmann]

Lesson 22: It Takes Only a Few People to Make a Career Exactly how many? Let’s count. Dealers? You need only one dealer — someone who believes in you, supports you emotionally, pays you promptly, doesn’t play too many mind games; who’ll be honest with you about your crappy or great art, who does as much as possible to spread your work out there and try to make money from it, too. This dealer doesn’t have to be in New York. Collectors? You need only five or six collectors who will buy your work from time to time and over the years, who really get what you’re up to, who are willing to go through the ups and downs, who don’t say, “Make them like this.” Each of these six collectors might talk to six other collectors about your work. Even if you have only six collectors, that’s enough for you to make enough money to have enough time to make your work. Critics? It would be nice to have two or as many as three critics who seem to get what you’re doing. It would be best if these critics were of your generation, not geezers like me. Curators? It would be nice to have one or two curators of your generation or a little older who would put you in shows from time to time. That’s it! Twelve people. Surely your crappy art can fake out 12 stupid people! I’ve seen it done with only three or four supporters. I’ve seen it done with one! via How to Be an Artist https://ift.tt/2DZWz96

https://www.vulture.com/2018/11/jerry-saltz-how-to-be-an-artist.html

[abmann]

Voluminous Spam The lower right quadrant is less annoying. You’re still dealing with less critical information, but the more you move to the right, the fresher the information. I’m sure learning lots of useless things quickly. At an extreme, it’s spam. An organization spends energy moving information hither and fro and my concern if you’re seeing a lot of information falling into this quadrant I am concerned about the overall efficiency of your team. If you’re seeing a lot of useless information on a day to day basis, what about the rest of your team? via The Signal Network https://ift.tt/2Fk1Jye

http://randsinrepose.com/archives/the-signal-network/

[abmann]

Oh my God I’m not sure of the accuracy of this scale but I made one anyways. 1: Jane Austen. Theoretically Romantic, mostly a clever satirist more interested in the novel as the perfect vehicle for social commentary than in poetry for capturing emotion. Very little chance of swooning and/or dramatic death. A very safe spot on the Romanticism scale. 2: Dorothy Wordsworth: Actually a Romantic, though not excessively so! Enjoy your long walks in the country. Keep those diaries. Your brother can mine them for publishable material until people consider them finally worthy of academic interest a century or two later. 3: Wordsworth. May result in later becoming annoyingly conservative but mostly harmless. Go ahead and wander lonely as a cloud. Gaze upon that ruined abbey. 4: Charlotte Turner Smith. Recover that English sonnet and transform it into a medium that mostly expresses sorrow! Help establish Gothic conventions! Have what Wordsworth called a true feeling for rural England! Die in penury and be forgotten by the middle of the nineteenth century.! 5: Blake. ?? Who even knows man. Talk to angels. Create your own goddamn religion. Confuse all of your contemporaries. 6: Mary Shelly. Go ahead and run off with that unhappily married poet who took you on dates at your mother’s grave, but this may result in carrying your husband’s calcified heart around in a fragment of his last manuscript the rest of your life. But also, arguably inventing sci-fi as a genre… so that’s some consolation. 7: John Keats: listen to that nightingale but be forewarned: you will die of TB in Rome and everyone will mock you for dying of bad criticism instead of, you know, infectious disease. 8: Coleridge. May result in never finishing a poem and a severe opium addiction. 9: Percy Shelly. May result in being expelled from Oxford and in premonitions of your own death by drowning. 10: Full Byron. Never go full Byron. via Nudity and Nerdery - Oh my God I’m not sure of the accuracy of this... https://ift.tt/2DXcFQ0

https://nudityandnerdery.tumblr.com/post/180534736625/oh-my-god-im-not-sure-of-the-accuracy-of-this