Leonland - Leon Barnard
July 23, 2008
300 pages down
I'm about 100 pages into Emotional Intelligence. It's not all that engaging, it reads a bit like an academic research paper, and the scope seems a little too broad perhaps, but it's very sensical and is a good guide for introspection and self-improvement.
I'll meet my goal if I can finish it in the next 8 days. Wish me luck!
July 16, 2008
Started a new book
I've slowed down a little since finishing The Tipping Point. I just started Emotional Intelligence, which I've been wanting to read for a while. It's denser and seems a bit dryer than The Tipping Point, so I'm going to have to be more diligent about my reading to get to my goal, but I think it'll be a good book to have read.
July 12, 2008
200 pages down
I just finished The Tipping Point today. I started this month on page 80 and it's 280 pages long, so I'm 40% of the way towards my goal of 500 pages for the month. The book was pretty good. By this point, I've heard so much about it that I felt like I'd already read many parts of it. But I still got something out of it. The message about making big changes through small (but not arbitrary) efforts is inspiring and I'll try to remember it.
July 05, 2008
It's been a while
I decided to try to spend more time offline last month, which is why I've been absent for so long. This month I'd also like to take myself offline a lot as well. My goal for this month will be to read 500 pages from one or more books. Being online is too conducive to multi-tasking, which I'm trying to get away from, so reading is a nice alternative activity.
Unrelatedly, I just posted pictures from Bratislava and Vienna and our recent fantastic trip to Croatia.
May 31, 2008
Final May Update
So, May is pretty much done and I don't have anything concrete to show for my "12 in 12" project. I did a lot of web-related stuff though, so I think I'll turn this into a 2-month project, since I'm making progress and want to keep at it. I've been doing a lot of work on the redesign of my site, which has been frustrating because I just can't seem to make a decision about how I want it to look. I try all sorts of things and none of them are exactly right. Maybe that means I'm heading in the wrong direction, or maybe I'm nearly there but just haven't found the right combination of colors and graphics. Maybe I should switch gears and focus on the other changes that I'd like to make, like adding some new things and merging all my posts together.
May 18, 2008
May update
Not much specific to report on my web project, although I've been doing a lot of thinking and exploring lately. I have been focusing on redesigning my own website. I think that I will merge the three main sections (journal, travels, music) into one site, and also add some extra features, which are TBD for now.
Here's a screen capture of what I'm thinking for the new look of my site.
I had originally planned to go with a totally different look, but decided that it might be better to take what I have and spruce it up instead.
I'd really like to create a cool new header, though, so I plan to focus on that this week. The empty orange area at the top is (probably) just a placeholder for now.
May 06, 2008
First steps
I've been doing a lot of research the last few days for my web project(s). Specifically, I have:
- Installed WordPress on a test domain to see if it's easier to manage than Movable Type (I think it is).
- Played around with with the Flickr API to find out about grabbing photos from Flickr, rather than manually uploading them.
- Created some mockups and color schemes using Photoshop.
It's a fun project, but it's pretty amorphous, so it's been a little hard to manage.