The Crowley Chronicles

I just checked, and I can proudly say that I’ve been deleted.

A colleague lent me a copy of “The Last Lecture” by Randy Pausch and Jeffrey Zaslow.  When she gave it to me, I knew roughly what it’s about: Randy had been diagnosed with cancer and only had a few months to live, so he gave a ‘last lecture’ at Carnegie Mellon aimed at imparting his advice on life for the future.

And, well, you know I’m going to recommend it, you read the title of this post.  So go and buy it.

I’ll admit to getting all teary-eyed at the end, so if you tend in that direction, you’ve been warned.  But, seriously, because I borrowed this copy, I’ve put it on my list of books to buy before Leon is old enough to read that kind of book.  I won’t throw it at him, but I want him to have a good chance of coming across it on his own.

It’s a good book.

My brother sent me, a while back, a reference to a website called “I Write Like.”  The premise is pretty simple: you copy and paste some text you’ve written into this website and it’s analysis program will tell you what well known author your work most resembles.

So, today I tried it.  I was dismayed to find out that a rough draft I’d written a while ago–it’s been a while since I’ve written much–was identified with Kurt Vonnegut.  I even tried different sections of it.  Another piece was connected to Neil Gaimon, and I liked that.

Then, I found something I’d actually edited.  You know, a genuine second draft.  (I don’t do much of that, even when I’m writing alot.)  That was connected to Neil Gaimon again.  I’m okay with that.

I was surprised that I recogniced both authors’ names.  I mean, I like to read, but I read pretty simple stuff.  ’Literary’ types read very different authors than I do.  So, I cut and pasted some fake non-fiction I’d written for classes (it was the autobiography of a fictional character).  And whose name came up?  David Foster Wallace.

I’ve never heard of him, but his name is on my list of books to get.  I hear he writes like an author I like alot:  Me.

I had a (mildly) funny experience the other day.  Before going out for a jog, I wrote Christine a text message so she would know where I was when I came home.  Using the predictive text on my phone, I almost told her I was ‘going logging.’

I wonder: there were only two possibilities for the combination that makes ‘jogging.’  Why would Sony-Ericson decide that logging is the more common?  The only thing I can think of is this:

They know what Monty Python always knew.  We all secretly want to be lumberjacks:

From Drop Box

Maybe because I didn’t know what else to do with this blog, I wanted to start sharing some website that I find useful.  That way, they get incoming links, and I get to talk to you all.

The first is a site called Gmaps Pedometer, which explains itself with it’s name.  No, it doesn’t count steps for you, but it will tell you how far you’ve gone and how many calories you’ve burned.  (This is great for me the jogger.  Turns out that I burned two thousand calories today, have a look at the bigger image for proof.)

None of that, though, is particularly spectacular.  You could figure out your route in Google Earth, and then find an online tool to convert weight and distance into calories. . . if you really wanted to.  What I really like about the Gmaps Pedometer is the fact that it’s more intelligent than the path tool in Google Earth.  You don’t have to make a series of straight lines, it’ll follow streets and paths.  (Though, here, in the example above, I had to switch to straight-line mode more than once where paths in the park weren’t in the map.)

Still, I think it’s motivational (I love saying that I burned two thousand calories.  Did I tell you that I burned two thousand calories today?) and it lets you save your routes (to a static website, no idea how long they stick around there) if you want to use it as a sort of running log.  I think it’s pretty cool.

So, yesterday I went to a ‘chess meeting,’ after registering for it online.  It was a good time, and I learned a lot.  (Well, a lot was explained to me, I don’t know that I learned it just yet).

When I showed up, though, there were just the two hosts and I asked if I was in the right place.  ”You must be the guy who registered.”  One said.  ”Mr. Crowley.”  I said I was.  ”I thought it was a fake.  If I thought you were going to show up, I’d have written you back.”

Of course, I wanted to know why I seemed like a fake.  After all, I didn’t write a text, I just filled out an online form.  ”I read the blog,” he said–meaning I’d used the STCrowley.com email address and he checked it out–”and it looked like it was written by an American.”

I am an American, but I live in Dresden, Germany.

So, if I register for your activity with this address. . . I’m really going to show up.

Well. . . it’s been more than two weeks since I told Facebook to delete my account.  So, I figured, why not see if I still exist?  I tried logging in.

And. . . no, I’m not deleted, yet.  Facebook told me my account was scheduled to be deleted on the 25th of August and would I please confirm (for the upteenth time) that I really want it deleted?  I confirmed.

When I told them to delete my account, the website said it’d be deleted in two weeks.  Now, the ‘scheduled deletion date’ is a full month after when I requested my account be deleted.  Weirdness.

I’ll try again sometime in September, is anyone taking bets on whether I’ll be deleted or not?

One of the things I’ve wanted to do for a while is learn to play chess.

I’ve started playing against Scott, my brother-in-law, at Sound Chess.  It’s a chess-by-email website that I can’t recommend enough.  (You actually play on the website, and it sends an email to your opponent that it’s their turn to move.

And now, after a bit of wondering what to do with my Facebook time, I’ve resolved to invest it in training with the Chessmaster program.  It offers lessons with Josh Waitzkin (star of “Searching For Bobby Fisher,” which I reread in the airplane on the way over here) as well as a virtual, ‘matched opponent’ to practice playing against.  That’s kind of cool.

The thing is, now that I’m being honest with myself, I wonder if I have what it takes.  It’s a lot of concentration, and I’m finding it hard.  I like to think that I can train it the way I can train running.

I guess we’ll see.

So, my two months off are winding down, and I’m trying to cram all the things in that I didn’t get done in the last seven or so weeks:  namely, I’m trying to exercise and read.

I was supposed to go for a bike ride today, as part of the ‘a little bit every day’ program.  But I didn’t.  I jut didn’t have the time, not to mention the energy.  We’ve started turning ‘the extra room’ into ‘the kids’ room.’  The last couple of days, that’s meant painting two walls (yellow and green) and putting up a border.

Today it meant buying carpet (the wall-to-wall kind), moving everything we could out of the room, moving everything still in the room to one end, laying the carpet down, moving everything back to the other side, working some more with the carpet, and then, just when you thought you were finished, we have to arrange the new room. . . and arrange the rest of the apartment’s furniture to reflect the presence of a ‘kids’ room.’

So, yeah, I didn’t go for my bike ride today.  But I don’t think you can say I didn’t exercise.

Today, I made the leap.  I deleted my Facebook account.  Of course, I didn’t really delete it.  I requested that they delete it, and, in fourteen days, they say they will.  I’m not sure why they have to wait so long, but I’m glad to be out.

Now I just wonder what I’ll do for fifteen minutes every day after I check my email?  Maybe I could start writing email.

Or just plain start writing.  We’ll see.