Click to enlarge, please.
This is my mouse path for today, from 10:00am until 5:30pm. The lines are movement, and the dots are periods of inactivity. (The bigger the dot, the longer the rest.)
Makes a very busy day look beautiful, doesn’t it?
ETA: The application appears to have been created by Anatoly Zenkov. You find more information and links to download the app here.
See these piles of manuscripts? They are a pretty good representation of the number of unresolved, undesigned, book covers I’m working on right now. Three times a year, there’s a big crunch as we get our covers ready for the next seasonal catalog (summer 2009 is being designed right now). It’s kind of an awful feeling for a couple of weeks, and then there’s a (brief) period of relief before everything comes back with requests for changes and reworking.
A couple of my titles are giving me grief right now—things I thought would come together quickly, but somehow nothing looks right. That tends to happen more with the books I enjoyed during the reading stage of the process. I’m always amazed when the comps finally DO start flowing—where were all those ideas before, and why didn’t they come to me sooner?
Yeah, it’s coming home with me this weekend. (And no, I don’t have Monday off!)
I finally got a new camera. Here I am in the bathroom at work (always my favorite place for self-portraits—the lighting is perfectly depressing/clinical, and there are those great Mart Stam chairs in the entryway) upon arrival this morning. So far, I like it. I’m not a very good photographer and I don’t have patience for adjusting settings, etc., so I need all of the automated help I can get. I’m also excited to have a wide-angle lens for taking photos inside the house!
The temperature outside is rapidly dropping. I’ve been wearing my new Wrist Worms from Sandra. Love them! I know fall is going to pass too quickly, and soon it will be colder than cold. I’ll try to savor my favorite season every day in the mean time.
At my work-office, I try to keep my space very clean and tidy. I don’t have control over things like desks (they are awful wood-grain laminate) or carpet (industrial-grade blue), but over the past 10 years I’ve tried to make it a little more personal.
I have plants in the window. When I bought them, they were teeny-tiny. I’ve had to re-pot them twice (potting plants is a weird thing to do at work, but it had to be done!). I feel happy to see them every day, and to give them water from my bottle. I am very lucky to have this huge, old window to look out during the day! It’s especially wonderful when it’s snowing.
I keep a set of resuable plastic utensils here, as well as a supply of chemical-laden drink mix packets that encourage me to drink more water throughout the day. I also buy my own storage boxes (like this pink one, which holds CDs) instead of using the ugly black plastic ones from the office-supply catalog.
There are pictures of my loved ones, of course.
I keep my paper clips and rubber bands in a little green glass Marimekko dish. I bought this clock at a stoop sale years ago, and it worked perfectly until recently, when the cord suddenly started to dissolve and ooze green goo everywhere. It’s just for decoration now.
I have a Cable Turtle to control the slack on my extra-long mouse cord. I use an ugly, old Logitech mouse instead of a pretty Apple one because I’m so used to it. It’s hard for me to adjust to anything new!
My beloved Sigg bottle, which I fill up at least 4 times a day.
If you work outside of your house, what do you keep in your office to make your days a little happier?
I decided that my scabby old black file cabinet (at my work-office, not at home) needed some sprucing up, so I gave it some teardrops. I put a sheet of thick, glossy paper through the Xyron, then cut out shapes with scissors. Instant, removable stickers!
My work days are long and tiring right now. Thank goodness I have a huge window to get lost staring out of, and plants to tend to. I can’t keep indoor plants alive at home, but somehow I’m able to get them to thrive in a midtown Manhattan office building. Go figure…
