My desk at the End of the Day for June 25, 2014 – My Word with Douglas E. Welch

A bit of a photo essay this evening. Words weren’t really flowing tonight, as I put in quite a few hours at the computer on a number of projects including an 18 part short video series for a client. Such repetitive and fiddly work can make your brain go a little soft after a while.

This is what my desk looks like at the end of the day. Bits and pieces of everything that has crossed it in the last 12 hour or so. reference materials, equipment, notes and more. It seems a bit revealing to let you see it. My desk is not the cleanest one in the world, nor one of the messiest, but I can feel a bit embarrassed when showing it off.

End of the Day screen shot

The blank page. This is what I face each evening as I sit down to write — usually around 1030pm local time. I use the previous day’s post as a template, add a link for the previous day, discard the previous post and then brilliance flows. Er, uh, well, sometimes it ain’t horrible, let’s say. The blank page defeated me a bit tonight. Hence the photos.

My schedule is off as Rosanne has started teaching summer school 3 nights a week from 4pm-10pm. This has my own internal schedule all freaked out. This is nothing like our usual school year schedule and I find myself feeling as if 4pm is Noon and 11pm (when she gets home) is more like 6pm. I’m sure I’ll settle in, but in these first 2 days it has been weird.

Eotd 2

Here is the program I am using in preparing the videos I worked on today. I think I am getting old as the font size on this program seems to defy even my variable lens eyeglasses. I lee having to turn on more and more lights, just to make sure I am reading things correctly. That said, I was able to work through stage 1 and 2 on all 18 videos so I can proofread titles tomorrow and then spend the remainder of the day rendering the HD video. I am trying to finish this project by the end of the week so that files can be deliver over the weekend and ready for the client to review and upload on Monday morning. Fingers crossed.

End of the Day notes and recorder

A bit of equipment awaiting use and a notepad where I scribble tasks as they come to me. More and more, I am trying to complete one task before moving on to the next, but that requires a quickly scribbled reminder when another thought or task jumped to mind. Knowing that I have captured the thought, I can return to my original work without feeling I will forget it.

End of the Day Desktop

…and this is where the magic happens. Having used dictation software, I can’t think I would ever move off the keyboard as an input device. I find it hard to connect thoughts together when dictating. I am too worried about saying the words I want correctly and all thought of “writing” goes out the window. I do use Siri to dictate essays or notes I have written by hand, though. This is far faster than typing them and I don’t run into the thought process problems, as I have already written the piece in a traditional way. I am only using the dictation software to replace the typing…which I’m not that good at anyway.

There you have it — a look into the dark teatime of my desktop. It probably says a lot more about me than even I think. Don’t judge me too harshly. A lot of work does get done here.

Previously on End of the Day: