A Splintered Mind

A lot is made of ADHD’s super power of hyperfocus. I’ve written about it on several occasions over the years as well. I’ve even created a ToDo List technique to simulate it! Should we really label hyperfocus as a superpower, though? I have always been painfully aware of the downsides to hyperfocus . I’ll even avoid undertaking certain tasks because I know that I’ll slip into hyperfocus and loose track of time and the events around me. It’s not always a desirable state of mind to be in. Normally, adults with adhd might as well be hamsters on a wheel, furiously running, but not getting anywhere. Suddenly, hyperfocus grants us clarity of vision and purpose, opening the road in front of us into a straight line towards success. When your days are spent fighting against your own brain to get something done, hyperfocus is a big deal. So, what’s so bad about hyperfocus? Hyperfocus without limits is a form of tunnel vision. I like to say th...

This process may seem dull, but it works extremely well for me, especially since I'm dealing with Post-COVID brain fog. Writing slowly by hand is helping me sort out my thoughts. In this entry, I decided the fate of the second novel. It's nice to imagine that I can simultaneously write two novels while blogging weekly while juggling Great White sharks and chainsaws on a unicycle, but I have to be honest with myself. (Mobile browsers only display the first page. Please view the text entry after the embedded PDF…)   24 AUGUST 2022 Bookwork 7: Family visits and fatigue have halted the geeky server work. I hope to get back on track soon. Tonight I'm contemplating my second novel. I don't believe it has a ghost of a chance to see the light. I can't even handle my current workload. Why add more? Because, unlike WaiMin, this is purely my story. Because the story is nagging me to give it life. Because it will be easier to consult with myself over story ...

Here's another thrilling tech-heavy entry as I battle the evil forces of drudgery, then I ask myself an important question: Why don't I make things easy for myself and just delete it all? It's tempting, but then I'd lose a few thousand or so links back to my blog. It would be a little like blowing up the airport on a remote island. If you were curious how I am creating these PDFs, I take a .nebo notebook file from my Kobo Elipsa, open it in Nebo on my iPad, then export it as a PDF. The Elipsa supports an earlier version of Nebo's library that can create a pretty wild HTML copy of the journal entry using vector coordinates. The geek in me squees when I see the code, but when I paste it into a blog entry here, it breaks the blog. So we'll have to live with the wonky formatting here and there of the converted PDF. It's not a perfect world. (Mobile browsers only display the first page. Please view the text entry after the embedded PDF…)   1...

The technical hurdles have been overcome, and I come to a decision regarding blogging. This is a slow process, but I'm glad I'm going through it. Regardless of Multi-Irons Syndrome , I need to focus on only one or two projects if I want to publish a book by the end of the year. (Mobile browsers only display the first page. Please view the text entry after the embedded PDF…)   12 AUGUST 2022 Bookwork 5: I know that I am finally recovering from this last bout of illness. Fifteen minutes after I woke up this morning, I figured out what was wrong with the Apache server and fixed it. The Pelican blog server is up and running on my Mac, rsync updates the rPi's web content across the network perfectly, and the website loads quickly to the outside. All I need is a vanity domain name, illustrations of the female romantic lead, and I'm ready to go! As far as my latest bout of Multi-Irons Syndrome is concerned, I have decided to blog weekly still, and I am c...

These tech-heavy entries focus on the nuts & bolts of hosting a blog. It's not exciting reading, but I needed to resolve this problem if I wanted full focus moving forward. Sometimes our most passionate goals require us to sludge through drudgery before we can attain what we seek. In this case, I want to host my blog on my home server, but have been putting off the grunt work because it's frightfully boring. (Mobile browsers only display the first page. Please view the text entry after the embedded PDF…)   11 AUGUST 2022 Bookwork 3: Blogger.com feels like abandon ware; comments have been broken for years; apps that support Blogger.com become abandonware; and what Google giveth, Google can taketh away. I'll probably be happier running blog software on my own server. It's time to move off my current server anyway. Even though I set it up and paid for it for years, I've shared an account with my daughter since 2005. She's paid for my servi...

While I was sick from October 2021 to April 2022, I allowed myself to pile on new projects as a coping strategy. It worked very well. Having new plans helped keep me focused forward when the present was bleak and discouraging. Now that my health has taken a turn for the better, however, I need to stop letting ADHD spin wildly and spend my time wisely instead. It's time to rid myself of cruft, and focus on the most important projects. (Mobile browsers only display the first page. Please view the text entry after the embedded PDF…) 10 AUGUST 2022 Bookwork 1: Despite all the sickness and setbacks I have experienced over the past year, I still want to write and publish a new book. But which one? I wrote down all the book plans that I made while I was ill, and I was shocked, but not surprised, at the massive project goals that I had accumulated. Update my Pokémon book Finish one of ten new mental health books simultaneously write TWO fantasy books Blog we...