Hi! Welcome. Namaste. Välkommen.
This is a blog.
Blogging is my trade — I am a blogger. My name is Scott the Blogger. I arrange, design, and publish blog posts.
What do I write about?
The ineffable nature of life!
But, alas, it’s ineffable. I can’t tell you what it is. Not in so many words. And I have no clue what it is. So I write about me (my favorite topic), and cultural stuff, and web stuff and software and programming and whatever occurs to me to write about.
What it really amounts to is a lot of me washing dishes. I wish I could give you more than me washing dishes, but it’s all I have. I hope my take on dishes and dishwashing will fascinate, or at least amuse you. I’ll be writing about all things dish and cutlery related.
There are no rules to this thing.
Give it a try. There are several options for subscribing, including a good old-fashioned electronic newsletter:
Are you not in love with the dishwashing theme? Well, you once had your doubts about green eggs and ham, too, but then you found that you do so like them. In both cases — odd colored breakfast food and strangely themed blogs — it is essential that you try them.
All of my posts and my own photos that you’ll find here are “free as in freedom.” Please copy and share them. (Attribution and linkage will be appreciated.) Where I use other people’s work, note that it may be freely licensed, public domain, or used under the theory of “fair use.”
more about what I’ve written
I started this blog six years ago to write about free software, free culture, and “assorted miscellany.”
I wanted to write about moving to free software (sometimes called “open source”), which gave the site its name, “Moving to Freedom.” The move has mostly been completed. I’m not pure. I sometimes sacrifice freedom for convenience. But then I often give up convenience or features altogether in the interests of keeping things simple and free.
I still care about free software and free culture, but I don’t write as much about these topics now, nor as much technical stuff as I used to post here. You’ll find pointers to everything, older and newer, in the archives.
what I’ve been writing about lately
Firstly, and most importantly, dishwashing. We already talked about this above. And I didn’t mention it specifically up there, but I also share useful information on proper cutlery technique.
From there, this thing can go anywhere.
As mentioned, one area I’ve always had an intense interest in — and will continue to focus on — is writing about me.
But I’m most interested in learning how to tell a good story. So far, my pursuit of this has resulted in many years of flailing around, looking for material, succumbing to Resistance, and not practicing enough.
Yet I will keep trying to write more gooder. You’ll want to keep reading to see how things develop. It’s extremely fortunate for both of us that you have numerous options for monitoring the situation.
I still like the Moving to Freedom name for this place. It works for just about anything. We can always aspire and move toward greater freedom in different areas of our lives. “It’s in the journey that we find our true love.”
a few more things about me
I live in the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area in Minnesota, one of the United States. Minnesota is a beautiful state — probably the best state — with many lakes, forests, parks, and trails. These are things I like much more than publicly financed sports stadiums for private billionaires.
I’m married and have a daughter. We have pets. (Here’s one. And another. And another. And one more.) They make appearances here and there as I share more and less about my life.
I like tying knots in my spare time.
Wait.
I used to enjoy tying knots. Somehow I’ve gotten all out of practice. I’ll get back to it, though. When the Zombie Apocalypse comes, knot tying will be a much more useful skill than playing with my Buckyballs, an activity I seem to have plenty of time for. It’s as if I’m in denial that the Zombie Apocalypse is real and imminent.
(“Buckyballs” isn’t a code word for my unmentionables, by the way. Nor am I talking about buckminsterfullerene. I am of course referring to the Amazing Magnetic Desktoy You Can’t Put down.)
I like this picture of the Brule River at Judge C.R. Magney State Park:
I love rivers. And metaphors involving rivers. And Richard Bach’s parable about a river, in his book, Illusions. It begins:
Once there lived a village of creatures
along the bottom of a great crystal river.
I live in that village.
Each creature in its own manner clung tightly
to the twigs and rocks of the river bottom,
for clinging was their way of life,
and resisting the current what each had learned from birth.
That’s what I’m doing. I’m clinging. I’m clinging tightly. My fingers are numb. But I’m going to let go. I will!
and…
Here’s a list of things I like in different areas of media consumption. I enjoy this standard sort of listing of what people like in these categories, or at least what they’re willing to reveal. This isn’t a comprehensive list, of course. It’s just a sampling, and it’s a mixture of all time favorites and things I’m currently into. I don’t know if I’ve accurately weighted it to reflect the true essence of my cultural milieu, or if it’s just my best effort at impressing you with my singular good taste.
music: Martin Sexton, Ryan Montbleau Band, Jason Spooner, Donavon Frankenreiter, Jack Johnson, Jonathan Coulton, Colin Hay, Rush, Sting, Neil Diamond
television: The Wire, The Sopranos, Mad Men, Six Feet Under, Dexter, Breaking Bad, The Shield, Flight of the Conchords, Arrested Development, Shaun the Sheep
movies: Groundhog Day, The Shawshank Redemption, Pixar movies, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Back to the Future, Haiku Tunnel
books: Richard Bach (Illusions), Anne Lamott (Bird by Bird), Natalie Goldberg (Writing Down the Bones), Brenda Ueland (If You Want To Write), Steven Pressfield (The War of Art), Marcus Aurelius (Meditations), Ralph Waldo Emerson (Essays, etcetera), Norman Maclean (A River Runs Through It), Neal Stephenson (Cryptonomicon, Baroque Cycle, etcetera), Lao Tzu (Tao Te Ching)
Updated: 2 December 2012
