I've decided to start writing things down. I have been thinking about it lately and I think it would be a good idea for me to be able to organize my thoughts. Mehrzad was over tonight to watch the second half of the raptors season opener with me (they won 106-99), and I ran the idea by him and he had apparently the same idea today. I think Mehrzad and myself are very similar. I've also started reading two other blogs recently, which have provided more inspiration and motivation for me.
The first blog is Thoughts from Inside the Box, which is written by a guy that is currently working at Google, and is living inside an 18' box-truck in the Google parking lot. Apparently the ridiculous housing market in San Francisco was a big factor in his decision, and he decided investing in a Truck instead of paying $1000+ a month for a bedroom was a better financial strategy...which it is. I think this guy really resonated with me because I am in a similar situation to him, but on the other side of the coin where I am the schmuck that is paying $1000+ for rent every month and not putting it towards something smarter like...oh I dunno, my student loans. Really not happy with my financial situation presently.
The second blog is the late Aaron Swartz's, Raw Thought. I watched a documentary on Swartz recently and have read up on him quite a bit since then. He is an absolutely fascinating, and tragic, story. I think he represented the epitome of our internet generation; an extremely intelligent mind combined with early exposure to computers resulted in the innovative and idealistic advocate for the power of the internet that was Swartz. That sentence was a mouthful, I think I need to work on my prose. I guess that's why I'm starting this blogging thing. I think I will implement a no-backtracking rule while I write these posts. Just a written regurgitation of my stream of thought...hence the name of the blog: flow.
Well really it's because that's my nickname but there's levels to this shit.
Anyways, Swartz's blog is insane. He basically wrote an exposition for every event, thought, or book he encountered in his life. Some of the posts are so interesting to read. I remember coming across his blog last year after I finished reading Infinite Jest and I was trying to figure out what the fuck happened in it. He had posted a concise and super informative breakdown of what actually occurred at the ending of the book, and as far as I could tell this was basically an original theory he had written and it almost certainly was correct. I find that mind-blowing considering this book is one of the most highly acclaimed (and convoluted) works of post-modern fiction from the 20th century. Swartz was a genius; I really look up to him and I am really starting to connect with some of the views and realizations he expressed in his early-20's, now that I'm also in my early 20's. If he was strong advocate that blogging is beneficial for oneself, which he was, then I think it would be helpful to give it a try.
