Remember the wallpaper in your bedroom when you were a kid?
Remember the wallpaper in your grandfather’s house?
Remember the wallpaper in the kitchen of that apartment?
Never underestimate the power of wallpaper.
How many hours have we spent looking at those walls?
Having just come back from an event where I was able to experience a couple of different VR demos, I feel fully qualified to give my opinion about what we should and should not be doing with VR.
We should: let people feel like they are in places they have never been.
We should not: force someone to stand still and listen to a lecture about that place while wearing a headset and holding VR hand-things that do nothing.
We should: find better ways of letting people move around by physically moving their own feet.
We should not: require more effort to move forward a couple of feet in VR than one would expect to expend in real life.
We should: keep trying to make VR useful and/or fun in creative and innovative ways.
We should not: use VR to make 3D versions of 2D charts and immersive versions of horrifically boring educational experiences.
So, it was the first day back after Thanksgiving and I got distracted and I left my phone at home.
It was a travesty. Sort of. It was actually more inconvenient than I thought it would be. I’m getting more attached to the smart phone stuff.
1) I couldn’t tell anyone via text that I forgot my phone so they couldn’t text me.
2) I didn’t have any meeting reminders chiming quietly from my phone in addition to the silent pop-ups my desktop computer.
3) I couldn’t use my phone to get my password for a website I use for work.
4) I couldn’t add a reminder to do something after work.
5) I couldn’t look up the lyrics to ‘Jack and Diane’ while I was stopped at several red lights on the way home to get my phone during lunch.
Well, it was on the radio and I realized there were some words I’ve never understood.
6) I had to make notes about this on… a Post-it note!
Sometimes you just need to listen to a sound that relaxes your brain.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSlgKZrHJg8
This is one of my favorite sounds: rain on a tent. Especially if the tent is waterproof and there is no chance of getting dripped on.
Even better, sitting in my living room and listening to it.
Don’t do it
You can’t do it right
It’s a waste of time
There is no point
It doesn’t matter
Try
Palms and shadows of palms… a nice change from the snowy scenes.
A trailer in the foreground.
Granddaughter in a bucket.
Merry-go-rounds
Laughing children
Swimming pools
Chocolate malts
Good jobs
Sunny days
So, normally when I travel, a certain amount of planning and packing takes place because of TSA rules: I have to put my liquids in a baggie, make sure I can get the laptop out, and I had better wear socks because they’ll make us take our shoes off.
Apparently, all of this careful planning is pointless.
Because when it comes down to getting a zillion people through security for the day-before-Thanksgiving crowd, none of that matters.
Even the scanners that I regularly opt out of weren’t fast enough. Nobody had to take anything out of their bags. Shoes stayed on. Dogs were brought in and we went through a metal detector.
Why don’t we just do that every other day of the year?
“You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”
― Eleanor Roosevelt
