Busy doing nothing.

Hey everybody, what is going on? Welcome to the sabbatical blog where I try to make use of my time in a hundred-day experiment to see just how long I can be busy doing nothing.

On one hand, I've not constructed a crossbow. On the other hand, apparently you can't just change gear from software engineer to bowyer in a couple of days and there is a practical limit on just how fast you can retrain. I've mentioned before that the twentieth century turned a lot of blue collars white, and this accelerating trend is ever more significant in the twenty-first.

For more crossbow specific details here is link to the Roger in Technology blog entry where I talk a little about winding crossbow strings. When I improve I'll try and post a tutorial up too.
http://roger-in-technology.blogspot.co.uk/2017/06/lost-and-foundry-another-string-to-my.html

So - welcome to the Twenty First. A question you may have heard asked is "what would you do if you could do anything?" or some variation on this - "if you didn't have to work, what would you do?", that sort of thing. On contemplation it's a question that I think is over-asked and while it has it's place I think it's a much bigger question that people give it credit for.
Here is the thought process - our definition of self has been shaped by employment for so long that the question "what do you do?" has penetrated our consciousness so deeply it's become a natural ice breaker. Concurrent to this, specialisation has meant the question can often be answered in a single short phrase which may well be the tragedy of our time.

What would you do if you could do anything? Think on that for a while - what would you do next month if you didn't have to work? What would you do on Monday, this coming Monday, if you cleared the decks and your calendar was a blank slate you could fill with anything? What would you do RIGHT NOW if you had the chance?
Unless it's something that is already part of your routine, then I'll bet dollars to doughnuts that really how you will spend you time is learning and training.

The future of employment is going to continue to be reshaped in the twenty first century. Technology is going to redefine jobs this century in the same way it revolutionised our workforce in the Twentieth and the Nineteenth before it. By my reckoning, it's time to get ahead of the game. Train in a new skill, learn a language, brush up on you hobbies and crafts. And these are things you can do now. Live your life, make something. Succeed, fail, learn and create.

There is nothing better in life than bettering your life, however you may.