Development, Usability, and Experience

Peppered at work, summer heats up

July 16th, 2008 10:22 pm —  37 views

Sometimes in my normal job, priorities and objectives change and it’s hard to keep up. Just when you think you’re on the same page as the authors, the storyline changes and you find yourself as a background character in a 3 color comic.

It doesn’t matter whose idea it is. Good ideas should be recognized as such. But for some reason things get confused and I’m not sure why. But upon reflection, I realize it doesn’t really matter if I understand. On the flip side, when I understand I tend to get new ideas. Like the moon and the tides, things wax and wane. We’re only human. Ordinary mortal beings.

A couple times a day now I check my basil for japanese beetles. When I find’em I smack’em around so they know who’s boss and then they take off like a herd of shiny flies. I’ve noticed when I open the slider to the deck they take flight, hoping to avoid the backhand biotch slap. But alas, I think my basil is done for. Chewed full of holes and sad looking it is.

My peppers are going crazy though. I’m not sure when to pick them or the cherry tomatoes for that matter, so I’ll just wait a bit. I consider this first season of deck grown vegetables primarily an experiment. Having never grown these items I have no idea what to expect. It’s fun that way.

Though it’s summer, I’m still thinking a lot about user experience, interactive design, and most importantly, information architecture. Thinking about it I realize the notion behind an architect of information involves a myriad of things that most people don’t really consider. Information is at the heart of everything we do. In fact, everything we do produces information while at the same time consuming information. We couldn’t function otherwise. We are organic information processing machines.

Tomorrow is going to be hot. Golf will be played in a furnace. Friday we take our cats to the vet but don’t look forward to it. As for projects, we might paint our bedroom this weekend in anticipation of new furniture slated to arrive at the end of the month. Eventually there will be pictures chronicling this entire process for the edification of all you interested readers.

Ha. But really, it’s too soon for that. I have to be sensitive to other’s feelings you know.

Image: Taken this morning, this is my chili pepper plant. I’m not sure if they’ll turn red first or if they’ll turn red after I pick them. I’m still learning, but it sure is fun.

Related Posts

5 Comments 

Comments

5 Responses to “Peppered at work, summer heats up”

  1. Brenda Bellinger on July 17th, 2008 7:39 am

    Morn’ we are fine. Dad said that your peppers will turn red on the vine, but you can pick them green and eat them too. Have a good weekend. Tell W. hello and her card is in the mail. love brendama

  2. Dawn on July 17th, 2008 11:06 pm

    what kind of peppers are these? Hot? Can’t spell halopenia…but if that’s what they are you can eat some now and let some get even hotter (and redder) as they stay on the plant. Sorry about the basil. But at least they left you the peppers!

  3. Spike on July 18th, 2008 12:15 am

    The picture is of my chili peppers. I also have sweet banana, hot banana, and jalapenos. I suppose the rules apply to them all?

    I want them to be as hot as they can be, so I’ll just leave them on there until they fall off or turn red.

    It’s an experiment I say.

  4. Erin on July 18th, 2008 11:30 am

    I don’t have much to say about peppers, but I think your insight on human beings as organic information processing machines is quite profound. I think it’s something that most SI students realize about 4 months into their schooling, but haven’t put into words. It’s the same thing that make it so hard to explain what a degree in “information” is to people who haven’t been around the school. When you start studying information science, you realize that EVERYTHING we do is an information problem. EVERYTHING! And when you have some good frameworks for looking at information problems, you start see the world differently. It’s not a matter of “when you’re a hammer, all the world is a nail”, although that trap is there. It’s that you have broad, but applicable, structures for processing, analyzing, and solving day-to-day problems.

    Okay, pontification over. Hope the peppers turn out.

  5. Spike on July 18th, 2008 11:46 am

    Nicely stated Erin.

    I have really come to appreciate the complex dynamics of human information processing in way that I hadn’t before. It’s way beyond the question of nature versus nurture, it has more to do with perception, perspective, and how an individual brain functions with respect to memory retrieval, storage, and how intertwined all that is with awareness.

    When you bring in the memes of culture and socialization while taking a serious look at the chasm of human computer interactions, it is easy to develop a deep appreciation for how amazing the human brain is and how far computers have to go.

    Heh…see what you started? Now I’m running off at the keyboard… :)

Leave a Reply




Subscribe without commenting