In a nutshell

These are the things that drive me mad every single day…wish I could send Grammar Girl to all the offenders!

You're Versus Your
"You're" means "you are." "Your" is the possessive form of "you."

It's Versus Its
"It's " means "it is" or "it has." "Its" is the possessive form of "it."

They're Versus Their Versus There
"They're" means "they are." "Their" is the possessive form of "they," and "there" is usually a place.

TextEdit goes creepy

I was messing about trying to make Friday afternoon more creative by turning uninspiring copy pink…and lo and behold, there's a web on the colour slider in TextEdit's Colors palette.

Cute! I love Hallowe'en.

(Though I don't remember Software Update asking me anything about TextEdit?)

mad mac

New MacBooks! There's just nothing like popping the lid on a well-designed piece of kit to ease you into a creative frame of mind…if I'm creating something beautiful (I hope), I want to use something beautiful.

'Just put your fingers on the crisp keys and you’ll feel pure typing bliss.' It might sound like bullshit…but I just know it's not.

'The amazing new trackpad doubles as a button — just press down anywhere and consider it clicked. No separate button means there’s 39 percent more room for your fingers to move on the silky glass surface. Now that Multi-Touch gestures have come to MacBook, all the function is in your fingers.' SideTrack has been my best buddy for a long time…this generates paroxysms of delight.

All just in time for Christmas lists!

Jobacle

I saw this article on the web and though, well, seriously though - is anyone surprised that lots of people waste lots of time at work? I have met some absolute masters at it, and I have to admit that having my own head down from nine to five, no stopping, is nigh on impossible…

So I wrote about it, and then thought, why not share this one? So I fired it over to Jobacle, which is the best job website I've ever come across – actually useful, funny and irreverant, it does a great job of helping you through your working life. Anyway, they published it!

Also check out True Office Confessions for a laugh (but careful, all that whinging might be contagious).

Freedom to write

And here's an answer to the internet addiction…turn it off for as long as you need! Freedom is a (Mac only) way to disconnect yourself, and only a restart or some UNIX fiddling will get you back online before the time you specified.

A bit scary?
A good idea.

Funny how these things turn up!

The internet - creativity tool?

The internet saves a writers countless frustrating trips to the library (I say frustrating because I have always, apart from at Uni, lived in areas which need serving by a moblie library as well as cute, tiny, badly stocked physical libraries). But are writers addicted to endless net research? Accorting to the test, I'm not, but really, I'm not so sure.

More important to me is the question of whether the net saps or promotes my creativity - reading is always good, but the net, naturally, isn't quite the same as a good book (and I don't want it to be).

I suppose it depends on which websites I'm reading, but generally, yes…as well as being a perfect procrastination tool.

With the summer one-magazine-a-week madness over, I'll have more time for both creativity and procrastination. Hurrah, and fire up GoogleReader!

Clean text, please.

Love:
TextSoap
Find and Replace – I love that it'll find 'space space' (Who still does that? Did you love your typewriter very much? Please, don't!) and replace with one space.
Tiny, tiny screwdrivers that allow me to fit RAM and rebuild iPods. iGeek.
TextEdit. No fuss.
Leopard - Kat loves her cats.

Hate:
Your and you're mix up. If you mean you are, it's you're. It ain't hard.
Micockisoft Word. Especially the .wps fiasco, which makes people think Macs are to blame.
How expensive InDesign is.
Applications demanding attention. I fired you up so you could load your lumbering ass in the background while I get on with something else. Don't switch me.