UberNoggin

I’ve talked to several folks lately about where they’re most productive. In the office? On the train? At home on the couch? Thanks to our ever-connected lifestyle face-to-face meetings are the rarety for many of us. In fact, for me it’s sort of a special occasion now to actually drive/fly to meet someone. If I want to see their face…well there’s all kind of webcam apps for that. If I need to hear their voice there’s the phone, Skype, SL and lots of other options. All of this adds up to a whole lot of reasons to have a really comfy place to work at home. Over the years my at home workspace has gone from a pile of books next to the couch to a pretty spiffy set up in the center of my house. Today, Mark and I added another goody to our home office.

Our super desk set up!

The monitor from my old computer, which now lives as a server under my desk, got moved up top to be a TV. We hooked it up to the cable (thanks to handy Media Center) so we can have Hulu, Netflix, or just MSNBC playing up there and viewable by both of us. We’ve also got the Twitter election stream going up there.

Yeah, there’s a little bit of showing off here but there’s also a couple of serious points to make. First, I share this space with Mark and, in the past, if one of us wanted to watch something we had to run it on our side monitors which meant the other couldn’t see it and had to rush to mute it if the phone rang etc. So having the central machine there with a remote control makes it a more friendly space to share. Next, well…now there’s no reason to leave my desk at all. Moving to the living room to watch Olberman (drool) was my break but now I can just sit right here at the helm and take in all the media I want. So yeah, it might mean that I work longer, but it also means that I get little breaks now and then when my eyes migrate to something entertaining on that middle monitor so I don’t mind sitting here getting things done.

Shared monitor…as Martha would say..it’s a “good thing.”

Post a Comment