#3onThursday - Geek Gear I Love
I'm waving my geek flag like a crazy lady lately. We've covered how I like my tech from e-readers to smartphones to tablets...but I've found a few new techie tools lately that I really, really love...so I thought I'd share them with you all today because they all have a little bit of a writer bent.First, my new TomTom - it's the MultiSport, and it's a fitness watch. It tracks my distance running, cycling, swimming...monitors my heart rate, gives me a calorie count and feeds right in to the MyFitnessPal app that I'm using to track calories and stay in my fat-burning zone. What does this have to do with writing? Everything. Seriously. As a writer I sit. A lot. Sitting isn't terrible, but when I'm at the computer for 6+ hours a day, I'm not getting much movement in. I can set an alarm on my TomTom to remind me every hour or so to get up and move around. Plus, I know exactly how I'm doing with my workouts. Win, win.
Second, Spotify. You've all read countless posts about my playlists. Making a new playlist is one of my all-time-favorite things to do as I'm starting a new project. But I've filled 2 iPods, an iPod Touch and my Smartphone with different songs...I came across Spotify, which is a streaming service, last year and gave it a try. I still buy a ton of music, but this is working really well for me as a playlist keeper.
This screen shot is my template for starting a new project - I have tabs for research, chapter outlines, hero/heroine/town/etc images. I break out the main turning points and even make a calendar of sorts so I know where I'm at in the project at any given time.
Scrivener does many of the same things, I find Scrivener most useful for the actual writing...but for the extra stuff - research, images, outlines, etc - I find OneNote much more useful.
Those are the three things I'm geeking over this week...what has your geek heart thumping?
I've heard a lot about OneNote recently - I'll definitely have to check it out. I'm always forgetting the colour of my heroine's eyes, hehe.
ReplyDeleteI need silence whilst I write, so this whole writing playlist thing makes no sense to me. But my eye doctor loves Spotify (he has it playing in his office) and I've been meaning to look into it.
I have a Fitbit One, which I wear clipped to my bra, and I'm addicted, LOL. My goal is 10K steps per day, and if I don't reach it, I'm totally bummed. For reference, 10K steps equals just over 5 miles (9 km). And you're right, the writing biz is quite sedentary so anything to get us moving is a good thing.
I had a LifeTrak (which is like a fitbit) before, but I wanted a better track of my actual workouts. Plus, I do a lot of cycling and swimming and the other tracker wasn't good for either of those. Good for you on hitting the 10k/day stop goal - that's a great one, Luanna!
ReplyDeleteI want...something. However, I know they all require movement and I'm not doing much of that lately. I have a friend who swears by her Fitbit, too.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading about your tech stuff. I don't have anything to add although I am getting moving with a Beach Body DVD
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