My desk has been bugging me a bit lately. It’s still a productive desk, but I find myself sitting down and fighting my current desk setup. The monitor needs adjustment or the iPad isn’t quite where I want it.

Of course this means I started looking at YouTube videos of desk setups and…almost every one seems to be some ideal desk that you can’t use in real life.

My real life means kids drop stuff on my desk sometimes. It means that I have to turn my keyboard and mouse off if I leave the desk in because my kids play with them and could delete a file on some server by accident.

My real life means receipts end up on my desk for me to scan.

Sometimes I have a keyboard apart on my desk. Sometimes, I have L brackets I was supposed to put on my daughter’s chair 9 months ago sitting there reminding me to put them on the chair.

My desk also has a light stand next to it with a YouTube studio, which photographs terribly if I’m trying to make it look decent for some video.

The problem with looking at the desk’s on YouTube or in some blog post is that it’s the ideal desk all cleaned up and sanitized. Real life has been taken off the desk.

This is the problem with almost anything online. People are showing you a life that’s sanitized of real life.

Yet we compare our reality with some other reality that doesn’t exist.

I’m still going to rebuild my desk and I’ve found some cool cable management ideas, but I’m never going to have some crazy clean minimal desk. I’m okay with this.

## I Shipped

Monday I did a video on [getting started with a Zettelkasten system](https://curtismchale.ca/2020/07/27/getting-started-with-zettelkasten). If you’ve been trying to track research, this is the system I use.

Wednesday I took a look at [Joplin Notes](https://curtismchale.ca/2020/07/29/joplin-notes-quick-look). This is an open source note/research application. It’s got some interesting things, like the command line interface, but the iPad app is lacking so I don’t recommend using it.

As you read this, I published a post about [reasons to share what you learn](https://curtismchale.ca/2020/07/31/why-you-should-share-what-you-learn). Most of the opportunities I have are a result of sharing what I learn. I’ve met people that I now work with. You started reading my site or jumped on my email list because I shared what I learn. Unfortunately it seems like less people are doing it now. Even as I looked for desk setups, few are from solo people writing on their own somewhere. Most stuff is “10 ideal desks you’ll never have” from some media company. I want more solo people writing and sharing what they’re doing.

If you’re already doing this, [let me know](mailto:curtismchale.ca) so I can follow you.