Tech it or leave it

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio/vlog version of this story, click here.]

Back in my Gaelic (Irish) football-playing days, when the extent of strength and conditioning training was often little more than running and sprinting, I was quite the stickler for following the exact course of any run.

Tech-ache: The rules of engagement are constantly changing. 

For example, if we had to do laps of the field, I wouldn't cut corners — I'd stay outside the lines of the pitch, which was what we were meant to do. And it annoyed me when more laid-back teammates didn't follow these rules. Cheating so-and-sos.

If they happened to finish before me, I'd console myself with the belief that their disingenuous actions would work against them in the, um, long run. (And, quite literally, over longer distances this was usually the case. Or at least the short-cutters would generally finish behind me in such pursuits. It was a different story with sprints. I wasn't blessed with blistering speed.)

'Play up, play up and play the game'

My latent Catholic beliefs no doubt played a part in this mindset. The sinners would be punished for their devilish deeds. OK, they could confess and receive absolution but knowing the characters involved, I figured it was unlikely they'd fess up. 'Mine shall be the Kingdom of Heaven.'

It's one thing, though, being obedient and rules-bound in training. It's quite another to bring that attitude to a competitive game, where winning is everything and your opponents will do what they can to defeat you, including bending if not exactly breaking the rules of engagement. To paraphrase the Kenny Rogers classic, Coward of the County, sometimes you've got to play a little dirty to win.

Or, in a less violent sense, at times you've got to play the field as it is, not as it once was or as you'd like it to be. If not, defeat is inevitable. To avoid that outcome you either adapt to the new conditions or find a different game to play — if that latter option is possible and desirable.

This all resonates with me on various fronts. The most pertinent one is continuous technological advancements, particularly AI, artificial intelligence, in all its forms. For if I continue to play the content creation/multimedia game and dream of better results, there are tools I could use that would most likely enhance what I produce and boost the chances of growing my reach. Yep, still chasing those dragons.

'It's like a man going to battle with a bow and arrow even though some of the most advanced weaponry is at his disposal.'

Now, I've no intention of using AI to write blogs for me. Not only do I view that as beyond cheating — it'd be like a footballer replacing himself on the field with a potentially better robot clone — but it would also be counterproductive personally. I do, you might be shocked to learn, enjoy writing and I like to try to better myself at it, challenging and frustrating as it oftentimes is. In any case, no AI can write like Wrong Way, right?

Laptop lassitude

Where the latest creative technology can be of assistance to me, it seems, is in the making of vlog versions of my blogs. The means, I believe, already exist to make such videos slicker and more eye-catching without much extra effort compared to the crude ones I currently create for Spotify and YouTube. I just haven't dabbled in these means yet.

A general lack of enthusiasm to turn on my laptop these days plays its part. And this laptop lassitude is made more acute in Colombia's hot lands, so my current base of San Martín de los Llanos in the Meta department doesn't help in this regard. Plus, I lack a suitable office with a WiFi connection here — I find it hard to do computer work where I cook, eat and sleep. San Martín, though, is good for me in other ways, I must add.

With my smartphone, I can easily write anywhere. But creating videos requires laptop work. One has greater scope and precision working with a mouse and a bigger screen. Or at least it used to be the case that a computer or laptop was needed to make videos that require a degree of editing. Perhaps the latest smartphones and certain applications make video creation a breeze on phones now. I've had my device, a Motorola One, since 2019; practically a relic in 21st-century tech terms. But if it ain't broke . . .

At play, too, is my minimalist approach and general lack of interest in cutting-edge technology. I use only the apps and gadgets that have become next to essential for my modus operandi, no more, no less.

Nonetheless, to come back to the football field, while I'm still running laps to try to get in shape, most others in this game are working with the best strength and conditioning techniques available.

It's akin to a man going to battle with a bow and arrow even though some of the most advanced weaponry is at his disposal.

So, I either change the way I attack or choose to fight a different war. A blend of both might just be the best option right now.
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Listen to The Corrigan Cast podcast here.

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Life imitating art of Los 39, minus the bloodshed

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio/vlog version of this story, click here.]

There are few things I like better than getting on a bus — or, more rarely as is the case, an aeroplane — for an escape from my routine and normal, everyday surrounds.

We could all do with more beaches and fewer bitches in our lives.

It's something I've been able to do with regularity over the last few years in Colombia. The relative independence that comes with not having a full-time job, coupled with singlehood, has helped me to do this.

My adopted country's size — it's about 13 times larger than Ireland — and its fairly decent bus network from my Bogotá base helps as well. That Bogotá is the base is significant, in terms of both connectivity and my wanting to frequently take a break from it.

If I were based, say, in San Luis de Gaceno or, from where I currently write these lines, Palomino, my desire to regularly travel would probably be greatly reduced. Such outposts are, understandably enough, less connected than the capital. Plus, with my current mindset, I'd be happier to stay for protracted periods in them than in bustling Bogotá.

One aspect of such escapes that I particularly enjoy is my doing it alone. Solo sojourns. Indeed, as I age, I find that I've become more comfortable at shunning activities, events, and people that, instinctively, I'm sure will just annoy me.

As I put it in Paths to cleaner living, I'm more in the jomo (joy of missing out) camp than fomo (fear of missing out) one these days, especially when it comes to socialising of the raucous revelling variety.

Play the game

So the idea of a getaway with a big group of lads excites me as much as giving English classes to beginners.

Thus, despite the obvious upsides of a generously subsidised trip, with pay, to Colombia's Caribbean coast, I could see the downsides of having to spend an indefinite period in the company of and working with previously unknown people, predominantly men. I would, to borrow from the poet Henry Newbolt, have to 'Play up! play up! and play the game!'

And play the game is apt here. Seeing as how the gig was an acting one made up of renowned professionals from Spain, journeymen, wannabes and, the category that best describes me, amateurs-by-accident — super extras in this case — there was much subterfuge. While women tend to take much of the flak for being spiteful gossipers, the boys can be just as bitchy as the girls.

'Either the production team had a change of heart or the guy who told me this was talking horse manure from the start.'

It was the wannabes and amateurs-by-accident whom I got to know best. I was in the same hotel as some of them and we also spent many hours waiting around on set during the weeks of filming. (Hours waiting around on set is standard, especially, although not exclusively, for big-budget productions with complex scenes and fastidious — as the best probably are — directors.)

From previous but far shorter involvement in productions, I'd experienced the tendency for some of these minor players to think they're bigger than they are. They behave as if they are directors whilst the reality is they are merely minions. Witnessing this sporadically is somewhat humorous. However, dealing with it on an almost daily basis is more of a headache.

Now, at the risk of making myself out to be bigger than I am — but do see my captivating cameo in Narcos, to name just one of my dazzling performances — such on-set behaviour is like a below-average student telling his more astute classmates that they need to up their performance levels. The best strategy is to ignore this noise, which I figure comes from some deep insecurity. It can be hard not to bark back at times, all the same.

One comes to expect this pathetic acting up on set. But it wasn't left there.

At breakfast in our hotel one morning, a Bogotá-born colleague who had, he seemed to think anyway, the ear of the production's decision-makers, informed me that a member of our group was going to be sent home prematurely because his behaviour was annoying some of the more important crew members. This didn't happen.

So either the production team had a change of heart or the guy who told me this was talking horse manure from the start. I suspect it was the latter, especially considering the informant's on-set conduct, portraying himself as a know-it-all.

This insidious — I say insidious for I believe it was said to me to create further divisions — as opposed to idle gossip came after a rift in the group of eight of us who travelled on the same flight from Bogotá for the initial bout of filming.

Such splits are common when a disparate group is assembled. Indeed, the series we were filming, Los 39, has splits galore — and plenty of gore — as it tells the story, with much artistic licence no doubt, of the 39 sailors left behind by Christopher Columbus in 1492 on the island of what today is called Hispaniola.

So that divisions, minus the bloodshed albeit, emerged in our real-life group of actors is far from shocking. True to form, none of the groupings appealed much to me. I wasn't too bothered about trying to fit in with any of them in any case.

To restate, I'm quite content doing my own thing. So once I'd fulfilled my contractual obligations i.e. done what I had to do on set, I was happy to be left to my own devices.

The quiet man

There were, though, those in that group of eight with whom I connected. One was an easy-going Italian. That we were two of what I believe were just three non-native Spanish speakers employed by the production helped create a bond.

Yet, as a smoker, he was pulled, against his better judgement, into the orbit of a 50-something-year-old, Bogotá-based Spaniard who seems determined to silence silence — he just doesn't shut up. To make this worse, it's like he wants to be heard in his native land with each utterance. And he can't seem to do anything independently: 'We should do this. We should do that. We should go there.'

In his defence, there appears to be no malice in him. Nor is he pretentious, unlike the gossiping Bogotano mentioned earlier.

Nonetheless, much noise often comes from those with little genuine to say or show. I apply that to both the Bogotano and the Spaniard, even though they wouldn't like to be grouped together.

In contrast, the principal actors, from the brief interactions I had with them, came across as affable. And while I would have been very happy to receive suggestions and/or advice from them during filming, they rarely commented. I guess they were focused on their roles, as one would expect. I suspect they are fairly secure in themselves, too.

Also, considering acting is their profession, when the cameras aren't rolling they probably enjoy just being themselves. Some of the wannabes would do well to follow suit.

As for my preference for shunning contrived social gatherings, let's just say I'm readying myself to play the lead role in Hollywood's remake of The Quiet Man. I await the call.
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Listen to The Corrigan Cast podcast here.

Facebook: Wrong Way Corrigan — The Blog & IQuiz "The Bogotá Pub Quiz".