Barrett

November 19, 2023

How to Stop your iPhone from Buzzing All Night Long

Unless you want to be kept up by your iPhone with endless updates while you’re trying to sleep, you need to give it a bedtime. Here’s how.

I am the Borg. You are the Borg. We are the Borg. Yes, humanity has already been assimilated.

Remember, those evil “Star Trek” cybernetic bad guys who kept running into Captain Picard and wanted to take over the galaxy? The Borg were all wirelessly interconnected and acted in sync like a colony of bees. Their hive mind kept them instantly updated.

Okay. Well, no… we’re not completely moving throughout our day following the constant direction of a unified data stream. But I think the scary reality is only because it’s not unified. (Well, not yet.)

Time to Put your iPhone into Sleep Mode
Our smartphones are constantly bombarding us with various updates…. from family, friends and work to various companies and organizations we’ve touched and shared our personal data with.

These ongoing texts, emails and calls can become a persistent din. It’s like the world is screaming at you. If you wear an Apple Watch with haptic feedback on your wrist, there’s a constant visceral reminder that someone or something wants your attention.

All that noise, noise, noise!

Sure, you have instant access to so much more information, but it comes at a price. (What’s a Borg drone to do?)

And the last thing you need is to have that constant drumbeat interfere with your sleep.

There’s got to be a way to turn it off.

Well, of course there is…

How to Activate Sleep Focus
I realized recently that I really needed to take some action and effectively put my iPhone 15 Pro Max to sleep while I was sleeping. Yes, it was muted, but my iPhone would wake me up with all the buzzing and screen brightening to alert me of something new in the wee hours of the morning.

I needed my REM sleep!

I knew that I could simply move my iPhone to a different room, but I like to charge it up on my nightstand. Fortunately, I can set it and forget it…if it will let me. (I usually don’t wake up in the middle of the night with the need to grab it and see how my blog’s metrics are doing.)

Instead of turning my iPhone off (whoever does that?!), I activated the sleep setting in the Focus App.

Here’s how to do that.

Tap on Settings
Tap Focus
Tap Sleep
Set a Schedule

Then you assign a lock screen for this setting. (The trick I think is not to assign it to the screen lock photo that you use throughout your day.)

You can also program exceptions to let certain contacts make it through your Do Not Disturb barrier.

Done.

Now my iPhone goes totally dark at my bedtime and does not respond to any incoming anything throughout the night.

Happiness restored.

Silence in your Sleep Chamber
It’s ironic that we now need to tame our smartphones to prevent them from overwhelming us with too much of what was supposed to be a good thing.

The simple truth is everyone and everything should not have immediate access to your attention.

Even the Borg knew that. They had those cool standing sleep chambers throughout their Borg cube ships where their drones could catch up on their sleep… uninterrupted.

And as we all know, it’s never a good idea to wake up a sleeping Borg.

November 16, 2023

How to Spend 30 Minutes to Take the Edge Off a Work Trip

If you’re online at sunrise, don’t forget to turn around and appreciate the sunrise outside your hotel window.

Work trips can be stressful. Even if you appreciate the opportunity, working long hours for consecutive days in a different time zone can wear on even the most experienced traveler.

So often, I hear stories from colleagues who have returned from their travels, and they lament that they never were able to escape from their work environment and appreciate the location they’ve visited.

I say there’s always an opportunity to squeeze in a few minutes to get outside and smell the roses. You just need to be planful and allow yourself a little time to pull away from the gravity of your work requirements.

Take a Half Hour to Refuel
Thirty minutes is all you really need to walk about and see your environment. Really experience it.

Do it during lunch. Take a break. Perhaps start your day a little earlier. If you can’t find 30 minutes… or the time to take two 15-minute breaks, then there’s likely another issue to address.

If you want to maximize these moments, you might want to take a few pictures along the way. You certainly don’t have to, but if you like searching for cool photos during your day-to-day, your walk might reveal exactly that.

The Healing Properties of a Micro Excursion
Whether you want to connect with your space, take a photo or just clear your head, carving out 30 minutes for a ‘micro excursion’ is one of the best ways to feed your sense of well-being.

It can make all the difference.

Here’s what I spotted during my own stroll in Palm Desert, California during a recent work trip. I used my iPhone 15 Pro Max for close ups and my Panasonic Lumix DC-ZS200D for the zoom.

November 5, 2023

Is the Lifetouch Digital Package for your Child’s School Photo a Good Deal?

After your kid’s school picture day, it’s time to choose which photo package to buy. Here’s how to figure out what might be best for you.

I have a confession to make. I have dozens of unused Lifetouch school photos of our son still sitting in their original envelopes. They span back over a decade of my middle schooler’s life. What happened?

Quite simply, I ordered more photos than I needed. Each year, I’ve really tried to order to right package for my family. But the truth is the package configurations are supersized with options I don’t need. I’ve never wanted those little 2×3 wallet photos to give out. (Doesn’t a digital picture on a smartphone serve the exact same purpose?)

Sure, an 8×10 print is nice. Even a couple of 5×7’s. But really, it’s the digital file that’s most important to me. Then, I’ve got the keys to do exactly what I want with it. I don’t really need a photo factory churning out a high volume of prints for me. (Caveat: I’ve got a smaller family.)

But of course, Lifetouch wants you to buy prints. That’s their profit margin. So, the digital file is difficult to isolate.

Welcome to the Digital Landscape
Now, Lifetouch (owned by Shutterfly) offers their new Digital Only Package.
Yay! But wait…

It contains two digital versions of the exact same photo. One has the standard blue background. The other offers the background of your choice.

You also get the option to stamp your kid’s name and grade on the front, and the option to allow a Lifetouch artist to retouch your kid’s photo to ‘improve’ it.

Really?

Keep it Real
So, I don’t really want or need a buffed-out photo of my 13-year-old son. He’s perfect. And I say that every kid is perfect. There’s no need to change anything. Seriously. I understand why a parent might want to improve a photo, but that’s not the way your kid looked in that moment.

If you’re buying school portraits every year, like I’ve done, I think it’s best to think of them as a progression of a child’s life over time. That’s their ultimate value. We all have thousands of photos of our children that we’ve taken ourselves. We don’t really need another photo.

But taking the same photo year-over-year… and then putting them together in a montage… I find that’s a magic equation to help tell the story of a person’s early years.

The Basic Package
For $19.99, the Basic Package offers plenty for most needs (unless you have a large family). You get the digital photo file with the basic background (forwarded to your Shutterfly account). Plus. you receive a few prints:

2 – 5×7
2 – 3×5
4 – 2×3

The two 5×7’s are useful, and I can pop them in frames. The rest will sit in the envelope forever.

Still… spending twenty bucks for a portrait, the digital file and a couple usable prints is a good deal.

The Digital Only Package
For $36.99, the Digital Package still only gives you the one portrait. Sure, they say they give you a second digital file with a different background. And that’s true, but I don’t feel that almost doubling the price is worth it for the exact same picture of your child.

No, I don’t need the ‘premium’ touch up treatment, thank you very much.

And I absolutely don’t want his name and grade burned into the image of the digital file. That’s really limiting for future use in my own photo montages of him that I may create. (I just want the ‘clean’ photo.)

Basic is Best
If you compare the two packages and strip away the undesirable pieces, the Basic Package gives you more. You get the digital portrait plus a few hard copies.

The Digital Package effectively gives you the same digital portrait. And that’s it. For almost double the cost.

So, this year, I’m buying the Basic Package.
Click.

Barrett’s Suggestion for Lifetouch
If I were to design a Digital Only Package that I would want to purchase, it would contain four digital files.

2 digital files with the background of my choice
2 duplicate files with the name and grade burned into the image
Optional premium retouching service (if you insist)
$29.99

You’ve got to believe that eliminating the printing/packaging/delivery costs of physical prints is a huge savings for Lifetouch. Why not beef up the Digital Only Package a bit and bring the price down?

Food for thought, Lifetouch…

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