Tue Jun 30
I just came back from an extended stay in Italy. My dad was in hospital, but while I initially underestimated the problem, this time it turned serious. As his health was quickly deteriorating, I got on the first flight and rushed to see him. For the last four decades, I have been convinced he would go with a heart...
I once said, in a public argument about a book that advocated for divorce, that if I found my wife reading it we would have a conversation about it. My wife is a surgeon and the family breadwinner; the idea that I could control her is faintly comic to anyone who knows us. None of that mattered. Within minutes I had...
First half of the year has passed, only half of the year left. 2026 is a difficult year for me so far. At the end of 2025, I wished for more rest this year. I didn’t do that yet. I pushed harder in different ways and I just can’t keep doing that. For 1.5 years now, I have been going extra hard in everything I do - I...
Roshan: Wikipen [[File:{{#setmainimage:RFID_Wrist_Tag_on_Alpine_Loop_Watch_Band.jpg}}|thumb|The RFID tag on my wrist]] A short while ago, I bought [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DD3R9W81 a set of Apple Watch Ultra 2 bands] from one of those undifferentiated sellers on Amazon. The style I've now come to like are the...
Books and some interesting pages I read in June 2026 This month I decided to not finish a book after reading the first 100 pages, so I just finished a single book. The warm weather and outdoor activities resulted in less screen time, but still ran into some fine web pages! Fiction Train Dreams by Denis Johnson...
Collxn Pulse worked because a real person at an audio fingerprinting API helped unlock messier record matching.
While part of an agency, you’re always hoping to land that dream client: An organization aligned with your own interests and values, with stakeholders who support honest and open collaboration, engaged in challenging and inspiring work. When the The Type Founders worked with Cloud Four last year, it quickly became...
I spent the first half of this week in Geneva for Ecma. After getting in Sunday night, Aki and I prioritized finding a place with air conditioning where we could catch up—Switzerland was at the tail end of a brutal heatwave, and I’ve been living under Karl too long to handle any kind of sustained heat well. I was...
Age: 61 Number of Years driving: 45 Approximate number of cars owned: 13 New Cars purchased: 1 In a twist of fate so cruel it was almost unbelievable, the universe broke my beloved 2005 Camry last Saturday, the same day I wrote about a bad luck streak that included a new dishwasher, an expensive HVAC repair and...
Two years ago, I published a post entitled Unfinished. It was a way for me to share some thoughts without having to work on them as much as I do on regular posts. As I wasn’t sure if these “lesser thoughts” were worth my efforts and my time, I compiled them in a different post format, inspired by a song: This post...
Dans "L'appart du futur", Corentin de Chatelperron nous présente un mode de vie alternatif, qui nous remettrait à notre place au sein du vivant
So, I've noticed that Twitter has had an auto translate thing for a while now. You'll see a post from someone with an all kanji name but the text is in english. Then under their name is a little note that says "Translated from Japanese." Used to, you had to click "translate" to see what something said. I know it's...
(last updated: October 1, 2025) (originally posted: roughly August 23, 2018) I subscribe to many, many podcasts and have been listening to the format for 20+ years. I commuted 75 minutes each way for six years and listened to a lot and these days I tend to listen while I’m cooking or running. Though I’m not the best...
Our 2 hens have finished sitting on the Guinea fowl eggs - out of 10, we managed to hatch 5 of them. The chicken eggs we have in the incubator won't be ready for another week or so. Excited to see how many of them we get. Thanks for reading this post via RSS. RSS is ace, and so are you. ❤️ You can reply to this post...
Today’s prompt asks, “What’s the best way to deal with negative thoughts?” Well. You’ve certainly come to the right person. If I know anything, I know negative thoughts. I collect them like I collect browser tabs. Every time I think I’m done, another one pops open, and I can’t get the damned thing closed. Which...
2026-06-30Hello! This is still from the same photowalk in the park under a rainy sky. I'll keep the article short.Pro tip: typing into a search engine "anatomy of a ..." shows the technical words describing those unknown or unfamiliar parts of an object. I can use it for machines as big as a building or for cell...
Web directories eh? Now that SEO spammers have stopped spamming them, they’re becoming cool again, and I was impressed with Warp Point: a web directory dedicated to one of my favourite subjects: video games. I particularly like that every listing has an 88×31 gif and the widget is really cool. Sadly, I don’t think I...
I usually take pictures to remember what happens during the week. This was not the case for this one, so the notes themselves may not be as long as some of you may expect! Still, a lot of things happened. This second paragraph is being written right after I was done with everything here, turned out to be just as...
We Don't Have to Hit the Accept Button on Life mtift Tue, 06/30/2026 - 08:22 You know the moment when a website loads and that box appears asking you to “accept all” cookies. If there is an option to say no, it is probably hidden behind a few more clicks. So you accept. Most of us do this countless times a week...
In 2023, Neal Agarwal created The Password Game, a viral browser-based game. Wikipedia has a nice summary: Although the initial requirements include setting a minimum of characters or including numbers, uppercase letters, or special characters, the rules gradually become more unusual and complex. These can involve...
It's Canada Day, and while like any large multi-cultural society, we have our issues, but we also have our strengths and those deserve celebrating. Wear some red, eat some burgers and chips, and celebrate this great place to be. The image above was taken this morning at Halifax Citadel :wq
I didn’t know Om Malik. But apparently I missed out, as he was universally, outwardly adored. The number of effusive farewell posts Om has received this week upon his passing at age 59 is something to behold. Om’s status as Silicon Valley’s favorite eminence grise was not news. We can rest assured he knew he was...
Reflections on the week During this week, I started focusing on gradually increasing the amount of exercise I’m doing, particularly exercise that raises my heart rate. I think this helps improve my mental energy, but there’s a complicated trade-off: physical fatigue and mental fatigue are linked to some extent. For...
June was a rough month. It was the first full month Cocoa was sick, and so our whole lives revolved around her. Therefore, as expected, no Micro Thoughts were shouted into the void this month. ⚠️ Want to learn what these Micro Thoughts are? Read the explanation here I guess you can read Micro Thoughts from June...
June was a big month: I went to Porto & Lisbon, and had a lot of life stuff happen. I'll get into the trip once I get my rolls of film developed. Three rolls at a new photo developing place: fingers crossed!ReadingI finished reading Intermezzo (of the bag) and it was fantastic. I've always liked Sally Rooney's books...
Last weekend, I went to the exhibition "The Creative Origins of Mamoru Hosoda" that's currently being held at Creative Museum Tokyo (until August 31st). The price was a bit high for my tastes at ¥2,500, but I was going with a friend and decided to not be too stingy. In the end, I'm glad that I did! The timing for...
I wanna expand on something I wrote a few months ago: One of the features of “AI” is the diffusion of responsibility: “AI” systems are being put in all kinds of processes and when they fuck up (and they always fuck up) it was just the “AI”, or “someone should have checked things”. “AI” companies want to sell...
June 2026. Kond. Yerevan. One more bar that last night in Yerevan, and a 20 minute uphill slog to Kond. We had no idea why Kond was a recommended detour, beyond it being inaccessible. This pic from We Did It Our Way hardly draws you in, and about all I can tell you about Kond is that it had a kebab takeaway, the...
C’est difficile d’écrire dans une lange étrangère et de publier tes résultats. Tout les fautes sont recorder. Peut-être les gens qui lissent tes articles ne savaient pas tes autres publications, donc il peuvent former des opinions défavorable concernant la totalité de ton travail. Pour moi ceci n’est pas un...
The philosophy journal Utilitas is temporarily halting submissions. An announcement posted on the journal’s website today states: “We would like to apologise for the current delays in reviewing and accepting new submissions. We are currently between editorial teams, and will be pausing submissions until we are able...
Today I read a heartbreaking article about a Catholic nun who was arrested by ICE agents on Sunday while she walked to Mass in her habit in South Texas. Sister Leticia Ugboaja was released the next day, but only after parish officials posted her story on social media and it gained traction in the news, leading to...
N. Ángel Pinillos asks, Why Are Humanists So Bad at Defending the Humanities? — and his answer is that humanists’ defenses of the humanities fail when they argue that the humanities have any kind of intrinsic, as opposed to instrumental, value. Now, Pinillos says that he happens to believe in the intrinsic value of...
“Whatever has happened, whatever is going to happen in the world, it is the living moment that contains the sum of the excitement, this moment in which we touch life and all the energy of the past and future,” Muriel Rukeyser wrote in one of the greatest books of all time. “Fearlessness is what love seeks [which]...
Hi friends, Many of you mistakenly got onboarding emails yesterday. I'm sorry about that. I was tweaking the way emails are sent to new users and accidentally sent it out to everyone. Don't worry, you'll get your weekly digest on Friday as usual. (If you got a message about verifying your email, please do verify...
Though I am taking it slow, there is something about this writing that is so immersive. Once I start a sentence I cannot stop reading. Every word feels so beautifully crafted and thought of. It only makes me aspire to write just as well.
Screen compulsion is a widespread problem — anyone who says they don’t have it just hasn’t realized it yet. Is ditching the screen while keeping the tech apparatus connected to the internet a possible way out? I’ve been thinking about this since I put an Apple Watch on my wrist. (I’ve since taken it off after four...
Since late last year I have been slowly (very slowly) removing digital artefacts from a few places in my life. It partly goes hand in hand with the death plan I’m building —more on that later— and partly just a reaction to my loathing of having too much clutter, something that feels like a constant battle with a 4...
Count Releases 0 Commits 10 Contributors 2 Pull requests merged 7 Issues closed 1 At a Glance Emscripten Upgrade 4.0.13 -> v6.0.0 ARGV Rework for the CLI You can now use -- to split args from the CLI to your game Improved Developer Experience You should be able to use Docker from within Docker now Updated...
I am back with Season 2, Part 5 of the Home Network and Devices track in my CybersecKyle Security How-To Series. This time we are moving toward passwordless sign-in with passkeys and hardware keys without creating a brand-new lockout problem.Passkeys are one of the few security improvements that can actually make...
Cuando los días estaban feos, mi padre me llevaba a comprar algunas historietas de Paturuzú o Condorito, revistas de informática, de videojuegos y libros de magia, todas colecciones y números sueltos de una edición ya acabada que llegaban desde España. Me gustaban esos libros que hablaban de duendes y dinosaurios....
nytimes.com He spent the past 19 seasons as a television analyst on the Bulls’ game broadcasts and hosted a popular podcast called “Gimme the Hot Sauce.”Catching up on old links and this was an old one that hit me hard and didn't want to forget... Not only was Stacey King a 3-time champion on the Jordan Bulls and...
I recently came across Bubbles, a really nice IndieWeb aggregator. It’s great to see the IndieWeb ecosystem getting better and better, and I love the idea of having something like Lobsters or Hacker News for the IndieWeb community.
This last weekend Crysta and I got in the truck and made the drive down to Milwaukee to see my parents. Several family members on my Dad's side of the family had flown into town for what is, normaly, a weekend where we go to a ballgame. Unfortunately, with the Brewers playing the Cubs, those tickets were way too...
Ayer descubrí un detalle muy agradable en mi PC secundario. Sabéis que tengo un miniPC con una distribución de Linux, que en este momento es Manjaro, rama unstable, ejecutando Plasma 6.7.1 como entorno de escritorio. Pues me fijé que el color de retroiluminación del teclado que tengo en este ordenador, un Keychron...
In which I challenge myself to draw a pokemon every day until I stop As a starter, wanna toss out that the Supreme Court ending pride month 2026 with "eh maybe trans people shouldn't have any rights" is pretty par for the course with the christofascist regime we're living in but that doesn't make it any less...
a half-assed review"> For the first time ever Mortal Kombat Warriors battle with DC Universe Super Heroes in Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. Back in 2013 when I was still living in the UK and got my Xbox 360 S with Kinect, which I don’t have any more as I gave it to my niece along with the torch of Hero of Dance...
Here’s some stuff I’ve experienced lately (and not necessarily only new releases)...
A roundup of auditions, recalls, and booked jobs from May 2026. Published by AHE. on 01st July 2026 Auditions - 3 of those auditions Ads - 1 (self-tapes) Theatre - 1 (self-tape) Puppetry - 1 (self-tape) May left me busy doing everything else. This month I had a bit of variety; an interesting puppeteer job which...
In some work headed by Macquarie Uni, a new species of spider was discovered in Northern Queensland (With a really cool hunting strategy). See this spider (dubbed the ballista spider) hunts green ants, the really angry, territorial green ants with a nasty venomous bite. In order to hunt these ants safely, the...
Last edited 9 minutes ago. Yes, cat trip, not cat nip. Last Sunday (28), I took a plane with a kitty that isn't mine to her new home in Brasília. Am spending the week here; there isn't a lot to do but it's a good respite and the weather at night is cooler, which I enjoy. I love night walking. Kitty is the sweetest...
Today's Record High is a website I created that tracks the record highs and lows for major weather stations and cities across the United States.
💡Read Small Potatoes now!What’s your favorite way to eat potatoes?I think the better question would be “What’s your least favourite way of eating potatoes?”. Potatoes are amazing and there are so many ways of eating them! Fried, boiled, baked, deep-fried, mashed. The possibilities are endless! I’m particularly...
When impressive performance gains do not matter is a very nice article covering some ways in which going after performance alone is not sufficient without considering the wider picture. It resonated a lot with how I think about performance. If there are multiple bottlenecks in the pipeline—and with these systems,...
Junited 2026It’s June again, a month of many special occasions: Pride month, my birthday, and Junited! I’m very excited for this. Junited is simple, and basically what many bloggers already do: sharing others’ posts. No challenge, no pressure, just the good kind of blog joy. Robert is organizing this community...
To those reading this on an RSS reader: Since this post is about this blog’s design, I recommend reading it on a desktop browser so you can see the new design. That said, it’s not mandatory as I’ve included screenshots where I can. Blog post URL: https://journal.james-zhan.com/redesign-v4/ The tinkering never stops,...
Someone needs your story—choose your timing well and you could change a life Photo by Anthony Metcalfe on Unsplash When I was barely out of my teens and in need of guidance but did not know it, an older and much wiser woman gave me some unsolicited advice. Her name was Leila Edwards. She did it in the best, possibly...