Sun Aug 23
Quoted Wendy's loses status as second-largest burger chain after 6-year run by Eric Mack (Fox Business) Wendy’s has lost its place as America’s runner-up to McDonald's, ending a six-year run as the second-largest burger chain, being surpassed by a resurgent Burger King. Fox Business reported on August 9, 2026, that...
August 23, 2026 Anyway, what I really want to remark on here is the idea of using AI to brainstorm. In the past, I may have written this off as well. But actually, with the rise of the very good AI voice technology — namely, GPT-Voice — I actually have found going back and forth with AI quite useful in helping to...
It’s been a remarkably productive month for the lab - mostly because I’ve been able to give it my essentially-undivided attention while I keep looking for new payroll work. A lot of that productivity has fallen into the writing department, but that doesn’t mean I’m not back to some of my old technical shenanigans...
Como todos los veranos he estado visitando La Manchuela que no deja de ser la zona de mis raíces. Este año he aprovechado para visitar La Mancha de Cuenca y de camino, aprovechado para parar en Alarcón. Alarcón se encuentra en La Manchuela, la comarca que hay entre Cuenca y Albacete. Este pueblo, bastante pequeño,...
After reviewing my post from yesterday, I realized that it was dreadfully boring. Here is the post in one sentence: if I had to narrow my iPhone to five apps I would keep Safari, Google Maps, Camera, Snapseed, and Spotify. Nothing exciting, or special. Who cares? Right? I almost deleted the post. Yesterday, and...
I have played Magic: The Gathering for over twenty years. It is probably my favorite game, but, like many long-term players, I have struggled with disenchantment toward it. When I first got into Magic (at age thirteen), I had a box of Revised-era cards that my brother gave me. Out of those, I made some really...
One of the beautiful things about social media is the inspirations that might come on any random day, and not even from people we know. This morning, a post from a human I don't know (Jim Hankins) came across my Facebook feed. Here's what the larger quilt looks like:I might have scrolled on by, if I hadn't read the...
Another week, another reflection. Though I ponder about the format of this text, as the weeks go by, as I figure out the ways to access my thoughts and write in ways which only I wish to write; minimalistic or not. I do not pretend to rely on empty words, purposeless prose. I could write simply in my journal, on my...
Another bump to Wasat, this being v1.4.0. This release is in support of some work I want to do on Rogallo, where I intend to add proper client certificate management. While Wasat provided good support for the generation, storage, and use of client certificates, there was no real public API that would allow for the...
Venetia existed within the Exarchate of Ravenna, as part of the Byzantine Empire, and what happened in the Exarchate mattered to Venetia.
Fear. Henry Peach Robinson. Public domain image via Metropolitan Museum of Art and Wikimedia Commons. I keep subjecting myself to scary movies, in spite of the fact that the long-lasting and excessive fright they induce is just plain ridiculous. I mean look, I’m ostensibly so advanced in maturity that the AARP wants...
It’s here! This is an absolute piece of beauty and I can already imagine how this could be a wicked good hobby! So many ideas on how I want to stage this! This whole kit came decently packed but I did have to super-glue some components that had popped off or broken during transit. The WAP5 kit has the WAP5 Engine, 3...
I mean, I'm still here doing it anyway but I think that's fascinating Photo unrelated - I know I've mentioned this on the blog previously but a while back, Della and I started photographing the wall at the pharmacy every time we pick up a prescription; given our health, that means I have a seemingly infinite supply...
A short (work) week – I had the Monday off and went to Basel for some shopping and lunch with my sister. Of course the Tuesday was very much a condensed Monday then, so that was great. In other news – we finally got some rain, but that seemed to have been a short-lived blessing. I’m looking at the blue sky as we...
Christof Koch, a German-American neuroscientist, posits consciousness is an attribute of the universe, rather than something spawned by creatures possessed of a brain. Although somewhat left of field, the notion has raised eye-brows. Yet if consciousness is universal, so to speak, can any entity capable of...
Stop reading now if you aren’t interested in a nuanced take on both of them Photo and text by the author I’m not usually into the would you rather game, but this one on Mastodon caught my attention. We were asked to choose which we preferred: an AI generated poster, or a poster made by hand but set in Comic Sans....
dear creative soul is a series of letters from my creative heart to yours Dear Creative Soul, My favourite artist is WMJ Turner. His art both fills me with beauty and sometimes makes me feel like crying. In the past I have let my love for the work of someone keep me from making my own art. But I have kept at it,...
Gordon's post, I no longer care, resonated as I'm also getting older and of the same age as him. I think the difference between 32-year-old me and 52-year-old me is that I still care about some things. It's just that I no longer feel the need to broadcast my opinion as loudly. Atheism is what comes to mind as I say...
Thoughts on audiences, motivations, and finding a voiceTwo discussions I saw today in online communities I’m part of got me thinking: who is the audience for my blog? why do I write? What is the essence of my writing voice? The first question is perhaps the easiest to answer. I don’t assume anyone reads my blog. I...
♠ Yours truly, more than two months ago: As of today, it’s not clear to me whether this approach will stick. Clearly this approach is here to stay: bloggify (40+ posts at the time of this writing). I am starting to ponder whether to split /bloggify posts into an Agent Blog: These posts are written by my agents, not...
Since this past April, I've been experimenting with Claude Code. Shockingly, what started as a small, personal app testing the capabilities of AI turned into a fully functional app I dubbed "Nexus". I published it, and you can check it out here. This essay is a snapshot in time — documenting my experience. I've been...
August 2026. Newport. Gwent. Four years since my last visit to Newport, but I’ve still probably blogged more about this wonderful town than anywhere outside “home”. Four years means a couple of Beer Guide debutants have crept in, that Weird Dad micro over the Usk, and a lively town pub run by Rhymney Brewery in the...
Little League World Series Trip 61 Nights: 200-202 Photo Album Every year I watch the Little League World Series. Every year, during the series, I tell my wife that we should attend the following year. 12 months later, I watch the next LLWS and tell my wife... This has been going on for years, maybe even decades at...
By: Joel Kotkin | Rating: 1/5What an absolutely godawful book. Kotkin has obviously no interest or any knowledge of the European feudal societies of medieval times. He uses this lack of knowledge to shoehorn his theory into. It just doesn't work. Yes, big tech entrepreneurs are rich arseholes. That has nothing to do...
Sunset over Culver City and the Santa Monica Mountains. A stripe of fog runs down the tall buildings of Wilshire Blvd., I don't know if I've ever seen that before. ウェストサイドの夕日 カルバーシティとサンタモニカ山脈に沈む夕日だ。ウィルシャー大通りの高層ビル群に沿って、霧の帯が伸びている。
Re:Paper is a pet project where I get to read interesting papers from the past and share my thoughts/impressions. It's not too dissimilar to book reviews, except for papers. Or paper-like things (a talk that gets published, an essay from an academic, etc.) For 003, I have Animal Cultures: How We've Only Seen the Tip...
I was away on holiday this week, so slimmer pickings than usual. Everything I shared on social.omgmog.net between 17 and 23 August: a simulated fly walking around a Mac desktop, why Nintendo put real cars in Mario Kart, and Susan Kare’s icon work for the original Mac.
I’ve grown to appreciate unplanned visits. This is likely due to maintaining a (fairly) tidy abode instead of living like a slob as I did in my twenties. (Sorry Anne & Wendy.) This morning friends came over and we enjoy pleasant temps on the porch with snacks and suspect expressions. Currently Listening: Noah Kahan...
We're at a fair. A family walks by. Or at least, I think it might be a family. It could be two families, who knows? The adults are all women, and I count three kids: two boys and one girl. The two boys seem fascinated by something at their left, seemingly oblivious to anything else but the scene that plays out there...
Roshan: Wikipen [[Suicide is Absolution]] is the idea that if someone kills themselves then their crimes are forgiven. It is a historically common position adopted by various societies. Some of these are: * Modern Western Civilization - [[wikipedia:Jason Arday]]'s suicide retroactively transformed his fraud and...
Mac Mini 2018 i7 Hand-me-downI’m really excited because a mutual friend said they’re willing to give me their retired 2018 Mac Mini (which was originally used for music production). What’s extremely exciting is the fact it’s a maxed out model with 64GB DDR4 RAM (I’ve never owned a computer with over 16GB of RAM!)...
Papagalii peruși sunt păsări frumoase, dar risipesc multă mâncare când mănâncă. Mulțumesc că urmărești ThinkRoot prin RSS. Poți folosi și Atom sau JSON Feed.
Guess who's back?! Yes, that's right, it's me. By way of explanation, I took a step back from blogging and social media. Not for any specific reason, other than life interfered -- in a positive way. At the start of July I transported myself to Spain for a few weeks. We are very lucky (having worked hard for years),...
If you’ve ever found yourself waiting for a downtown 4, 5, or 6 train at Union Square, then you’ve seen them. At the platform edge every 10 feet or so are sets of steel grills. When there’s no train, they don’t move. But when a train pulls in and comes to a stop, the steel grills automatically extend to fill in the...
Dungeon Crawler CarlAuthor: Matt DinnimanGenre: Fantast, Sci-fiReleased: 2020Rating: ★★★★★The apocalypse will be televised! Welcome to the first book in the wildly popular and addictive Dungeon Crawler Carl series—now with bonus material exclusive to this print edition. You know what’s worse than breaking up with...
Bild: ThomasDalbyArt Ein erstes Ärgernis war, den Kipppunkt mal wieder verpasst zu haben, an dem die Temperaturen draußen die Temperaturen drinnen überstiegen haben. Die Fenster der Wohnung über Nacht auf Kipp gehabt, da war’s noch halbwegs erträglich, und vormittags vergessen, sie wieder zu schließen, da war die...
To have told my 30-year-old, 40-year-old, 50-year-old self that my artistic output wasn't the fundamental and most valuable aspect of my life, I would have thought you didn't understand. These days I don't feel that way. That's not to say that I've stopped working as much, but it just feels, self-evidently, that...
A weekly recap of the articles and posts I’ve read that I think are worth your time. PSA: Know What You’re Doing | The Art of Manliness — Amen to this. I’d also add an addendum around being ready to finish your transaction as well. The number of people who can’t figure out how to LEAVE a checkout, or queue, baffles...
I collected 241 items for 1997. And 10% of them are key texts. That's a bit odd.
On my icon gallery sites, I have metadata I’ve manually added over the years to tag certain icons as being predominantly “blue” or “orange” or some other color. Then I use this metadata to present icons of (roughly) the same color. It’s kinda neat to be able to browse a wall of icons that are all the same color. The...
Taken just today on my phone. I'm mostly surprised that it's a reasonably decent close-up as my phone doesn't have a macro mode and is normally pants for this sort of thing. I think it's a common darter, but any correction is welcome.
Claire Keegan’s novella Small things like these is very sweet and the ending is so triumphant and satisfying and punk rock that it’s going to stay with me for a very long time. I leave this rare book recommendation without a quote or much of a description simply because I don’t want to ruin anything. But what I will...
Stares at collection of white border pieces. Welp I underestimated how long this puzzle was going to take by a long shot…
A lot of the educators I admire in the frontend web space seem to be either bowing out or dialing back their efforts: Axel Rauschmayer, Salma Alam-Naylor, Josh W. Comeau, to name a few. Other well-known luminaries like Kent C. Dodds, Addy Osmani, Rachel Nabors, and Lydia Hallie have pivoted from talking about...
A fascinating 11-minute video by Modern Vintage Gamer about the PC videogame piracy in the 1990s: This is a “no honor among thieves” story about a few groups racing to pirate and release one of the most important videogames in history: 1996’s Quake. There is a lot of interesting vernacular here: leetspeak, nfo...
Apparently I've been on a bit of an anime nostalgia spree recently. First ATLA, now Madoka Magica. I remember being obsessed with this show circa 2012. I've been watching some YouTube clips and perusing the Wiki (including the Meduka Meguca parody, of course). Some of the animation and action is also just very...
… here’s a bit from a series of images I’m working on. (By the way, nothing I post here, words or pictures, uses AI. It’s strictly good old fashioned fucking around.) Send me an email Latest 3 posts 24 Aug, 2026 In Lieu of an Actual Post… 23 Aug, 2026 Back On My Art Thing 21 Aug, 2026 Can We Just Do The November...
image courtesy of an unknown pinterest artist, (based off another work by Andrea Galad) it's been several weeks since i've been able to breathe words upon a page of my own. this paralysis that's taken ahold of me feels an intoxicating mix of indulgence, insurmountable pressure, and pointlessness all at once. a...
Aaaand it's gone. I deleted my fedi account because I got tired of how aggressive it all was, and I had so many followers I felt like every move I did, everything I said, was scrutinized by some people. Few of these said people tried to influence my way of thinking, trying to make me agree with them about...
17th August - 23rd August Back home visiting family and stopped in for a pub lunch at a random pub that turned out to be the one I'd go drinking in at college about 30 years ago. Which was a bit odd! Spent the rest of the time eating chips and ice cream on the beach lamenting the broken optical zoom on my Coolpix...
In all fairness, writing a (negative) review about a film I have not seen nor I plan to watch is at least disrespectful and discourteous towards myself and the reader. However, the discourse of this post is not about how bad I find The Odyssey (2026; Christopher Nolan) to be and why so; conversely, – about my stance...
Whether I stroll through the park, cycle through the countryside, or simply take a short break on a bench outdoors, the sight of the green nature has an incredibly calming effect on me. My mood improves instantly. And the best part: all those options aren’t far away. 📷🌳 Interactions & Comments
“Biologically, physiologically, we are not so different from each other; historically, as narratives — we are each of us unique.” “A person’s identity,” Amin Maalouf wrote in his brilliant treatise on personhood, “is like a pattern drawn on a tightly stretched parchment. Touch just one part of it, just one...
I have been gaming all my life, it's the one thing I started doing even before I discovered computers! I started with D&D and the good old Badic D&D Red Box which I managed to convince my grandmother to buy me when we passed it up in a …
The Netgear Meural Canvas II digital photo frame is one of my favourite devices i own. Its 21.5″ display offers adequate colour reproduction and superb viewing angles. Its design is nothing to write home about, but combined with the matte coating that prevents most if not all glare, it doesn’t read as ‘i’ve put a...
2026-08-23Hello!In the build up to Day 200, I've been trying to pull so many different resources from around the internet. It's looking like I'm going to be promoting less stuff this time around, but with more detail and context.Combined with other life obligations (and a possible case of burnout?) I've fallen a day...
This is an excerpt from my journal. People who visit me make the same kind of remark: “quiet, huh?”. Their ears are used to a different environment. Their first impression is informed by their prior conditioning and is true given that state of affairs. Though the mountain is not silent. Nature never rests. All that...
(The characters on this are completely asemic, I was just makin’ cool letters) (A calligram I came up with some years ago that reads ‘bismillah’ in a constructed alphabet I’ve been using since 2003) (Included for the benefit of those who were intrigued by the bismillah bird’s explanation)
This week ended with the news that the trade talk between Canada and the US collapsed. Once I read why, I was immensely grateful that we (Canada) have someone like Mark Carney at the helm. The negotiations must have been incredibly intense, and I just cannot imagine a career politician like Pierre Poilievre...
給博客添加純文本版本 看了 wiwi 的 偷偷加入的功能 (另見 Zine#54) 我也給博客的文章添加了純文本版本，你可以在每篇文章的底部找到純文本版本的連結，也可以將頁面 URL 的 .html 換成 .txt 訪問純文本版本 (如果換成 .org 就能看到文章的原始文件)。最近看到 Wiwi.Blog 純文字版，我也跟著做了一個 純文本版本的索引頁。 純文本的好处是極簡，基本上就是文字，沒有其它干擾元素，其次是體積小，在網絡不好時也能較快的加載 (不過網絡條件不好，和服務器建立連結也需要時間，能節省的是頁面需要的流量)。 製作純文本版本，只要將原始文件想辦法轉成 txt 版本就好了 (現在只是轉換成了...