I used to want the fanciest watches I could manage to afford. I have a nice Tag automatic and it’s a fine watch.
What I didn’t expect is that these days I love the fact that my everyday and my “dress” watches cost a total of around $50.
Also, as the saying goes, “A person with one watch knows what time it is. A person with two watches is never sure.”
Is it OK that I like posting in a bunch of different places using a bunch of different tools and methods? I think it’s OK. Today, I don’t feel like typing this in Emacs and then deploying the Hugo blog, even though it’s easy and I love Emacs and static websites. Today, I feel like clicking a button, typing some words, and clicking another button, using nothing but a WordPress installation somewhere out there.
I’ve spent a lot of time installing and configuring software on the two new Linux boxes. Install a package and figure out where to configure it, then (maybe?) symlink and sync the configuration so that I can do the same things on the other computer. It’s kind of exhausting. I realize that this is mostly a front-weighted problem, but still, it has me thinking of ways to reduce the ongoing effort.
One of those ways is to use more web apps. Omarchy makes “installing” standalone web apps easy.
I could use the Fastmail web UI for email instead of my intricate and complex Mutt or Mu4e or GNUS setup. I could use WordPress (or Kirby) for blogging and not need go/hugo/rsync, etc. I could use SilverBullet for notes. There is even a growing number of web-based image manipulation tools I could use for quick resizing/conversions.
I don’t necessarily want to change my tools in order to take advantage of web apps, but it sure would simplify some things.
Some days I just don’t feel like it, ya know? I don’t mean writing blog posts. I mean creating, managing, and deploying the blog itself.
I just tried deploying baty.net (Hugo) from the new Framework running Omarchy, and forgot that I first needed to install Go, Hugo, rsync, and Node (for pagefind), then make sure my ssh keys were in place. It’s a Whole Thing. I wasn’t in the mood for it, so I came here to WordPress (aka Easy Mode) to bitch about it. So hello!
Each week Manuel Moreale features a different blogger as part of his “People and Blogs” series. It’s usually very interesting, but today’s entry is all about me, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
If you’re interested: https://manuelmoreale.com/pb-jack-baty
A little experiment where I write a post with pen and paper, but I transcribed it as well, just for fun
Source: This post was written in a notebook
I still write on paper almost every day, but I haven’t been enjoying it as much recently. I’m not sure why. Joel’s giving it a spin. It’s always fun to watch others working on paper. It helps me stick with it.
Hey Joel, you should definitely try a fountain pen. Get something inexpensive to start with, like a Lamy Safari or Pilot Metropolitan. You know, ease into it before it takes over your bank account.
“Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.”
Kurt Vonnegut
There’s no point in having fuck-you money in the bank if you never say “fuck you”!
Source: How Tim Cook sold out Steve Jobs – Anil Dash
All Tim Cook had to do was say, “If you add tariffs, we’ll stop selling iPhones in the US” and we could have had a Nepal situation on our hands.
I just learned about Org-node. Org-node is an Emacs package that mimics much of Org-roam, but claims to be faster and easier to pick up. It’s node-based (via org-ids) and is pretty full-featured.
I’ve (temporarily) replaced my Denote workflow with Org-node, to see how it feels. I like the node-based approach. I also like that it uses org-ids for linking. I often worry that Denote’s “denote:” style links aren’t portable.
Org-node is worth a look.
Zork, one of the original text adventure games, was one of the only games I’ve ever bothered to finish. It’s from Christopher Drum and it’s called pez: Portable Executable Zork.
I just downloaded a copy and am playing in a terminal on my Mac. Flashbacks to some great computer moments going on right now.
