Baty.blog

Welcome to Jack Baty‘s blog about everything

  • Photo: The neighbor’s house

    The side of my neighbor’s house (2025). Nikon F100. Kodak ColorPlus.

    I was testing my first roll of Kodak ColorPlus film, so while walking the dog I took this snap of the side of my neighbor’s house. It’s supposed to be a throwaway, but I dig it for some reason. The more I look at it, the more I like it.

    I was using the Nikon F100, so I didn’t bother to think I might have set the ISO manually on an earlier roll. Sure enough, it was set at ISO 400. ColorPlus is a 200 speed film. Whoops. I noticed my mistake halfway through the roll, but figured I’d take the opportunity to push color film for my first time. It kind if ruined the “How good is ColorPlus?” experiment, but oh well.

    I scanned it using the Leica SL2 mounted on a Negative Supply rig, then inverted the scans using Negative Lab Pro in Lightroom (Classic).

    As usual, the colors look weird to me. The shadows have a splash of magenta and everything looks just a little off.

    And yet, I love the photo. I love the diagonal monochrome/color separation. I like the placement of the rocks and the tree. I like the air conditioner unit in the center. The single sunlit yellow flower against deep shadow. And I really love the satellite dish.

    It’s fun when the throwaways work out like that.

  • A timeline

    Monday: “Cool, I can do everything in Emacs and a terminal!”

    Wednesday: “I’m so sick of using Emacs and a terminal for everything”

  • SilverBullet for some reason

    Screenshot of my SilverBullet journal for 9/27
    What am I doing in SilverBullet?

    SilverBullet is another tool for notes. I toyed with it last year for a bit and it was great fun. It’s definitely geared toward the nerdier crowd, but for someone who wants to build a system of notes around a bunch of Markdown files, SilverBullet is a good option. I like it much more than Obsidian, fwiw.

    While testing LazyDocker on Omarchy, I figured I’d use SilverBullet as a test bed. That was easy.

    LazyDocker running SilverBullet

    I doubt I’ll actually use SilverBullet for my notes, but it’s tempting.

  • Watches

    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.”

  • Where am I again?

    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.

  • Browser first?

    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.

  • One of those lazy blogging moods

    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!

  • P&B: Jack Baty

    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

  • This post was written in a notebook – joelchrono

    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.

     

     

  • Vonnegut on build vs maintain

    “Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.”

    Kurt Vonnegut