Thursday, August 15, 2024
I’m bad about overthinking. Like obnoxiously bad. I can never leave well enough alone because I start thinking about what I should have done or how I can do the same thing, only better. Then a few days later I’ve forgotten all about whatever it was and I’m already overthinking the next thing. It’s a self inflicted scam. We’re constantly learning new things and getting better at the things we already know through repetition.
Thursday, August 15, 2024
I keep getting sucked into watching the Mr. Beast drama that’s been going on for the last few weeks. Ava Tyson was called out for sending inappropriate Discord messages to minors and since then more and more former employees are coming out and revealing all sorts of greasy stuff about what goes on behind the scenes over there.
I don’t even watch their videos but it’s been so interesting to see it unfold because it’s the most beloved and successful YouTube channel to ever exist. I feel like it’s one of those “don’t meet your heroes” scenarios. If you look into the personal lives of celebrities, you might find a lot of sketchy or downright repulsive behavior.
Sunday, August 4, 2024
I don’t get the anti-tipping culture on Reddit. There’s a whole community of people who never leave tips, pretending to protest in favor of the tipped employee because their wages should be higher? “Hey I don’t think you make enough money so I’m punishing you for your boss making you rely on tips to survive”
Monday, July 29, 2024
I’m so fucking lazy. I’ve never really messed with robots.txt. I’m kinda new to personal blogging; back in the 2000s I had a tech blog but I wanted everything to index my site. I even submitted my link to a bunch of off brand search engines to get my name out there.
But now there’s AI bots scraping websites like iFixit literally a million times a day.
Sunday, July 28, 2024
I’ve spent a lot of time trying to get on the right medications to bring my anxiety levels from a blood curdling scream to a dull whimper. I think I’ve got it mostly squared away at this point in my life. The circular thinking and stressing over things I shouldn’t care about are pretty much gone, but then there’s the issue of actual anxiety. The kind you’re supposed to feel when something’s wrong - like when you’re in physical danger or when you fuck something up so bad you know the only option is to stand up and face the music.
Saturday, July 27, 2024
I was a loyal Android fanboy since my very first smartphone: the LG Optimus running Android 2.2 Froyo
Before that, I was obsessed with everything Google was doing. I was naive enough to think they actually lived by the “don’t be evil” mantra. Search was still good and Google+ was a cool nerdy alternative to Facebook. They were making Linux mainstream with their highly customizable open source iPhone alternative and I was there for it.
Thursday, July 25, 2024
Sometimes I wonder if anyone else shares the same views on “the end” as I do. I’m not trying to be edgy and I’m not a doomer or an accelerationist but with all the crazy shit going on in the world, it’s easy to imagine a doomsday scenario where we don’t have to pay bills or go to work anymore. There’s probably radioactive fallout and immense suffering involved, but you gotta weigh the positives and negatives, ya know?
Monday, July 15, 2024
I’m a little too young to have really appreciated the pre-Web 2.0 internet. Me and my cousin had our own Tripod sites when we were kids but we really didn’t know what we were doing.
Then we got a little older and MySpace came out. It was like having your own little stripped down website but some guy named Tom hosted all of your data. You could customize some things with html but it was more locked down than actually hosting something on your own.
Saturday, July 13, 2024
I’ve never done much in the way of web hosting or development. I ran a more “professional” tech blog a long time ago, but that’s about as far into it as I got. I’ve never messed around with SQL, PHP, SSL certificates or different DNS configurations. I just ran a Wordpress site on Hostgator during the Web 2.0 days. Digg.com was still where you went to updoot links and Reddit was just a weird back alley of the internet back then.
Wednesday, July 3, 2024
A lot of my posts have covered stuff I don’t ever have the time of day to talk about. I work too much and almost all of my coworkers are conservative boomers. I don’t talk to most of them much but every once in a while I’ll have to share a store with some of them. Sometimes they give me random phone calls. Luckily I have the option of just not picking up the phone.
Sunday, June 30, 2024
I’ve spent the last month blogging and surfing the indie web. It’s still so new to me I can’t shut the fuck up about it. You’ll have to excuse me, because before that, I spent a lot of time scrolling Reddit, YouTube, TikTok, big news publications, listening to big commercial podcasts and watching tv. I’ve been on Mastodon for a few years and Lemmy for the last year or two. Those two sites were really my only exposure to the indie web, and even then most of the stuff being shared is the same stuff you’d find on Twitter or Reddit, bar crypto currency nonsense and other celebrity techbro junk.
Saturday, June 29, 2024
As someone who grew up during the golden age of digital piracy, I’m 100% sure records really do sound better than MP3s. Sure there’s lossless audio too, but we stream everything now and the quality is really only as good as your internet connection. Streaming is convenient; I’m not going to carry a suitcase record player with me in the car, but it does feel good to actually own your favorite albums instead of only streaming them.
Thursday, June 27, 2024
This could totally be a quote from some sappy movie or a self-help book maybe, I’m not sure. But I went to a funeral a few months ago and saw a lot of family I’d distanced myself from over the years. Not because of something crazy that happened, or a political disagreement or anything like that; I’ve just never been much for sticking around family just because they’re your family.
Sunday, June 23, 2024
I’m not one of the cool people who were on the Fediverse before the big Twitter exodus of 2022.
When Elon took over, I was one of many who mourned the death of Twitter and moved on to a better place: Mastodon. It was such a refreshing change of pace.
Thursday, June 20, 2024
I’m a winter person. Snow is beautiful. Sun burns are not. Every year when the heat gets unbearable, I fantasize about moving to Alaska. My girlfriend unfortunately doesn’t share this dream with me.
Monday, June 10, 2024
When I stop at the gas station or the grocery store after work I’m in my full salesguy attire: a long sleeve oxford, usually black or grey slacks and black leather dress shoes with the little strip of fake wood around the heel. People call me “sir” and look at me like I have my shit together. I absolutely do not, but I guess the clothes really do make the man 🤨