Quick Thoughts

Shorter than a blog post.

πŸ“· Micro.Blog April Photo Challenge #6: Windy. Steady breeze at Ryan’s lacrosse game this afternoon.

American flag on a flag pole blowing in the wind with a blue sky.

New women’s basketball fans who’ve been following Caitlin Clark are about to discover that undefeated, #1 South Carolina has flown under the radar this season because they don’t have one star player, they have nine. Will be a great game on Sunday. Looking forward to it. πŸ€

πŸ“· Micro.Blog April Photo Challenge #5: Serene. Calming green tea, after a Gamecock victory. On to the championship.

Green tea bag steeping in a South Carolina Gamecocks mug.

πŸ“· Micro.Blog April Photo Challenge #4: Foliage. The Horseshoe at the University of South Carolina.

The Horseshoe at the University of South Carolina

Remember when you had to manually set the RAM limits on old versions of the Mac? Microsoft may be bringing it back for Edge.

πŸ“· Micro.Blog April Photo Challenge #3: Card. Ace of Spades.

Ace of spades on a table

Panera closed an old location near us and built a brand new building. We ate at the new location tonight. It’s nice, but is significantly smaller, has kiosks for ordering, a drive thru, pick up area and outdoor seating. It seems like a post-COVID design, with less emphasis on being a community space and more focus on ordering ahead and picking up to-go orders.

πŸ“· Micro.Blog April Photo Challenge #2: Flowers. My wife’s amazing new sunflower tattoo, by Carly at Ophidian Tattoo in Columbia, SC.

Sunflower tattoo on a woman's forearm

πŸ“· Micro.Blog April Photo Challenge #1: Toy. A vintage Micro Machine. Tiny, but with tons of detail.

Yellow Trans Am Micro Machine

Is it just me or are people and companies extra April Foolsy this year? Sigh

I just added another retro tech shirt on Cotton Bureau: 1.2 MB: The 5.25 in floppy disk.

A red shirt with a 5.25 inch floppy disk.

I’m not sure how I feel about the Canva acquiring Affinity. They were both battling Adobe, but their products are very different.

Was changing the battery in my wife’s Buick Envision and couldn’t figure out how to release a box on top of the battery. Finally watched a YouTube video and figured out where the hidden latch was. Another win for YouTube how-to. Battery replaced.

The Dunkin’ Donuts near our house is closed for remodeling. While it does look a little dated, the real reason for the remodel is trying to accommodate the massive volume of DoorDash and other delivery services that flood the location with orders. The physical space needs to be renovated to accommodate a cultural shift toward delivery services.

Spending my evening sitting on the back deck with a glass of bourbon, grilling hamburgers and writing. It’s a little bit cool, but I can’t complain. πŸ₯ƒπŸ”πŸ’»

Our local minor league team, the Columbia Fireflies announced an alternate identity… the Carolina Grits. This is in addition to their La Copa de la DiversiΓ³n look, the Chicharrones de Columbia. One alternate is fun… two might be overkill. Minor league teams will do anything to sell merch, though.

After all the upsets yesterday, I was surprised to see my ESPN bracket is in good shape. My entire Elite 8 is intact, I’m at 96.1% among the ESPN brackets and first in my office pool. Not too bad for someone that didn’t watch a lot of men’s basketball this season. πŸ€

Liz and I walked a couple miles in the park behind our house. Everything is starting to turn green. The birds are out in force. And the pollen. Springtime in South Carolina.

Image of a creek with trees reflected in the water.

I’ve gotten back into designing shirts and I’m sharing them on Cotton Bureau. Today’s shirt is a salute to the 3.5 inch floppy disk. As a student, I swear I could fit an entire semester worth of work on one of these.

Grey shirt with a black 3.5 inch floppy disk.

As a creative person, your job should not be your sole creative outlet. Even if you work at the coolest design firm in the world, you still have clients and deadlines. Maintaining personal creative outlets is a key to remaining creatively fulfilled.

More car manufacturers are showing interest in developing less expensive electric vehicles. This report from Ford caught my eye. I saw an old Ford Ranger on the road the other day and commented that they don’t make small trucks like that any more. A small EV pickup would be a great option to have.

Green beer for St. Pats at Craft and Draft in Irmo, SC. πŸ€

Green beer on a wooden table.

A new BBQ restaurant opened nearby and I was excited to try it. My wife and I ate lunch there today and it was terrible. Really terrible. I’m so disappointed.

Started writing a blog post about how local call-in radio shows are just like modern social media. And then, I remembered that I already wrote a post about this over a year ago.

On April 8, a solar eclipse will occur over the middle of the United States. If you are going to be near it this time and want to celebrate the occasion, I updated my shirt from the 2017 eclipse and you can buy it on Cotton Bureau. But order soon to make sure it gets to you before the big day.

Image of a black shirt with a stylized eclipse corona and date of the next solar eclipse.

Watching an old episode of MacGyver where he’s trying to find a crashed experimental aircraft, the GX-1. The GX-1 is an F-14 and the aerial combat footage was lifted straight from Top Gun. Also, the Russians have a psychic.

I put Jump Around on my grad school study playlist. Good choice, although it’s impossible not to dance when it comes on.

The South Carolina women had a buzzer beater yesterday. I was waiting for a take out order at a Chinese restaurant and following along in Apple Sports on iOS. The time went to 0:00 and assumed they’d lost. Then, a second later, the score changed. When I saw the replay, I realized the shot was taken right before the clock hit zero, and went in the basket after time expired. So Apple Sports was showing it as it happened. Pretty impressive.

South Carolina Women’s Basketball goes to 31-0 on a last-second three pointer by Kamilla Cardoso. Her first made triple of her college career. Incredible.

The Rivian R3 looks exactly like what I’m looking for… And by the time it comes out, I should be in the market for an electric car.