I know I should probably vote early, but it’s my daughter’s first presidential election and I want her to have the full experience of going to the polls.
Quick Thoughts
Shorter than a blog post.
SEC football this season is incredible.
Went to the SC State Fair to see a giraffe.
Pluralistic: You should be using an RSS reader:
RSS basically works like social media should work. Using RSS is a chance to visit a utopian future in which the platforms have no power, and all power is vested in publishers, who get to decide what to publish, and in readers, who have total control over what they read and how, without leaking any personal information through the simple act of reading.
I really enjoy the Apple News+ game, Quartiles. It’s fun and challenging and I’ve started to mix it into my daily morning routine.
Got the email that my latest journal article was accepted for publication. I’ll soon have one more entry on my Google Scholar profile.
I bought my first Retro 51 pen at Origami Ink in Asheville, an amazing pen shop that was destroyed in the Hurricane Helene flooding. So when I saw that Retro 51 was offering a special edition to support Origami Ink, it was an instant purchase. Amazing pen. Cool design. Great cause.
Just found out that my favorite pen store in Asheville, Origami Ink, was completely destroyed in the flood. I assumed that was the case because they were located in Biltmore Village, but the owners posted an update today confirming the sad news. Such nice people. I’m devastated for them.
It’s funny to see how a post shows up when crossposting. In Micro.Blog, it’s a link with some tiny thumbnails. In Bluesky, a link with all four images. In Threads, a link with a preview, but the featured image is my Micro.Blog fish avatar.
In general, I avoid Twitter and Facebook. But Twitter is still useful for live sports. And Facebook is useful for checking on people after natural disasters.
Really enjoyed The Armageddon Protocol by Dan Moren. 📚
Expected Helene to be bad, but we don’t normally get hit this hard in Columbia. Lots of trees down and power outages across South Carolina.
For several reasons, I decided to work from home today. I know that many (most?) people love it, but I really, really don’t enjoy working from home.
The NY Times on the White Sox' historically bad season:
Baseball is a cruel game. Other sports cap your suffering at a reasonable number. In the N.F.L., the most games you could ever lose in a season is 17. In the N.B.A., you could theoretically lose 82. (The record is 73.) But baseball’s season is relentless: 162 games long… If you lose your grip, as the White Sox did immediately… you can fall through an eternal void of losing. And every day, in the middle of that falling, reporters will stick microphones in your face to ask you how it feels to be plunging through the eternal void.
Academics: A CV and resume are completely different things.
On their websites: “Click here to view my CV/Resume.”
Got a revise and resubmit with minor revisions on a journal article today. Excited to get this one out in the world. I wrote the paper for a Ph.D. class a couple of years ago, presented it at a conference and then improved the paper. Happy with how it’s turned out.
Today was my 10th race watching F1. I started with the Canadian Grand Prix. Since then, we’ve had 7 winners from 4 different teams. I think I picked the right time to start watching. What a fun sport. I’m hooked.
Blind copying people on emails is silly. There is really no good reason to do it.
ESPN is bringing Gameday to Columbia next weekend for South Carolina and LSU. Campus is going to be busy this week.
Great win for my Gamecocks today against Kentucky. The defense looks stout, even if the offense is a work in progress.
So I shipped a typeface a few months ago. And then today, I came across a new release with exactly the same name. I did all the searches I could do and thought it was in the clear. I’m sure they did the same… but it’s still a little disappointing.
Cooking some turkey breasts on my Weber Kettle tonight. I know it’s old school cooking with charcoal, but I really enjoy the process.
Today was terrible. Start to finish. Just rough. Tomorrow is a new day, but today’s going to stick with me.
Trying to troubleshoot cross posting to Threads from Micro.Blog. Was working fine… and then it wasn’t.
Because of an accident on the interstate, took the LONG way to work this morning, all back roads through the country. Including several roads that I never knew connected to each other. I made it to work eventually.
Hey @manton. FYI: Something is broken with Threads crossposting. I’m getting a “Threads: Error creating media container.” error in the logs when something tries to crosspost. (And Bluesky is working fine, so I don’t think it’s an issue with the post.) Happened a couple of times.
The For-Profit City That Might Come Crashing Down:
“We’re not crooks,” he told me. “We’re just guys trying to get something good done.” He said he was inspired to help found Próspera after reading Machiavelli’s writings on the impossibility of reforming a system from within.
A movement inspired by renowned do-gooder, Machiavelli. What could go wrong?
Harris Walz supporters should add the US Flag emoji to their social media bios. 🇺🇸🇺🇸 Partially to show support for freedom, but also to point out that there aren’t emoji for the Confederate flag, the Gadsden flag, the Trump flag or any of the other flags the far right prefers.
This week has been strangely draining. Not sure why…
Tucked in that Obama speech last night at the Democratic National Convention was a critique of social media culture. Just after the 26:00 mark. “We chase the approval of strangers on our phones.” He argues that social media divides us and makes us feel alone. Amazing speech, and worth a listen.