With the July 4 holiday falling on a Tuesday, pretty much everyone at the office took Monday off. Except me. I’m holding down the fort tomorrow…
Made the jump to using the Tiny Theme. Still a lot of CSS tinkering to do, but happy so far. Added my fish logo to the top, updated the color scheme and switched some of the headers to one of the typefaces I designed. Thanks @Mtt for such great work on this theme.
Just took a walk on the trails behind our house for the first time in a couple of months. It’s a little tougher walk with Columbia, SC heat and humidity…
I’ve been trying to go to bed earlier. The result is that I am simply waking up earlier, which isn’t necessarily helpful.
On a road trip from Columbia to Durham yesterday, I drove on five different interstates… I-26 > I-20 > I-77 > I-85 > I-40.
While on a roadtrip to Asheville, NC this weekend, I was looking for what electric cars I’d see along the way. This weekend, in addition to a bunch of Teslas, I spotted two Rivian SUVs, a Kia EV6, a few Chevy Bolts and a Polestar 2. It’s the first time I’ve seen a Rivian R1S in person. Looked sharp.
View from a stoplight in Asheville, North Carolina.
I moved out of my cube today for a new office slightly closer to campus. And while I love my new office – the natural light is wonderful – I’m a little sad to see the old cube go. It’s amazing how a place can become so meaningful over time. Even a simple beige cube.
Saw this article in the NY Times about the Southern Baptist Convention kicking out a megachurch for ordaining women. We are ELCA Lutherans and my children have always had a woman as a pastor. So here’s a shoutout to Pastor Karen, Pastor Ginger and Pastor Joanna. I’m grateful that you have been able to be a positive presence for our family and thankful that the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America allows you to serve as you are called.
Havard Business Review with an interesting (academic) take about how developers should view the Apple Vision Pro:
Developers looking to profit off the platform Apple has created would do well to focus on applications that provide users with hard-to-access contextual information at just the right level of detail.
Got to work. Found out I grabbed the wrong laptop. Sigh.
Finally got a chance to watch the keynote and read the reactions of people who’ve tried the new Apple Vision Pro headset. Going into WWDC, I didn’t know if Apple could pull off the technology and I had no idea why I would use one. After reading everything, it sounds like they aced the tech, but I still don’t know why I’d use one.
I’m tired. But also, I can’t sleep. Sigh.
Months ago, I scheduled my daughter’s college orientation for tomorrow. Which means that instead of watching the Apple Keynote, I’ll be watching presentations about adjusting to college life.
Spending some time tonight thinking about my dissertation topic. Do I stick with the research topic that I’ve worked on for the last few years? Or venture out with a new topic? There are pros and cons to each approach. Just not sure what I want to do.
For a short week, it’s been a long week.
One of my favorite bakeries closed after a long successful run, but I found out yesterday that another wonderful bakery is taking over its location. They’ve been selling cakes at local markets and haven’t had a permanent space. It’s the circle of life, but for bakeries.
I’ve been to a lot of high school graduations over the years. And most of them aren’t great. They start late. The guest speakers and district officials give speeches that aren’t particularly inspirational. The student speakers share a bunch of inside jokes that make sense to a small slice of the graduating class. And they just last too long.
So while I was looking forward to my daughter’s graduation today, I wasn’t looking forward to the ceremony itself. (Not to mention the ceremony was held at 8 a.m. on a Wednesday morning.)
What I got instead was a delightful ceremony. It started right at 8:00. The student speakers did a wonderful job. They incorporated some meaningful traditions. The district superintendent delivered short and relevant remarks. The whole thing was done in 1.5 hours with around 350 students graduating. Everyone had their name read and crossed the stage. My daughter was happy and I was pleasantly surprised.
Our oldest graduated from high school today. Next stop, studying English at the University of South Carolina.
Hanging out on my deck after a long weekend of home improvements. Beautiful evening.
Saw this beautiful flower on campus yesterday.
You are currently being recorded.
Our neighbors installed a new security system a couple of weeks ago. When you walk anywhere near it – and that radius includes our driveway – a recording plays: “You are currently being recorded.”
We have great neighbors, but when I first heard it, I was a little annoyed. My wife was irritated, too. Every time we walked to our cars… “You are currently being recorded.”
A few days after this started, I was walking out to the car with my kids and the alarm system informed us that we were being recorded… and my 15-year-old daughter waived in the general direction of the camera, yelled “Hello camera” and got in the car. She repeats this greeting every day when she leaves for school, choosing to be amused instead of irritated.1
There are two lessons in this story:
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Don’t install a talking alarm system. It’s annoying. (My neighbor isn’t happy either. He says it is way too sensitive and goes off at the slightest movement.)
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We can choose to be amused instead of irritated. Sometimes, it’s best to greet the metaphorical camera and go on with your day.
Bob Wertz is a creative director, type designer, Ph.D. student and researcher living in Columbia, South Carolina.
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We asked our neighbor if the camera records audio. It doesn’t. Jill knows this. She says hello anyway. ↩︎
I’m really intrigued by Adobe’s approach to generative AI. Building AI tools that assist the process of creative development, but don’t seek to replace it. The Generative Fill feature that they are building into Photoshop looks seriously useful.