Today’s News Minimalist email reads, and I am not paraphrasing:
Today ChatGPT read 1003 top news stories. After removing previously covered events, there are 2 articles with a significance score over 7.
That is, according to ChatGPT, there are only two significant news today. We are beating yesterday, thought. Yesterday there were none.
Kim loves to buy plants, or she will gladly take them from people giving them away for various reasons. That’s the extent of her “green thumb”. Plants commonly perish under her “care”. She tries, though, but often is not to be. It’s rather sad.
Then she makes me feel guilty when she asks, “Have you watered my plants?” Like, really?! 😅
I have a strong dislike for Crocs—the plastic shoes, that is. I believe it is based solely on their shape/form. Do that makes me a bad person?
This weekend I mowed the backyard twice, yesterday and today. Between biking, and mowing, I surpased 10,000 steps each day. That equates to over 8 kilometres per day. I am tired, but feel good. Kind of weird, but true.
With so many disasters around the globe, so many conflicts, every little bit helps to bring sustainment to those in need. Anyone can do that, through Red Cross, for as little as $10.
The American Red Cross shelters, feeds and provides comfort to victims of disasters; supplies about 40% of the nation’s blood; teaches skills that save lives; distributes international humanitarian aid; and supports veterans, military members and their families. The Red Cross is a nonprofit organization that depends on volunteers and the generosity of the American public to deliver its mission.
Please, considering donating to the Red Cross, and/or the International Committee of the Red Cross.
I am totally in love with Japanese woodblock prints. If it weren’t because my taste and Kim’s collide, I would have them framed around the house, and I would collect them.
Last week I spent 11h 21m screen time on all my devices (a Mac, and an iPhone). The tally goes: 6h 57m on iPhone, 6h 38m on Mac. That’s just macOS and iOS “vanilla” apps almost exclusively. Most macOS apps do not get recorded—perhaps because my Mac runs macOS Monterey. For example, I spend a lot of time on Teams, Chrome, and iTerm2 under macOS during work days, but none of it gets recorded.
A gas station offering a receipt after pumping, and then never providing it and showing a “Please see attendant” message drives me nuts. JUST STOP OFFERING RECEIPTS!
This specific one I use, because it is closer to home, does the same in all pumps—yes, I tried them all to see, on different occasions, of course. Ugh!
I have added a subtle way to provide feedback here, using the very easy to setup, simple, and awesome Tinylytics. Now that I have done it, I am having second thoughts. Do I really want it? I sure don’t know, so they (blue hearts) are here now, but they might not be tomorrow. Yeah, true ambivalence.
Update: 21:21
Feedback is anonymous. I see the same as you see: a number next to the emoji, nothing else. If you have JavaScript disabled you see nothing, and so do I.
Just watched “The Hunt” (★★★★). Though good, that was one upsetting movie—to the point that if it weren’t because I was watching it with the kid, I would have stopped seeing it. Was he believed, and fully accepted back? Think twice.
Does Safari has an offline mode (like Firefox, for example)? No.
By now it is settled that I love fonts. My thoughts have rambled around the topic more than once; my font collection is now at 1102. It might be surprising and, perhaps, inaccurate to say—because I am always discovering new ones that I like—but as of today, my first favourite (and the one currently in use here until further notice) is “IBM Plex Sans”, followed by “Inter”.
Came back from riding the bike with dad. Told Kim we rode around 5 kilometres. “Riding on the road is dangerous!” — she says. “We rode on sidewalks.” “It is dangerous” — she repeats, “Please, don’t do it again.”
Yet, if I don’t do it, she will say “You are too sedentary, need to move more.” Damned if I do, damned if I don’t. 😂
Haven’t played Diablo IV the whole week. Way too busy at work, and I have gone biking each day afterwards, and ended up too tired for anything else. Maybe I’ll play a bit tonight, after the TV is left alone. Right now some Chinese drama plays, I can hear it from the office room.
If you are running iOS 17 (beta, or final, when it comes out next week), and you don’t see “Live Voicemail” under “Settings → Phone”, change your language to “English US”. “Live Voicemail” is only available on that one, for now.
I truly don’t like Outlook, the program that runs on your computer, which started as a mail client, and now wants to do everything, and does it badly. I use it in a Windows VDI for work purposes, because there is no other practical choice. One of the things—amongst the many—that irks me about it is the “Remove extra line breaks in plain text messages” option enabled by default. That’s because—yes, you guessed it—I compose my emails in plain text.
It is simply amazing the amount of high quality, instructive videos, available on YouTube. Most are curiosities, to see how things are made, or to experience how someone else does it. And that’s just scratching the surface just a millimetre—which, in inches, is some other number.
I just got my chores handed to me, so I must hurry up to beat the rain and bike, and then rush home, shower, and get to chop, chop, chop!
If only I was a Horse, and not a Monkey! Damn you, opposable thumbs! 😂
“Their (Beijing’s) policy has been to reunite Taiwan with China. From their standpoint, maybe it is analogous to Hawaii or something like that, like an integral part of China that is arbitrarily not part of China mostly because … the U.S. Pacific Fleet has stopped any sort of reunification effort by force,” he said.
That guy sure is an arsehole.
About iOS 17 relase on 18 September, make sure to turn off the betas (thanks George!) if you participated. Simply go to “Settings → General → Software Update → Beta Updates”. and turn it off.
I found Webgbcam while browsing Javier’s posts, and I am in love with it! The good thing about pixels is they stretch nicely, and they conceal. A lot! LOL.
As Javier says it (translating it from Spanish), “a website to take selfies in the traditional way: with a Game Boy Camera”.
➝ Via Javier.computer.
Sometime in the very near future I am going to move my Mastodon instance to a new hardware. When that happens, there are two possible outcomes: it is successful, or it isn’t. If it isn’t I am going to be in whole lot of pain. Will keep a “glass half full” mentality for now.
Today was a bad day. Not horrible, as I am alive, but bad. Other than being pretty busy at work, juggling a couple of things that aren’t going the right way, I am having a pain on my neck, extending to my upper back—probably just neck pain, that’s been felt further from it—that’s driving nuts.
Will bike before it rains, and then take a very hot back to see if that makes me feel better.
Such pity to read hateful people’s comments making fun, poking jokes at the new iPhone—I have found them on Reddit, and Mastodon, so far—when they live their sad, pathetic days, with that aberration of an OS that is Android on theirs. Interesting thing is, I have never gone bashing at “the other phones”; it’s always “them” coming to bash iPhones. For me that’s telling.
Kim has a problem with the pace at which I eat. She thinks—kind of rightfully so—that I eat too fast. “Slow down, enjoy the food!”, she tells me. The truth is, I am enjoying it! That’s just the way I do it.
I have tried to slow down my pace, but she still thinks it is too fast. I like my meal hot. If I were to slow down and eat like she does, I would be eating cold food. Yuck! In social gatherings though, I suffer a bit, and slow down to the group’s pace. After all, I truly am not a neanderthal!
My take aways from the Apple Event:
Charles Chaplin’s movie “The Great Dictator” (★★★★½) final speech is uplifting, and remains as relevant today (for better or worse), as it was then. That makes me feel sad, but time is on our side.
To those who can hear me, I say: do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed—the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish…
The entire transcript is available at his website. I think it’s worth reading.
That far away thundering, and the constant notifications on the Weather app of an impending rain are such a tease! High temps today were 33°C, and currently it is still 29°C. And yes, no rain. Pff!
Update: 21:15
Well, I’d be damned! It is raining right now, with thundering and lightnings, all with a strong wind as if a tornado were nearby.
“Going to mum’s to eat whatever ông (dad) cooked for me.” I tell Kim. “Wish me luck!”
Update: 20:02
Meal was very good! He made sweet sticky rice, and shredded lemongrass chicken. That, and a beer, completed dinner for me today. Stuffed!
At which point a seemingly neverending web page will take too long to load—or it will stutter? I am currently paginating at 80 notes per page, but the original (which entised me to start “Notes”) sets no limit. I figure it will be limited by the operating system, or web browser, or by processor and memory constrains. Or all of the above.
I don’t think Kim Jong Un likes to air travel very much (or at all), and as he doesn’t go places that aren’t connected through land mass, he uses an armoured(!) train instead. He is travelling to meet Putin as I type this.
It is rumoured to include at least 20 bulletproof cars, making it heavier than average trains and unable to go beyond 59 km/h (37mph). His journey to Vladivostok is expected to take an entire day.
I wondered why was a train picked as the preferred travel method (it was such curiosity what brought me here to type this note), and Wikipedia provided a suitable, logical explanation.
I can’t believe that it has already been 22 years since the 11 September terrorist attacks. I remember seeing the one on the Twin Towers as it was happening on TV; we all stopped working, and watched in disbelief. I will never forget.
This thing is delicious, and thus very habit forming. I can’t stop eating little pieces of it. The packing description reads “Cơm Cháy Nước Mắm Chà Bông” (Vietnamese), which translates to “Burnt Rice With Fish Sauce”.
Its ingredients are listed as “crispy rice, pork floss, fish sauce, sugar, soybean oil, and chilly”. All I read is yummy! 🤤
And thus, as it came in a whisper, it leaves us the same: weekend is no more. Yet fret not, as it shall come once more just five days from now. Again, and again, and again… Time’s a show in a loop, just enjoy the ride!
TIL that there are around 12kg of gold, and 21kg of silver in 4.2 cubic kilometres of seawater. You can read more about it and, at the same time, learn why the ocean is salty.
➝ Via Hacker News.
This is a good read. The OP makes sure the preamble is set before stating very valid points.
I am a designer because I want to solve problems. I want people to be less frustrated when they use technology. I want to make their lives easier. I don’t want to make anyones life more difficult. These two sentiments sound the same, but they are not. I find both are important to consider.
While driving around the city, or parking, I encounter pretty interesting things that people place on their cars. Normally I don’t take photos of them, but today’s was too funny to pass. 🤣
