It’s been a week to digest the election results and… they’re not really sitting any better for me than they were a week ago when they were fresh. Continue reading “On the struggle bus”
What a legacy
I’ve never met my wife’s father. Frank passed away long before we met, in the early 90s when she was still a teenager. Yet, I feel like I know him, admire him, and would have really enjoyed having a relationship with him. Continue reading “What a legacy”
Splitting sites
Today, I surgically removed zonker.net from WordPress.com and co-hosting with Dissocated Press to have a cleaner split between personal and “professional” topics. The next step will be figuring out what blogging software I want to use for Dissociated Press for the next 20 years or so and start self-hosting it again as well.
I don’t do a lot of blogging on Dissociated Press these days, since I spend most of my time writing about open source for LWN.net, but I’ve never been 100% comfortable mingling personal topics with posts meant for a much wider audience. Not that Dissociated Press gets millions of page views, but…
Anyway, I hope to pick up the pace of blogging here about random things that don’t fit for LWN.net and are too long or less ephemeral than what I put up on Mastodon.
Switched to ClassicPress
Have updated the site to ClassicPress using the migration plugin. As far as I can tell, no problems. Please leave a comment if something is terribly broken. Or even a little bit broken.
Latest books: Midnight in Chernobyl, Red Team Blues, and more
We’re nearly three months down for 2024, and I’m still sticking with my resolution to spend less time watching stuff on streaming and more time reading. So far, that’s going pretty well. Since the last update, I’ve finished eight books. Continue reading “Latest books: Midnight in Chernobyl, Red Team Blues, and more”
2024’s reading list, so far…
So far this year, I’ve actually been sticking with my resolution to read more, so I thought I’d share what I’ve read so far with some thoughts on each title. It’s been a good year for fiction with a decent helping of Terry Pratchett, Martha Wells, and Maria Vale. Trying to balance that out with non-fiction, with mixed results. Continue reading “2024’s reading list, so far…”
“Now and Then,” the last (?) Beatles single drops
I’ve been a Beatles fan since I was 7, nearly 50 years now. There’s only two Beatles songs I that I actively don’t like* and then the rest of the catalog I love.
Sometimes it takes me a few listens to get into a song, even some of my favorite artists. I love Aimee Mann, but I had to come back to The Forgotten Arm for a few extra listens before it really grabbed me. It’s never been that way with The Beatles. Maybe because I got into them so young, but they’ve always just felt like home.
When they released “Free As A Bird,” and “Real Love” in the 90s, they instantly grabbed me and felt like Beatles songs. I had a frisson of joy the first time I heard them, the same tingles I got the first time I heard “Help!” when I was 7 and was an instant fan.
“Now and Then” … didn’t do that. I was open and hoping, but to my aging ears it just doesn’t sound like The Beatles.
But I’m glad they tried. I’m not cynical about it. Better, IMO, that they tried and if it does give other fans the same joy as other Beatles songs then that’s awesome.
* (“Revolution 9” which IMO doesn’t even count as a song, and “You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)” because it’s just so low-effort and dumb.)
Today’s Read: Exit, Voice, Loyalty, Neglect
Caught this on HN. “Exit, Voice, Loyalty, Neglect: Why People Leave, Stay, or Try to Burn It All Down,” by Brett & Kate McKay.
The exit, voice, loyalty, neglect (EVLN) framework will help you understand why people stay in or leave a relationship (including friendships), why people stay in or leave a job, why people stay in or leave a church, and many more of life’s interpersonal and institutional dynamics.
Definitely worth a read. I don’t agree with everything here but I think it’s a great starter point for discussions.
My observation is that people often use their voice when they are invested and want a situation to work. You’ve worked at Acme Corp for seven years, most of the time it’s been good. You like your job and co-workers, but growth and management changes have taken a toll. So you start speaking up trying to make things better. That is loyalty. Loyalty isn’t passive acceptance or blind hope that things will get better if someone else makes changes.
What this calls “loyalty” I’d call apathy, inertia, or lack of agency. “Things were good once, they will be again, so I can just wait it out.”
And neglect isn’t the same thing as “burn it down,” IME. I’ve seen both. Maybe it needs a section on sabotage…
Prolly going to write something longer on this for Dissociated Press when I have the time. A bit backlogged there.
Why I’m going to stop saying “I don’t like people”
I often say that “I don’t like people,” but I realized recently that it’s something that I really need to stop saying. Not least of which because it’s not really true. Continue reading “Why I’m going to stop saying “I don’t like people””
Cupcake has opinions
Cupcake is our resident movie critic. I don’t think she cared for tonight’s movie.