Weeknote #38 (20250608-20250614)

meta

Yet another “unprecedented times” kinda week, with running protests in LA and US Marines deployed on US soil. So exhausting.

did

  • Big whiplash feels, going from last week’s graduation positive vibes to this week’s …everything
  • Spent a lot of time at work this week working on Terraform stuff, and S3 bucket lifecycles — whee!
  • Tuesday was the tenth anniversary of the day I got half a kidney (and the tumor inside of it) cut out of me. A whole decade helping keep the average per capita kidney count under 2!
  • Got some new running shoes — Merrell Vapor Glove 6s, in the Granite/Tangerine colorway. I’ve only gone for one run in them, but my knees felt better, so I’m calling this a success
  • I updated all my static sites to 11ty v3.1.1, only to find a bug … which then got fixed!

exercise & shoulder recovery

  • Sunday: skipped everything, as family was leaving town in the morning
  • Monday: morning stretches, skipped afternoon run because hot af
  • Tuesday: morning stretches, afternoon gym (shoulder stuff, EZbar curls)
  • Wednesday: morning stretches, afternoon run (C25K W6D2)
  • Thursday: morning stretches, afternoon gym (shoulder stuff, Zottman curls)
  • Friday: morning stretches, skipped running because I was still sore
  • Saturday: skipped everything, whoops

read

  • I Think I’m Done Thinking About genAI For Now - you’ll almost certainly seen this linked …basically everywhere, I reckon? — but you should read it if you haven’t yet, it’s super

    In this particular instance, however, genAI has defeated me. I cannot make it make sense, but I need to stop thinking about it anyway. It is too much and I need to give up.

  • Trusting your own judgement on ‘AI’ is a huge risk — another one you’ve probably seen, but if you haven’t, worth a read:

    Self-experimentation is exactly how smart people get pulled into homeopathy or naturopathy, for example. It’s what makes them often more likely to fall for superstitions and odd ideas. The smart person’s self-identity means they can’t believe their own psychological biases are fooling them.

    Don’t self-experiment with psychological hazards! I can’t stress this enough!

  • Just fucking code.

    If you can’t invert a binary tree, why should you earn six figures? Your “no updates” report at standup provides zero fucking value to stakeholders. If you can’t fix the bug without opening ChatGPT, maybe it’s time to hang up the branded hoodie and bust out the bloody shovel.

    If you go home for the day because Anthropic’s API is down, maybe society isn’t willing to reward you with remote work and an oatmilk latte.

    Don’t ruin this job for me. My soft hands can’t go back to landscaping, you selfish bastard.

  • Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Aviation: this is maybe kinda niche in appeal, but if this type of stuff is entertaining to you, this blog post will leave you extremely entertained…

    • ADS-B messages only come from aircraft
    • ADS-B messages only come from aircraft and airport service vehicles
    • ADS-B messages only come from vehicles of some kind

  • Accountability sinks

    Once you start looking for accountability sinks, you see them all over the place. When your health insurance declines a procedure; when the airline cancels your flight; when a government agency declares that you are ineligible for a benefit; when an investor tells all their companies to shovel so-called AI into their apps. Everywhere, broken links between the people who face the consequences of the decision and the people making the decisions.

  • Getting Started with Notebooks

    Writing longhand is like taking your brain for a walk. It’s not going to turn you into the intellectual equivalent of an Olympic athlete, but going for a walk is much more beneficial than eating crisps on the sofa. Writing with a pen puts your brain in motion, and motion is lotion.

watched

  • Watched our Timbers eek out a 2-1 over SLC on Sunday; also watched parts of SEA-VAN (SEA eats two reds (arguably, a very soft second one), loses badly, goes further down relative to PDX? I’ll take that…) and LAFC-SKC (about as you’d expect given their standings)
  • More NCIS: New Orleans
  • Another Timbers match on Friday, this time against San Jose, ending with them snatching a tie out of the jaws of victory…

cooked

  • Monday: grilled chicken Caesar on Monday
  • Tuesday: grilled thick-cut bone-in pork chops, grilled corn, caprese salad,
  • Wednesday: grilled coulotte (aka picanha) steak, grilled asparagus

looking forward to

Next week I’m off Wednesday through Friday, really looking forward to that downtime