Self-driven.
Reading
How to Take Smart Notes
Sönke Ahrens
versenotes
And one more: Nehemiah is now complete in my Chapter By Chapter series.
It continues to weird me out that Ezra just pops in to Nehemiah’s book, just as Haggai and Zechariah to do Ezra.
Esther is next. I’ve written a lot about Esther …
versenotes
Finished another one today: Ezra is now complete in my Chapter By Chapter series.
Something new I noticed when reading Ezra so carefully is that it’s as much about rebuilding the exiles into the people of God as it is about rebuilding a city …
fiction
What that Aprille with His Slithy Toves
Some years ago, my brain—unbidden—committed an act of literary vandalism and produced the following. Apologies to… everybody.
Whan that Aprille with his slithy toves
The droghte of March hath perced to the borogoves,
And bathed every veyne in …
fiction
Fiction: Vision
My sister, aptly blogging at @QuilledSister, writes short stories on her blog. Read her stories; they’re wonderful. Every so often one of them lodges in my imagination and sends me wandering down a side path of my own. This is one of those …
Adding an "Open Terminal Here" Button to Finder
I often find myself wanting to open a terminal in the directory I’m staring at in the Finder.
I usually drag folders (or their proxy icons) onto the Terminal, or I type cd and drag into an existing terminal window1.
But today it occurred to me …
fiction
Fiction: The Lay of the First Pouring
(In collaboration with @QuilledSister; she titled this Keening)
“The song one!”
“Oh but you’ve already heard that one.”
“Tell us again!”
“Yeah, yeah, we want to hear it again!”
The four …
Exercising An LLM Wiki
I’ve been playing with a Codex-assisted LLM Wiki in Obsidian for a week or so.
Today it got its first serious exercise helping me plan for tomorrow’s VerseNotes office hours about Jesus as the firstborn, and it smashed it.
It started from …
Back in San Antonio again.
Apparently my hotel room came with a balcony.
If only it were cool enough to sit outside.
books
Brimstone (Callie Hart)
Finished reading: Brimstone by Callie Hart 📚
Look, the special girl gets more special!
Seriously, Hart’s worldbuilding and storytelling are massively improved from the first book, and this is a worthy read. (I really want to know who the Hazrax is, …
books
Finished reading: Cursed by Benedict Jacka 📚
Jacka continues to write fun urban fantasy with a little noir detective thrown in.
My unfamiliarity with London geography continues to make some of this series hard to follow, and the characters don’t see …
Day One AI-Guided Journaling: Good, Not Great
I tried Day One’s “Chat About Your Day” feature today. It’s a conversation about your day, where each turn is a little prompt, rather than a blank journal page.
It went well.
The prompts were very scope limited, encouraging short replies, and they …
photos
Afternoon hike at Ghost Falls trail down in Draper.
Three round trips in twelve days (San Antonio, Huntsville, DC) means I need to take every opportunity I have to get outside while I’m here.
Hop Skud and a burrito bowl at Free Roam in Boerne.
I don’t miss much about Texas, but Torchy’s is very high on the list.
Specifically, the brushfire tacos that were tonight’s dinner and which I can still taste.
Also high on that list: HEB. Other grocery stores should send ambassadors to HEB like …
books
Finished reading: The Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden 📚
I finished this years ago, but apparently didn’t blog about it.
This third book takes the calm dark winter fairy tale of the first two books and turns it into an action movie that …
books
Finished reading: The Enchanted Greenhouse by Sarah Beth Durst 📚
A worthy follow-up to The Spellshop, about Caz’s creator continuing her forbidden magic. Sort of.
I like this world, and I enjoyed seeing another part of it. Felt a bit long in places, …
First session back on the yoga mat after a three-week business travel extravaganza (I am so tired) was brutal.
books
Finished reading: The Lake House by Sarah Beth Durst 📚
Not sure what I thought I was getting—something like The Spell Shop, probably—but this is not that.
Three teenage girls go to a summer camp, but when they arrive, it’s been burned down, the …
books
Finished reading: Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson 📚
Outrageously detailed, as usual for Isaacson, with all kinds of facts and stories I’d never heard, despite having visited Milan’s da Vinci museum.
Highly recommended, with the caveat that, …
books
Finished reading: Quicksilver by Callie Hart 📚
A quick read with faeries and vampires and magic and gods.
Checks the romantasy boxes: brooding hero, gorgeous magical special girl, companions on both sides.
Some rough prose, but if you don’t expect …
books
Finished reading: Twelve Months (The Dresden Files, #18) by Jim Butcher 📚
A fun palate cleanser. Important plots move forward. A few important bits of lore get revealed. Nothing gets quite enough attention. (Dresden and Lara could have used an …
Suddenly it’s winter again in Denver.
Maybe it’s a good thing we brought our skis after all…
These thoughts from Thought Shrapnel are in conflict:
a Japanese farmer who rediscovered the old ways, and paying more attention to the seasons
and
Essentially, everything is emergent, and all your brain is doing is making links between things. …
Brazilian sandwich for lunch at The Garage Food Hall before my flight out.
Today’s LinkedIn CrossClimb puzzle used “Patriarch in the book of Exodus” as a clue for MOSES.
Quick, name any descendant of Moses.