The Art Of Not Asking Why

You know, my Leuchtturm 1917 journal makes me miss my digital Emacs journal.

I had a good talk with a good friend yesterday, and I wanted to make a note of it. I looked over to my left, where my hand-written journal was stashed in my leather bag. I’d have to get up, stop my work, sit down, take it out, take out a pen, put in today’s date, and start writing. Laziness, yes, but also a different mindset than that I was in. I was also thinking about referencing this conversation for the future, which is something I’d probably like to do.

The index at the start of the Leuchtturm is slowly getting out of hand. I have too many entries under the letter N, and they’re starting to bleed into the M and O categories. I can go to another page, starting a fresh one just because of N, where the other letters (which I will need to specify again in a blank page for the index) will likely remain empty for a very long time, if not forever since I’ll finish with the notebook before I have to reference more words under those forgotten letters.

I also don’t like writing the date twice: once for the entry I’m about to write and once at the top, where the notebook has a dedicated space for the date. This is where I write the date range for the entries on the page. For example, say I wrote something two days ago, on 2024-04-07, and today I sit down to write, and the date is 2024-04-09. I’d write today’s date, 2024-04-09, as a title and write the entry, and then at the top of the page, in blue ink, I’d write 2024-04-07/09. The date and the index are specific Leuchtturm issues I didn’t have with the Moleskine.

Then there are the other issues that never really went away: my arm will start hurting if I write for more than 15 minutes or so, and I also have to write slowly, which sometimes works for form my thoughts, but at other times, I just want to write fast for quick notes.

Lack of friction is important when you want to note things down. On Emacs, this is the most seamless process I’ve ever known: one second I’m working on a project; the next, with a quick keystroke, I’m capturing a thought. When done, that thought is automatically saved into a journal file with today’s date, week, and year. Easily searchable, safe (safer than the written journal), and readable.

There’s a lot of value in writing by hand too, benefits I rediscovered. Slowing down to capture the important thoughts is important. Working with ink if more intimate and captures feelings better. There’s also something about printing little images and taping them into the pages with a small descriptive note that says something.

It doesn’t surprise me that I’m here again. I knew I’d find myself sitting down and writing about how I miss my digital journal, and then, probably soon, I’ll switch back. But I always find it weird that I can’t make up my mind.

I’m having thoughts about returning to Emacs for my journaling. I used to journal more, and it’s so easy to connect to events and copy-paste relevant things; even images are simpler without printing. Mehh.

I respect folks who choose to have monogamous relationships just as they respect my non-monogamy. But I do wonder at times, how many just default to monogamy (and usually marriage + kids) not because it’s a choice, but because “that’s how it is”? Not exactly stuff you learn at school, you know? 🤔

Watched Bill Burr Answers The Web’s Most Searched Questions the other day, one thing led to another, and now I’m watching The Mandalorian for the first time. Enjoying it. This is the way.

This morning, I looked into improving the quality of compressed videos while keeping the file size down. I went into a ffmpeg rabbit hole for almost two hours. I didn’t know of “-present” for example, or the fact that ffmpeg still uses h264 by default, where you can specify h265… 🧠 🤓

It’s not the first (or second) time I hear good things about Kagi. I tried it myself, and I ran out of searches quickly because I used it on my work browser, and I do research all the time.

Friendship Ended With GOOGLE Now KAGI Is My Best Friend

The nicest thing I can say about Kagi is that it has fully faded into the background of my life, and that I do not really realize or think about the fact that I am using Kagi. I mean this in a good way. 

Another little gem I’ve been using for a while: org-toggle-narrow-to-subtree. I added an explanation to my emacs config:

Macro I created to focus on projects (headers in org-mode) that gets everything else out of the way. The idea is simple: when standing on a sub-header (in my case, this is usually level three. For example, I’m standing on “pay electric bill” in: * Personal > ** ACTIVE pay bills > ***TODO pay electric bill), jump to its parent (in this example, “pay bills”) and narrow. When running again, expand it back. This is working by using org-toggle-narrow-to-subtree. Very useful when working in a buffer with several projects.

(fset 'jr-project-focus
   (kmacro-lambda-form [?\C-c ?\C-u ?\C-c ?n] 0 "%d"))

I might have a flashy MacBook Pro for work and a Desktop with Windows installed to play the latest and greatest. But Linux feels like home. It’s the one place where I feel I can really do whatever I want, however I want. Everything else is an extended loan.

• Morning thoughts over coffee

Expensive dinner yesterday, but I can look at it and say, “It’s just money.” There were periods in my life when someone told me “It’s just money,” and I looked back at them with jealousy and irritation. I remember what it was like, glad I’m not at this point.

I had a lot of things to say about the AI boom as Wikipedia calls it (I agree). It was mostly a devil’s advocate kind of post, 3000 words long. You know what? I don’t want to post it. What is it going to do besides piss off those on the bandwagon anyway? I’m done with flamewars, one way or another.

Oxygen Not Included, aka ONI, is an amazing game I immediately recommend to anyone who likes thinking/managing games. It is made by Klei Studios, the masterminds who made Don’t Starve and a couple of other such gems.

You start off with three cutely animated mini humans, called “dupes” from “duplicants” at the center of a randomly-generated asteroid. The game runs from a side angle, so it’s completely two-dimensional. But if you think if this sounds simple, dear friend, you’re in for a surprise.

The dupes need to eat, so you give them food from a little yellow box until it runs out. Meanwhile, as the day progresses, they need to go to the bathroom, so you need to build them some. To build stuff, you dig away at the asteroid, which is made of different materials such as sandstone, copper, and sand (depending on your biome, of which there are plenty). You quickly discover that not all places can be dug out and that some are blocked until one of the little guys becomes more proficient in digging. They squeak and talk and give high-fives to each other as they work and dig, and eventually need to go to bed, which you need to build for them, or they will sleep on the ground and will become “unrested,” one of the many conditions which they can develop. In the morning, you realize that because the dupes were using the bathroom without washing their hands, they became sick, and if they’re sick, they spread germs, which is a whole thing in itself, and then they can vomit, and if they vomit, there will be vomit all over your base, which will ooze away at your clean water supply, which…

Look, just trust me when I say what I described does not even scratch the basics of the game’s first hour.

Being an adorably animated game (they have all kinds of cute critters as well) is one area that makes this management game unique. Another area worth mentioning is the science behind it. So far, it’s the most science-like game I know that still keeps things interesting. It’s a delicate balance that breaks for me in other more sciency games, but this one keeps it just right.

For example, you can dig out coal in your asteroid, which you can use with a coal generator to produce electricity, but that means CO2 will mix with the oxygen, and if you have too little space for it in your base, it will eventually spread and choke up your dupes. The generator also heats the base, which will eventually cause plants to stop growing, which means you won’t have any food. To counter that, you can stash this generator somewhere far (but not too far because getting coal to it will become a problem, not to mention building power cables back and forth). But, because CO2 is heavier than oxygen, you can put it next to a dip hole in the ground, and it will fill it up steadily, pushing the oxygen up to your dupes. Later on you can build a gas pump to pump CO2 somewhere else where you can use it (or even dump it into the void of space if you’re an evil environmentalist)

And power is just one such example. I highlighted gas above (of which the game has about 20), and other similar complex systems including liquids (pipes, pumps, filters, and more), entertainment and moral (dupes can get depressed in the game), transportation, and more. All of these systems come with their own unique problems and solutions, which in turn cause other problems you didn’t predict, to which you need to find more solutions.

Lastly, I should also mention that this is one of the most well-maintained games I’ve ever played, and it is easily one of the best investments you can get out of a computer game. ONI came out in 2017, and 7 years later, there are still updates every month. These updates are not just bug fixes: there are new plot twists, more options to play the game, better UI, and more - and I’m not even mentioning the active modding community of this game. Keli Studios understands their audience is usually geeks, so they have the game natively support Linux on Steam (and, of course, macOS), where I spent much of my time playing it. So far, the only extra money I spenton its single DLC, Spaced Out. Worth every penny.

If you’re a geek—and if you’re reading this on my blog, you probably are—do yourself a favor and at least check this game out. It’s highly recommended.