So, it’s done. I am at my low point of X usage. I’ve muted all but a handful of accounts (re-inventing lists in the process), and realized that I can do once-per-week wellness checks at most and not miss out on anything of importance. Now I only need to stop checking the Washington Post home page, and my media fast may begin.

I, for one, am still digesting Thursday’s dinner. There’s a reason why Thanksgiving is but once a year!

I reject the premise of this article, which ignores the option of talking to people’s face to face — the (actual, not stated) preferred communication method of every generation.

Last week was my 1-year anniversary using MarsEdit, and I feel not an iota of urge to switch to anything else for publishing. Now, if only there were a general-purpose editor that was as fast but that I could use as an nvAlt replacement. When is nvUltra coming out, again?

🗃️ Chris Aldrich’s advice on zettelkasten for course work applies to anyone who is just getting introduced to a new field:

A zettelkasten practice like that of Niklas Luhmann is more useful when one already has a strong lay of the land and they’re attempting to do the work of expanding on the boundaries of new areas of knowledge.

…

If you’re attempting to create 30 permanent notes a day and interlink them all, then you’re going to find yourself overworked and overwhelmed within just a few days.

This is why slip boxes get abandoned: not because they’re empty, but because they are full on unintelligible gunk. And doing it digital — looking at you, Obsidian and Roam — just makes it worse for those without discipline.

I am not a fan of legalese, but this case of typographic mischief was right up my alley. Just read the judge’s closing paragraph:

The Court further notes that the last thing any party needs is more words on a page. The length of an argument is no guarantee of its success, and indeed could result in more confusion, not clarity. Moving forward, the Parties are encouraged to spend their valuable time focusing on the merits of this case, and certainly not figuring out how many sometimes-useless words will fit on a page.

Words to live by! (ᔥMatthew Butterick, who was — no suprise there — involved in the case)

Bryan Vartabedian on the angry email:

The angry email is usually rooted in frustration over inefficiencies or some nagging problem that hasn’t been fixed. Ultimately, it’s about the fantasy of the willful imposition of change by the sender. […] The defining element of the angry email is that it’s ultimately regretted. Or it should be.

I’ve written thousands of angy emails in my head, a dozen or so on the computer, and sent zero to date. If there is a next one, I’ll write it in longhand.

Seth Godin on the amateur presenter:

If you’re called on to give a talk or presentation, the biggest trap to avoid is the most common: Decide that you need to be just like a professional presenter, but not quite as good. Being a 7 out of 10 at professional presenting is a mistake. Better to stay home and send a memo.

This is exactly what happened last month at that medical conference. Colleagues, please stop.

They are converting a modern office building into condos a few blocks down from my apartment, and by the looks of it they may as well have torn everything down and built it anew. I hope they will do that will all the brutalist federal garbage downtown, the FBI building first. Meanwhile, the late 19th-early 20th century townhouses scattered around DC have been switching seamlessly from commercial to residential and back for a hundred years now for little to no cost.

Optimization and scale: they work great, until they don’t. Just ask a salaried physician working for a conglomerate in the medical-industial complex, a large-scale operation which is being optimized to death (sadly not its own, but that of its component parts — patients and health care workers alike). All those large reptiles and mammals are extinct for a reason.

We discussed the problem of scale at the first RWRI I attended back in August 2020, the Beirut explosion still fresh in everyone’s mind. Less than a year later, a big ship blocked the Suez channel, as if to reinforce the message. I expect Nassim Taleb’s next book will have a chapter or three on the problem, even if “scale” doesn’t make it into the title.

What goes for biology, architecture, and logistics also goes for industry, and if there is one hyper-optimized massive-scale operation around, it’s Apple’s iPhone production. If and when its production chain comes toppling down, it will not be a black or a gray swan event, it will be snow-white, which is why I suspect (or, as an iPhone user, hope) they have contingencies.

And in practicing what I preach, I have slowly been transitioning away from GTD levels of hyper-productivity and into a 40,000 weeks mindset. Whether this is a sign of wisdom, experience, or just plain old age, well, who is to say? Why not all three?

The Benefits of Being a Young Mom:

My mom, who had me at 22, worked as a nanny for other people’s children when I was a baby, bringing me to work with her in St. Louis, where we were living so my dad could finish school. She had a few rules for kid-raising: no need to go to the doctor for most things (better to wait and see if a malady resolves on its own); a cardboard box from the garage makes for the most thrilling play; and babies can—and should—be brought practically anywhere.

I’m not a young mom, but I can vouch for the soundness of these rules. We did have our first child at an awfully young age for the East Coast (28–29!?)