I’ve gotta share with you one of the small changes that my wife and I made to our home that’s had a far outsized effect on our wellbeing. A life hack, if you will. It’s to turn off your microwave.

Well, not quite turn it off. But turn off two specific functions of it. First, turn off its clock display. Second, turn off its ability to beep.

Turn off the clock

Do you really need another appliance clock in your kitchen? The stove has one, your coffee maker has one. Even your fridge might have a clock on it these days. And that’s not even considering smart displays, the smartphone in your pocket, watch on your wrist, or actual clocks on the wall. If you can, I say choose only one to keep going. The rest, turn off if you can — and if you can’t, set it to a wildly different time and then never think about it again.

It’ll be at least one fewer clocks to set when the time springs forward and falls back each year. One fewer clock to dial in after a power outage. One fewer clock to try (and fail) to keep in sync with the countless other timekeepers in your house.

Personally, I like fewer things on my to-do list.

Turn off the sound

My wife gets all the credit for this one. For as long as we’ve been together, she’s loathed letting the microwave get to the end of its cooking cycle and sound the alarm that the food is done. The loud beeps that go on for way too long were personally offensive to her. So when she used the microwave, she stayed on alert waiting for the time to tick down toward zero, and then she’d manually stop it with one or two seconds remaining. All in the service of fewer shrill beeps.

When we eventually bought a new microwave in one of our moves, I happened to be riffling through the manual and saw a section about changing its options, including how to turn off the beeps. It made the microwave completely silent — no beeps when it’s done and no beeps on each press of its buttons. I earned some Good Husband Points that day as I banished those beeps from our life.

If you’re worried about forgetting about food in the microwave because there’s no alarm, well, that’s not been a problem for us. The only downside is that, although I eliminated having to reset its clock, now I need to go through those options to turn off the beeps after every power outage.

Give it a shot! A quick internet search for your microwave’s model name and the word “manual” should bring up a PDF of that instruction booklet you assuredly discarded long ago. But there could be some life-changing stuff in there.

This is post #23/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Tips Blaugust

A weekly list of interesting things I found on the internet, posted on Monday (this time). Sometimes themed, often not.

1️⃣ If you read my site, I think there’s a good chance that you also listen to a Relay podcast. They just celebrated 10 years as a network, and this is a touching short film about the hosts and community during their 10th anniversary live show in London. [🔗 _IanOfEarth // youtube.com]

2️⃣ Everyone was right, the Twenty Thousand Hertz episodes exploring Apple’s iconic sound design are excellent. [🔗 The Sound of Apple // 20k.org]

3️⃣ Joshua Grady has a great tip for keeping web apps on your phone without needing to keep their icons on your Home Screen. [🔗 @joshuagrady // social.lol]

4️⃣ Yikes. Prepare yourself for the photorealistic AI generation revolution that’s coming. [🔗 @chriswelch // threads.net]

5️⃣ The thing that kept sticking out to me during this amazing video about the GameBoy’s engineering is that their pursuit of making it affordable led to it being more efficient, and vice versa. [🔗 Real Engineering // youtube.com]

6️⃣ I expect I’ll have more to say about it soon, but I’ve been binging through The Sharp End Podcast. One episode per month details with survivors of climbing accidents. They discuss what happened and what they’d do differently. I already consider it required listening for mountain go-ers. [🔗 Ashley // thesharpendpodcast.com]

7️⃣ I doubt I’ll ever tire of watching people pursue things at the ragged edge of their ability and come out on top. Tradprincess works an absolutely wicked looking roof crack, one that’s only been sent by a few very elite climbers. [🔗 Tradprincess // youtube.com]

Thanks for reading 7 Things. If you enjoyed these links or have something neat to share, please let me know. And remember that you can get more links to internet nuggets that I’m finding every day by following me @jarrod on the social web.

This is post #22/31 for Blaugust 2024.

7 Things Blaugust

Manu Moreale, writing on his blog about how the digital world often reflects the physical one:

There was a time when forums were the cities of the web but now are more like small towns. They’re the place where people congregate around shared interests. Spend enough time on one and you’ll get to know its citizens. New threads are infrequent, discussions are slow and can develop over months and years and it’s the refuge for those who are tired of the busyness of the big cities but still want some sense of belonging to a community.

And then there’re personal sites, the house in the forest. It’s the place people escape to when they’re tired of the noise. However personal sites are not isolated islands. They interact and stay connected, using links, mentions, emails, and RSS. It’s a part of the web that moves at a slower pace and that’s a feature, not a bug.

I really like this metaphor for your blog being your home in a connected neighborhood, and how the internet is a compelling digital manifestation of the community structures that humans have built in the physical world — but with improbable scales. Manu likens the large social networks like Facebook and X and TikTok to major cities, while I think of them as skyscrapers. Silos, if you will, reaching impossibly far into the sky. So many people crammed into one spot, sharing common utilities, and yet only a small percentage actually know each other or interact directly.

Mastodon might be more akin to mass transportation system. There are large instances and small ones — like planes, trains, or buses — but they all interact and intersect. It doesn’t really matter which one you use because the point isn’t which you’re on, the point is where you go and what you do with it. Sometimes you’ll chat with the people you’re sharing the bus with (the local timeline), but it’s kind of rare.

Blogs, as Manu noted, are the homes. We decorate them differently. We organize what’s inside them in different ways. You might like yours tidy, while mine is a bit of a mess. We stockpile posts and links, hobbies and projects, and then sometimes get a wild hair and clean house. Throw out the junk. Put a fresh coat of paint up and new photos on the wall. But despite how different each individual home is from one another, they all serve the same purpose. It’s where we live and can just be ourselves.

(Email is — of course — just like snail mail, spam and all.)

We can’t help but rebuild familiarity with our physical world into our digital ones.

This is post #21/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Blaugust Linked

After another (let’s be honest, expected) delay on my part, I’ve wrapped up my PenPal conversation with Steve Ledlow of Tangible Life. For our final exchange, Steve told me more about his kids’ dance competitions:

Dance comps for my older two girls are pretty competitive, but each one has some common measurement aspects.  Usually, they are doing both solos and duets, as well as some group numbers for their company dance group.  The ratings are usually done by a group of judges, and the styles range from lyrical, contemporary, tap, hip-hop, jazz, musical theatre, ballet and some that blend those.  It’s really an amazing world to have fallen into because of their passion for it.  I could never have imagined knowing so much about a world I’d never been exposed to in any form before them.  They have both done well, earning convention scholarships and some cash prizes when they place in the top few spots for their respective age groups and level of performance.  I’m so proud of them and watching them on stage these last few years is like nothing else.  Even when I’m unable to attend the events live, they usually have a stream and I’ll even pull over on the road on the way to something else to watch their performances via live stream.  There’s an overused and cliche phrase in the dance world of “my heart is on the stage”, but it is the truth when I’m watching them do their thing.

Now there’s a proud dad! 🙂 We also chatted about using Cotton Bureau to get t-shirt designs online for purchase, and how he’s having some trouble getting his first design approved. I hope that gets resolved soon so I can buy whatever he comes up with!

Read our entire conversation →

It was a pleasure to email with Steve, and I hope that thread stays open. And although I’m going to be taking a little break from the PenPals project for a month or two, if you’d like to be a part of it in the future, please do let me know!

This is post #20/31 for Blaugust 2024.

PenPals Blaugust

My (not so subtle) attempt to someday guest on “the tech podcast where Dan has abandoned us once again.”

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Mikah Sargent: What is a third-party app that you think everyone should have on their phone?

This was a hard one to answer because the hosts and guests picked such good ones already (I also use CARROT Weather, Libby, and Annotable — they’re great).

So instead I’m going to choose an app that I only just found out about a few hours ago, but I’m convinced that everyone should use, and that’s Unwatched. I discovered this from the boys on Connected, and it’s a completely free app for keeping up with your YouTube subscriptions, with a rockin’ interface. Give it a list of channels you want to follow, and it’ll present an RSS-like list of all their latest videos, ready for you to swipe into a queue or dismiss. There are lots of niceties like per-channel speed settings, a sleep timer, a shortcut for saving ad-hoc videos, bookmarks, and more.

For years, I’ve been using Play to save videos for later (and have currently amassed nearly 900 unwatched videos), but I think (hope) that Unwatched queue system will encourage me to actually watch more of them. The interface is that good. And maybe I can move out all the YouTube RSS feeds I have in my RSS app.

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Kathy Campbell: What is the app you open when you wake up in the morning?

It kind of depends on if I received any notable notifications overnight, but in general, I hope my email client, Spark, first thing. The slower, asynchronous nature of email is one thing that I like best about it, but I also like to be prepared for my day and get back promptly to people if I can or need to. So I’ll look through my latest emails and do a quick triage first thing.

My next-up apps, in no particular order, are Reeder to check news and blog posts that published overnight, Micro.blog for a quick scroll through latest posts from friends, Overcast to start my morning podcasts, and (if I’m vulnerable or susceptible) Instagram where I’ll waste a bunch of time watching Reels.

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Jason Snell: What’s a bit of tech in your life that is getting a little old or faltering and probably could use a refresh?

Well, I’m currently in phase two of replacing a bunch of light switches around our house with Lutron Casseta smart switches, but the current ones aren’t faltering — they’re just not smart. So instead, I’ll say that I’d like to replace our water heater with an instant-hot tankless propane heater. We had one in our last rental home, and the immediate never-ending hot water was glorious. Our current water heater isn’t necessarily on its last legs (although, I think it has exceeded its expected life span), but it also doesn’t always keep up with our needs — even with just my wife and my usage.

But that seems like a whole thing to replace, so we probably won’t jump on it until the current water heater is truly dying.

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Jeremy Burge: Which tech product or concept were you wrong about?

Excellent question! I think I’m going to have to go with the Meta Quest/AR devices. For years I thought the whole AR/VR craze was just a fad. And to some degree, it has been cyclical — right now the world seems to be cooling off on them again — but in my brief time using my wife’s, I was impressed. Gaming is surprisingly fun, and the interface offers a glimpse into the future.

I was enamored by the Apple Vision Pro from the get-go, so I can’t say that. But another similar device that my opinion has changed drastically on, also from Meta, is the Meta Ray-Ban Smart Glasses. I thought the Snapchat Spectacles looked silly, and the Ray-Ban Stories were also not that great. But the feature set grew enticing enough with the Meta Ray-Bans that I really wanted to give them a go, and they’re indeed awesome for outdoor activities.

A couple of Meta products that I’ve had to eat my words about — who knew!?

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Bonus Topic: What is the best thing you’ve ever eaten while on vacation or traveling?

My wife and I sure had some incredible meals while on our honeymoon to Ireland and Austria, but I couldn’t describe them to you now. What I can recall with absolute clarity is the Big Mac meal I had in Aspen, Colorado after a massively draining hike on a two-week road trip out west. My wife had suffered from altitude sickness, and I carried her pack on my front while wearing my pack on my back during the 9-mile and many thousands of feet descent.

Not only was the beef quality better in Aspen, but my ravenous hunger contributed to that being the best McDonald’s meal I’ve ever had, by far.

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Overtime Topic: What is a hardware or software feature that you can remember enjoying in the past that has now been taken away and that you wish would return?

Great answers again from the guests and hosts. I likewise miss 3D Touch on my iPhone so much. I only used Nuzzle briefly before it was shut down, but that app was super cool too. And I loved the breathing animation on Macs and miss that as well, although I’ve noticed that the LED on the Apple Vision Pro does a similar breath-like pattern while charging, which is nice.

But my true answer is Dashboard on macOS. Dashboard was a feature on the Mac that you could access with a swipe or keyboard button that brought you to a full-screen view of all your widgets. This is before the massive expansion of app widgets thanks to iOS, mind you. My favorite widget was the Web Clipper, where you could “clip” a bit of any webpage and save it as a widget, and then that small web view would stay up-to-date over time. So if the website updated, so did your clipped widget.

All the widgets back then oozed personality, and I loved the hodgepodge of skeuomorphic designs all in that one view. You’d think with all the widgets coming with apps nowadays that it would be the perfect time to bring back that Dashboard view instead of today’s desktop widgets being hidden beneath all your windows.

I hold out hope.

Until next time, watch what you say, and keep watching the clock. Bye everybody!

This is post #19/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Crashing Clockwise Blaugust

A weekly list of interesting things I found on the internet, posted on Sundays. Sometimes themed, often not.

1️⃣ Luke Burrage took on the Herculean task of editing the 100 episodes of the Hypercritcal podcast, hosted by John Siracusa and Dan Benjamin, into new episodes, each by specific topic. That’s right, he cut apart and labeled each topic, and then stitched the like ones all back together so that you can listen to a full recounting of John and Dan’s thoughts about a given theme across the years of the show, (especially) including Follow Up™. [🔗 Hypercritical By Topic // lukeburrage.com]

2️⃣ Avery Trufelman of the 99% Invisible podcast makes a compelling case that the Olympics should be held in Greece every time instead of moving hosting duties around the world. [🎙️ overcast.fm]

3️⃣ I know there are iOS apps that do this (I’ve tried them), but boy I hope Apple build something like this pass maker into Wallet soon. [🔗 Wes Davis // theverge.com]

4️⃣ I really dig Matt Birchler’s concept for a ‘Question’ type of post on social media. [🔗 Matt Birchler // birchtree.me]

5️⃣ Matt Birchler also writes about the possibility that Apple is in a permanent descent from the high regard its biggest fans have had for it for decades. It’s a feeling I’ve had too. [🔗 Matt Birchler // birchtree.me]

6️⃣ Blogging extraordinaire Lou Plummer shared why and how his daily blogging habit brings him joy. [🔗 louplummer.lol]

7️⃣ Last night, I happened across this old Trailside episode about climbing in the Adirondacks that is very of its time, but actually does a great job explaining and showing climbing concepts. If you’re curious about how outdoor rock climbing “works”, it’s a good one. It’s also pretty cool to see the same spots that I climb today highlighted in video from 20 years ago or longer. Oh, and the climber/guide featured here is Russ Clune, who recently wrote a memoir about his climbing adventures and even gave a local talk at The Mountaineer just yesterday. Coincidence? [▶️ Trailside // youtube.com]

Thanks for reading 7 Things. If you enjoyed these links or have something neat to share, please let me know. And remember that you can get more links to internet nuggets that I’m finding every day by following me @jarrod on the social web.

This is post #18/31 for Blaugust 2024.

7 Things Blaugust

Today is August 17th, so we’re over halfway through Blaugust 2024 and I thought I would just let you know how it’s going. Bonus, it counts for my blog post for today.

After a few months of mostly not blogging, having a goal to post something every day was a real jump. Kind of cold turkey-ing my cold turkey hiatus. I didn’t announce I was going to do it. I haven’t set a recurring to-do in my task manager — doing those things would add too much pressure, I think. I just know that I want to get 31 posts in and that I should strive to write something every day.

It’s been going well! Although I haven’t posted every day, technically, I have kept up and doubled up on days when I missed. I’ve typically been writing as one of the last things I do in the day. Kind of like homework, that’s just when things with a deadline get done for me. At night, usually while sacrificing sleep. 🤷‍♂️

Although Blaugust has a suggested weekly topic theme or a prompt list to go off of, I haven’t used either of those things. I have a few ideas bouncing around my head each day and then I make the final decision when I flip open the iPad to start writing. Getting started writing isn’t really an issue for me. I just start typing. The fact that it’s been coming easily makes me optimistic that I’ll stick with this and complete the challenge.

Most of the time, I expect my off-the-cuff blog posts to be only a handful of paragraphs long, but many have turned out much longer. I just keep writing until I’ve said what I want to say and run out of words. No outline. No real plan. Just vibes that end up on the page.

I really ought to take this approach more often. Outside of Blaugust, I usually feel like I should be writing something meaningful. Something that takes time, some research, lots of links, and perfect grammar. When the goal is just to write every day, those hang-ups have kind of fallen by the wayside. Not that I want these posts to be poorly written (they still get a Grammarly proofread), I just feel that they can be a little more informal, more me. Hopefully you agree.

Anyway, my goal tonight was to let you, dear reader, how I’m feeling about Blaugust. I’ve done that, and I’m running out of words. So I think I’ll end it here. See you tomorrow!

Bee Tee Dubs, Check In is one of the coolest (and important) iOS features that you’re probably not using. Let’s say you’re driving somewhere and want to let your significant other (or parents because they insist) know that you arrived safely. But it’s so hard to remember once you get there to stop and send the text that everything was fine. Check In will do it for you. See how to use it here.

It also works for walks at night, hiking, outdoor exercises, climbing alone, and any other time you just want your phone to have your back.

This is post #17/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Blaugust

My mother-in-law sent a message to the family group chat a few days ago that went something like this: “Hey, there’s still a few weeks left of summer and I think we should all play a long-distance game together. Let’s all download a license plate tracker app, and compete to find the most state plates. It’d be a good excuse to check in periodically so that I know you’re all still alive and well.”

I was all in.

On family road trips growing up, the license plate game was a staple for car entertainment. Granted, we typically played the alphabet version where you’d find letters of the alphabet in order using only license plates, but the idea was still there. You still had to be on constant lookout, afraid that your sibling would snipe the license plate you were scouring.

Then on a trip out to Colorado in college, my professor and I played the alphabet game but with car models as we switched off driving duties. That competition was likewise fierce.¹

So, despite us not being on a road trip, I’m ready to win this battle. And I think my chances are good seeing that I live in a tourist destination. I’m up to six out of fifty states so far. Wish me luck! (Here’s the app I’m using.)

And I agree with my mother-in-law, it’s nice to have a specific reason to check in and stay in touch. I’m pretty bad about it otherwise — I just get caught up in all the other things to do. Maybe start a competition within your own family or friend group to round out the summer?

This is post #16/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Blaugust

Much like I think it’s important to do hard things, I also think it’s important to make yourself do scary things from time to time.

I’m a rock climber. I’ve been climbing for half my life. I earn a notable portion of my income as a rock climbing guide, helping people to get outside and try out this sport, often for the first time. I still get scared almost every time I go climbing.

Especially when lead climbing (when you’re climbing from the ground up and pulling the rope up with you, clipping bits of protection every so often, but risking significant falls when you’ve climbed above that protection), I waging a mental battle that often more fierce than the physical one of pulling myself up on tiny edges of rock. That battle is one to stay calm, manage my breathing, reassure myself that I’m in control and not going to fall, and just generally keep it all together enough that I don’t make silly mistakes that would lead to me falling and potentially hurting myself.

It would be easy to give up climbing so that I wouldn’t have to face that fear— no, that’s not right. It wouldn’t be easy because I do love climbing. But there are certainly times when out on the sharp end of the rope when I wonder why I put myself through that visceral fear, willingly, no less.

I’m not traditionally a thrill seeker. I like distance sports, not speed sports. I prefer running trails to mountain biking them. I have a healthy respect for moving water and will often wear a life jacket even when others do not. I’m conservative when it comes to finances, always wanting to have a little extra stashed away just in case.

But with rock climbing, I push myself to do the things that I know will scare me. In the past few days, I’ve been in the midst of that mental battle several times. I’ve stepped up to the plate to lead routes that I knew were at the edge of my ability and strength. I’ve fallen off one such route, falling onto a piece of protection that I had placed quickly and didn’t completely trust. It held. Instead of building an anchor and asking my partner to finish the route, I made myself give it another go even though I thought it likely that I’d fall off again. After we had to bail because of an unexpected rain storm, I went back on my own and set up a rappel to go back and retrieve the gear I had to leave behind — even though I wasn’t sure I was in the exact right place, that my rope would even reach the ground.

I think it comes down to trust in yourself. Trust that even though the thing is scary, you’ll be able to figure it out and be okay in the end. That you’re smart enough and capable enough to avoid disaster. That you can succeed despite being afraid. And each time that I prove to myself that I was okay, that I did avoid disaster, and that I am capable, the fear loses a little bit of its power. It builds character and allows you to pursue objectives that don’t seem possible at first.

So when people ask me about rock climbing and question, “Aren’t you scared?” I reply, “All the time.” It’s not whether or not you’re scared that’s important. It’s what you do while you’re scared, I think, that tells you more about the character of a person. And just like everything else, it takes practice to do well.

So go do scary things.

This is post #15/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Journal Blaugust

My (not so subtle) attempt to someday be a guest on “the podcast that always arrives precisely when it means to.”

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Dan Moren: Would you consider a Mac mini in its rumored new even smaller form factor?

I’m a current Mac mini user (the M1 version), and I adore it! The Mac mini’s appeal has three parts. First, the BYODKM (Bring Your Own Display, Keyboard, and Mouse) factor. You can just drop it into an existing desktop computer setup and basically be off to the races. Second, it’s historically the more affordable Mac. Third, its small size makes it accessible to use in places where most other desktop computers just wouldn’t fit. Entertainment centers, storage closets, mounted under desks; the list goes on.

But with the downsizing of internal components needed for Apple silicon Macs, the current Mac mini — despite it being pretty small already — has a ton of wasted, unused space inside its enclosure. And, as Letterkenny has taught us, if you can only be one thing, be efficient. So getting rid of that space to scrunch down the Mini’s size is a-okay by me. Users will be able to put them in ever more places. However, I do feel for the server farms that have racks of Mac minis that will have to adapt.

All that said, I’m probably not in the market for a new Mac mini even though I’d be a fan of its more diminutive size.

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Stephen Hackett: What are your thoughts on Apple requiring Patreon to pay the 30% App Store commission for its creators’ in-app memberships?

This is a hairy topic that needs more than a few flippant paragraphs, but in a nutshell, I’m disappointed in Apple. Moreover, I think it puts a big ol’ spotlight on the notion that Apple’s App Store fee programs need a complete rethink for the year 2024. Really, they should throw the existing rule book in the bin and start over with a blank page.

One of the troubles of this situation is that Apple has that rule book to begin with. And if they don’t want to be accused of playing favorites or being unfair (unequal?) in its business dealings (and it certainly doesn’t because that’s how Google lost its app store monopoly lawsuit), they should be striving to apply the rules the same way across the board. That Patreon has historically not had to pay the commission is an oversight and an example of Apple not applying the letter of its only rules fairly.

But it’s egregious that the rules were written that way to begin with. And now that they’re enforcing their rules, it’s hurting Apple in the court of public opinion during a period in which their relationship with developers and creators is already frayed. I don’t see how Apple comes out ahead, reputation-wise, one this one without some pretty sweeping changes to how the App Store business agreement works.

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Mikah Sargent: Tell us a little about your notification habits. Schedules, badges, focus modes — what do you do (and don’t do) to sort through them?

My notification habits have changed over the years. I used to let anything and everything through. I’d use Do Not Disturb, but sparingly. These days, I use a little bit of everything to fine-tune how my attention can be grabbed by apps on my phone.

First, while I am pretty liberal with giving apps a chance with notifications — what if they’re helpful? — I’m not shy about turning them back off if they start to annoy me. I’d actually like more controls in every app about which kinds of notifications are allowed.

Second, I use Focus modes to restrict who and what can break through. My main modes are ‘Sleep’ which I turn on manually when I set my alarm each night, and ‘Do Not Disturb’ which I’ll flip on if I’m in a meeting or other environment that I don’t want to be distracted.

Third, I’ve started to adjust how notifications are allowed across devices. I used to think I should have all the same notification settings across my devices. But that just means I was dismissing the same ones over and over again on my phone, Mac, and iPad. These days, I hardly have any notifications enabled on my Mac or iPad, everything just comes through my phone (and watch, by extension) instead.

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Shelly Brisbin: Do you think that Apple should be happy about Rivian adding Apple Music support as opposed to CarPlay?

Personally, I think every car should offer CarPlay and Android Auto support. Customers love them, and it would be a huge bummer to purchase a car without their support after having it for years and years.

That said, I understand why automakers are starting to resist it because they want to own the whole experience. Much like Apple wants to own and control the whole experience of using an iPhone.

But the question was should Apple be happy about Apple Music support coming to Rivians. And I think no. I find it super unlikely that anyone is going to become an Apple Music subscriber just because their car has support for it. They just going to use whatever music solution they’ve already had for their Rivian (Bluetooth, phone speaker) if they’re not already Apple Music subscribers. It’s not going to (hehe) drive new subscriptions to Apple Music.

Apple would be happy if Rivian jumped on board with next-generation CarPlay, but that sure ain’t gonna happen!

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Bonus Topic: What is your go-to travel snack?

I’m not afraid of a crunchy or crumbly snack. I eat of lot of chips and popcorn in the car on long road trips. For air travel, it’s usually some sort of bag of chips or crackers purchased under duress at the airport. But I’ll always make room for the complimentary snacks the flight attendants offer.

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Overtime Topic: What non-support tech interaction do you remember from a parent or older friend?

From the moment my friend Robert pulled out his Palm Treo at a Scouting campout, I was sold on gadgets and technology. Seeing how you could organize and communicate with such a small, personal, and portable device was like seeing the future. That fascination turned into a love for the iPhone when it came out, as well as for macOS and Macs, which Robert also let me play with. I eventually was given Robert’s old MacBook Pro as a gift — perhaps the best gift I’ve ever received — and his old iPhone, which we used to text and iMessage constantly. Robert was very generous with his technology, and without him I would not be writing this blog today!

Until next time, watch what you say, and keep watching the clock. Bye everybody!

This is post #14/31 for Blaugust 2024.

Crashing Clockwise Blaugust