Recently saw an old aquaintance of mine who was in town and staying at our place. We used to be friends, but that would be too strong a word now. Nothing happened, we just grew apart as our different values took our lives in different directions. My wife seems to get along better with her now than me. She was pretty open about her drug use, and she left her bag on the bathroom counter, wide open. I didn't snoop, but standing there washing my hands, I couldn't help seeing the five or six transparent orange prescription pill containers in there. From what she told us, it must be some combination of anti-depressants, sleeping pills, and probably some secondary pills to counteract the side effects of the primary pills. A couple of the familiar little containers, about the size of an old film cannister for those who remember them; the kind I'm used to from the handful of times I've been recovering from surgery or taking antibiotics. Some bigger containers as well, what could accurately be described as jars, containing literal hundreds of pills. These are not temporary measures just to get through a rough patch. This is her life now, what she ingests daily just to remain normal, or so she believes. You walk around the world meeting seemingly well put-together people, with no idea what kind of complicated chemical scaffolding some of them rely on just to keep from collapsing.

If you ever find yourself tempted to ask God, or the universe, or whatever: "haven't I suffered enough?" maybe don't.

It occurs to me that the installation of every Flock camera must be done, in part or in whole, by a fellow electrician. They bring grave dishonor to our trade.

The Blue Collar Dollar

Some thoughts on the increasing precarity of life on the street. Not a pleasant read. View article →

#asknostr Wallet question, hoping someone more technical can help this caveman understand: I created a wallet on YakiHonne, then connected it to Wisp, Primal, and Amethyst with NWC. Now, the wallet no longer works on YakiHonne (balance: N/A, no transaction history, won't generate receive invoices), won't reconnect to Wisp and Amethyst, but somehow still works on Primal. Anyone got any experience with this kind of thing? Is it time to get my shit together and start using a better wallet? Any wisdom is appreciated.

A few months ago I got a new phone and told my wife that I was taking control and flashing it with a different, open-source operating system (GrapheneOS). "Are you sure that's safe? Do you know what you're doing? What if you wreck your new phone?" Fair questions from someone who, up to that point, didn't even know that was possible. Having observed some of the privacy features now (she was initially a bit confused by the per-connection MAC address randomization on our home wifi network), she's no longer concerned and mentioned just yesterday "maybe I should get you to install that on my phone too." I don't really try to orange- or purple- or privacy-pill anyone, including her. I just act in accordance with my values and if people are interested and want to know more, I'm happy to nerd out. Be The Change (BTC) you want to see in the world; people will come around when they're ready.

Twenty-five years ago my father, recently divorced, was alone, more or less broke, and living out of a rented garage in a bad part of town. When he would get home from his uninspiring job in a mediocre local cabinet shop, he would throw himself, and every spare dollar he had at the time, into an all-consuming passion project: building two exquisite wooden kayaks; one for me and one for my sister (although I now have nominal possession of both). He was at a low point in his life, without his children, and this was a creative outlet into which he could channel his simultaneous frustration and unbreakable spirit of creativity and craftsmanship. Over the years, these vessels have been the source of many happy memories and adventures. Just last week, as my wife and I found ourselves battling unexpectedly rough seas, those boats served us well in making our way back to safety. A three-sixteenths-of-an-inch layer of wood, shaped and set in place by my father two and a half decades ago, was all that separated each of us from a thrilling challenge and an extremely bad, possibly tragic outcome. When work is executed with excellence and craftsmanship, the long term possibilities are impossible to predict.