Lots of rain this week, so we did indoor activities like going to the library, going to the grocery store, and making ambulances out of boxes.
This box is still in our living room, though now Charlie calls it his “garage” and likes to hide underneath it while we walk around the house and call his name. Eventually he pops out and giggles hysterically.
We also went to gymnastics and a birthday party for one of Charlie’s friends.
Another activity was starting seeds. Charlie did the dirt scooping and watering. I’m learning from last year’s seed starting mistakes:
- more lights (shifted four bars to one shelf instead of one per)
- lights closer to the seeds (raised up the soil and heating pads)
- warmer location (basement instead of my drafty office)
- lights on a timer (sunrise to sunset)
Workshop upgrade progress report
I put in the dust collection system! It is a 2HP Harbor Freight dust collector that I took off the stand and mounted to the wall. Instead of the dust bag, which doesn’t collect fine dust, I used a canister filter, which does. Hoses run through the rafters over to my Shopsmith area and to the work bench.
I got a decent amount of karma on Reddit when I posted about my realization that deli quart containers can work as adapters on 4in hoses, blast gates, and splitters.
I also made and hung the french cleats and started building tool holders. I love how this works and am excited about it. More tool holders in progress this week.
I spent more time than I’d like last week figuring out the permitting process for Peekskill so we can get our fence replaced.
I’m slowly improving my Shortcuts actions. My Like shortcut and Bookmark shortcut are smoother and more flexible now. The same shortcut works across browsers and devices, and takes input either from the share sheet or the clipboard. I’m now posting bookmarks to my digital garden site, reducing my dependence on third party subscriptions. I need to clean up and rethink how they are displayed, but the data is there.
The next step is automating importing my are.na, Twitter, Mastodon, and Instagram bookmarks. If you do this, hit me up.
Related, it turns out consistently tagging disparate pieces of content using AI without pre-defining the tags is a non-trivial problem. Great thread from Simon Willison on this.
I’m doing very little pleasure reading right now. I’m working a lot in the workshop after Charlie goes to bed, which is when I’d normally be reading. In general, reading less doesn’t seem great, but I’m replacing it with something fulfilling and productive, which I feel good about.
Looking back at two years ago and one year ago. Charlie has grown so much in the past year! It is interesting to see how my week notes have evolved. Very work and life dependent. Also, I need to get a move on getting my weather station replaced.
Amanda and I have predictions on what is going on with Kate Middleton. Amanda thinks she is having a mental breakdown, I think she served William with divorce papers over his cheating and the royal family doesn’t know what to do about it.
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