Posted by Chuck Grimmett. Learn more on his About page.
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Habanero harvest 2025 sauce
Life was busy in late September/early October when the habaneros in our garden ripened, and I didn’t have the gumption to make a batch of hot sauce out of them. Charlie and I bagged them up and froze them instead. We ended up with ~60 orange and red habanero peppers, about twice as many as…
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Snowy Weekend
It snowed here all weekend. It is hard to tell exactly how much we got because Saturday the snow was fluffy and the wet, heavy snow on Sunday compressed it. There’s six inches on the porch railing as I write this, and it is still snowing. Charlie and I spent a few hours playing out…
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2016 trend
You’ve probably seen the Instagram trend of posting selfies from 2016. Here are some of mine. Visiting the Sol LeWitt Retrospective at MASSMoCA. I spent hours in this building taking notes on the wall drawings. LeWitt is my favorite artist and this retrospective is well worth your time if you like his work, too. Taking…
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Chili with Vaquero beans
This week’s bean dish was chili with vaquero beans. My original plan for this week was a lentil dish, but after rummaging around in the basement freezer, I realized we had tomatoes, tomato paste, and beef, so a nice hearty bowl of chili came to mind. Perfect for today’s snowstorm, which dropped four inches of…
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Discernment
The hard part isn’t learning the finer points of prompt engineering, how to set up and use agents, or how to connect the right systems for necessary context. The hard part is choosing when using AI is appropriate and when it isn’t. Choosing which output is acceptable and which isn’t. Choosing what to work on…
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Shopsmith is back under new ownership
An email went out to the Shopsmith mailing list last night saying that they are under new ownership. Here is a link to the browser version of the email from Mailchimp. TL;dr: This is good news! Their website hasn’t been updated yet, but I bet that will happen soon. Here’s a video with the new…
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Cassoulet bean gratin
This week’s bean dish was a gratin made with cassoulet beans, fennel bulb, onion, garlic, thyme, and breadcrumbs. Recipe from Rancho Gordo, which I’m sure you read about in the WSJ this weekend. Amanda and I both loved it. Charlie wouldn’t try it, but he was very curious about what fennel bulb is, how beans…
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Featured images are friction
Henrique commented on my “Just hit publish” post with: As a designer, I feel that the Post Featured Image blocks me from writing much more than ‘normal’ people would think. I need time to conceive and prepare it—which makes quick daily posts impossible. Maybe I should review my blog template and get rid of them…
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Cauliflower with cassoulet beans and capers
This week’s bean dish was cauliflower with cassoulet beans and capers. I really enjoyed the smoky tanginess that the sherry vinegar + smoked paprika added to the dish. I served this as our main side with a pork tenderloin. This was tasty enough to make again, but probably not going into the standard rotation. I’ll…
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What I’m Reading, January 2026
Non-fiction Fiction What are you reading this month?
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Just hit publish
Blog posts don’t have to be Atlantic-style essays, ground-breaking ideas, or heavily researched. Not everything has to be epic or viral. You can post whatever you want, whenever you want. Keep it low friction and hit Publish. Personal blogs are meant to be low stakes. Some ideas: Don’t overthink it or get caught up in…
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Blogging Beyond the Wall
Social networks are walled gardens. They are closed networks that restrict how users interact, what they see, and how data flows. Outside of the walls is the blogosphere. It is diverse and distributed. If the web is Westeros, social platforms are the Seven Kingdoms, run by mad kings from their Iron Thrones, and the blogosphere…
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Shopsmith Mark V Single vs Double Bearing Quills
Earlier this year I started noticing some runout on the spindle of my 50 year old Shopsmith Mark V. I did some reading about my specific model and came to two conclusions: Replacing the bearing is straightforward. Alex’s Shopsmith Repair sells them and with a few tools you can replace it yourself. What I also…
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Why I Blog
This weekend a friend texted me a screenshot of a Pinterest link his wife sent to him. It was a link to my climbing wall post. She wants him to build one for their son. He recognized Charlie and my blog right away. Someone had pinned it and it gets a decent amount of traffic.…
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Weekly Beans
One of the things I want to do in 2026 is to cook more beans. It occurred to me a few nights ago that I should try to make at least one bean dish each week. I started on January 2 with a chicken, wild rice, and black eyed pea soup. Here are some more…
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Winter gift for the birds
For the past three years, we’ve started the new year by going for a walk in the woods to collect pinecones and make a little treat for the birds. We roll them in peanut butter and birdseed, then go back out the next day and leave them on logs, tree stumps, and branches for the…
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Month of December 2025
December was all about the holidays. We started the month by getting rid of the Thanksgiving decorations. Charlie wanted to run them over with the car, so we did. We set up the Christmas Tree in stages. First the tree + train, then the lights and ornaments Amanda and I prefer, then Charlie’s additional ornament…
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Things I’d like to do in 2026
I’m not big into resolutions, but here are some things I’d like to do in 2026. Many of these are getting back to old interests I’ve moved away from for one reason or another. I know that adding more means that I’ll have to do less of something else. I’d mostly like to scroll less…
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Top 3 (2025)
Happy New Year! I like to do a more narrative recap on my birthday, so at the end of the calendar year I make lists of top things in multiple categories. See also: 2024, 2023. Meals Shows Non-fiction Books Fiction Books New blog follows Places Purchases Memories Things I’ve made Accomplishments