Where Are The Wise Men?

I wanted to do some changes around here and then got caught. I wanted to blog more but I didn't want to support any of the old blog. So i ripped the band-aid off, grabbed very few recent posts and then left 12 years of blog posts over there.

So I'll change some things around here but this is will help me blog more often. I hope.

My Android phone has been weird lately and in the midst of troubleshooting it, I did a factory reset to figure out if that would fix it (it didn't). After the reset I installed very few apps because I wanted to narrow it down. Now that I have done that and have a work-around, I figured that I don't miss having social media on my phone. Yes I have Slack but that's different. Not being able to check FB and (rare for me) Twitter on a whim is so freeing.

My wife got my a little beginner home-brew kit for a late Christmas present. I was delighted and started the fermentation process that night.

As week later, I took a small sample from the fermenter and was excited by the result after such a short time. I gave a little more to my wife, who, upon tasting it, said "It tastes like warm, stale beer!"

Me: "I know, it's that great?!"

Wife: "No! Get me a breath mint!"

Our favorite feature of the Nest Thermostat is the lock feature. We found out about this feature after kids starting turning up our thermostat. One time up to 81 ℉! The nicest thing is what we can still adjust it on our phone without unlocking it.

Once every few years I end up looking at Interactive Fiction and am surprised that it's live and well. People are making games like Zork for the fun of it. What a fun little niche that I'm glad is still going on.

Oh and if you have never played inkle's 80 Days you are missing out.

My fantastic employer let me put Safari Books towards my (ample) education/training budget last year. Just last night I remembered that I hadn't used it in a while so I fired it up and undid some books that were in my queue that I didn't need anymore. Then I had to think about what I wanted to get this time. Oh a book on JPA. Yes, they have one and yes it's already become useful.

Hooray for great employers!

Shaun Austin often runs solo challenges for Star Realms, which is one of my favorite games. The challenge for this month is especially good. Or I was really in the mood for a great game, which I got when I played it. I'm anxious to give it another go very soon.