Trump planned the ambush to make up ground with his base after he was nice to other foreigners earlier in the week, but the angle of attack was a straightforward narcissistic rant because Zelensky wasn’t being grateful enough to placate the big fragile orange ego.
The stroppy, awkward independence of open source
Friday, February 28, 2025
For at least the last 25 years, since I read Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon, I’ve flirted with Linux every so often, and it’s so much better now than it was. I think Apple’s pricing and Windows' cruft and AI might be making it time to move. My latest flirt is with the Linux partition of my Chromebook, partly for sheer tinkering, and also because there’s a specific notes app which is best in Linux, and also ChromeOS’s file management app is execrable and even a lightweight Linux file manager is vital.
Up your Chromebook game with this simple file manager trick
Monday, February 24, 2025
I’ve been using a Chromebook as my main computer for months now, and for almost everything, it’s a great laptop. Almost everything. The one thing it lacks is halfway usable file management. The ChromeOS file manager is like using a particularly clunky website from 2009 which needs to sync to the server every time it as much as breathes. Trying to organise my files has been agony. Then, in a belated flash of inspiration, I realised the solution, and now I have a file manager that works as well or better than Windows file explorer and Mac’s Finder.
How it feels to not grieve your parents
Monday, February 24, 2025
When Logan Roy died fishing his iPhone out of the toilet on his private jet in Succession, his daughter Shiv hesitated over whether to go and see his body. Her brother Roman clocked what was going on in her head, as co-traumatised siblings tend to, and said ‘he’s not going to shout at you if you don’t.’ That’s the main thing when the narc/abuser/toxic/whatever-we’re-calling-the-nasty-fuckers this week dies. The venomous terrifying shouty person is never going to get to do their venomous terrifying shouting at you again.
Finished reading: Harlan Coben - Win by Harlan Coben 📚
His books are so much smarter and snarkier than his TV series.
At the diner table next to me, a middle aged man monologues about painting his house, taxes and other middle aged man things to his largely silent adult daughter. Eventually he asks about how her mother’s doing.
Snotty upmarket opticians: no sir, that loose hinge on your glasses is irreparable. You will need a new pair. Walmart opticians: give me five minutes, I’ll glue it, no charge.
Writing across iOS and Chromebook - the options
Wednesday, February 19, 2025
I’m spending far too much time recently figuring out my best options for writing apps across a bunch of platforms, and having finally been forced to tabulate my findings for my own benefit, though I might as well stick them as a blogpost. Table below, for the impatient, but for the more patient, some context: I’m mostly Apple-based (iPhone, iPad, Mac Mini) but for the next few months a lot of my writing and other work type things will be on a Chromebook, for various reasons.
You know when you're researching one thing and you discover something else entirely? That's how this piece started.... it's about recruiting patients into clinical studies.
Tuesday, February 18, 2025
Latest sciencey comms newsletter open.substack.com/pub/trues… newsletter.
Finished reading: We Had to Remove This Post by Hanna Bervoets 📚
Douglas Coupland lite, hyped because of the social media moral panic.
Finished reading: Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra 📚
I read it fast, which is a good sign. One of those ‘does what it says on the can really well’ books.
TIL that Google Keep doesn’t have a way to add photos from Google Photos. Image files from your drives, yes. Photos Google already knows about, not so much.
Roses are read Violets are blue The ASCII for ‘space’ Is Code 32
Snowy, innit.
Wednesday, February 12, 2025 →
Another sciencey communicationsy newsletter, about explaining your work to your mother. And other civilians.
When I log into iCloud in Chrome I get a weird serif font in Reminders. On the other iCloud account, same browser, literally logging out of one account and into another, I get the right design. I’ve cleared the cache, logged in and out, and the wrong font has persisted for months. Thoughts?
I find I’m filtering all the coverage of the US through my ‘what would the Germany-in-1933 version of that be?’ touchstone to gauge implications.
Disturbed to find Martin from Friday Night Dinner as a murderous baddie in the very bad final Da Vinci Code film. He has yet to say ‘shit on it’ and his shirt remains on, however.
Most journalists (some of my best friends etc.) want to get the story right, but they need your help. Find out what you can do in this close analysis of me getting the wrong end of the stick over a story this week. truesciencestories.substack.com/p/how-to-…
Most journalists (some of my best friends etc.) want to get the story right, but they need your help. Find out what you can do in this close analysis of me getting the wrong end of the stick over a story this week. truesciencestories.substack.com/p/how-to-…