Recent content on Aesthetics of the Absurd

 The first draft of this was in the fall… of 2022 . Lots more to say here, but obviously the issues of procrastination, perfectionism, and general time management rear their ugly head. Since then I've consumed too much, so let's start off 2025 in the direction of more creation (including the top photo, from Hawaii in 2022): 
 
Who doesn't love to do a little consuming? From the…

So, it's been a little time, huh? I wanted to give a few updates on what I've been up to as I've been doing more writing, though not so much on this site (obviously). Though I did just update to a shiny new theme, complete with dark mode. There is a plan going forward, but first what I've been writing, and where, in the meantime: 
 
As an unexpected turn of events, due to my F-Word…
Hi, my name is John and I’m a recovering theoretical physicist. In the recent past I worked as a postdoctoral researcher, doing physics around the world. Currently I’m a Lecturer in Critical Writing at UPenn. This is my personal website for sharing various thoughts in blog posts, and more structured writing in the form of essays and photo essays. Thanks for stopping by! 
 Want to…
An essay I have written has just been published!
Whether you are a budding amateur or a seasoned professional photographer, the software tools you use play an important role in organizing, editing, and showing your photos. Maybe you are tired of continuing to pay Adobe as all their software moves to subscriptions or are looking for some of the best tools out there which also happen to be free. In this post I will introduce some free (or…
Something I’ve long been thinking about doing are photo stories or essays, combining a set of photos into a larger, more cohesive, work. This is my first attempt after recently taking a trip to Paris, one of my favorite cities. Comments welcome! Click on a photo to view it full size on Flickr, until I add some fancy gallery. 
 
 As the train pulled into Gare du Nord and I took my…
After 5 years as a gradstudent and 5 years as a postdoc (researcher) in physics, my academic career has come to an end. This was not on my terms; I had come up short of my dream to be a tenured faculty member at a research university. I sold off what little furniture I had, packed up my few belongings, drove 1,000 miles (which turned out to be the end for the car) from the South back to the…
Hi there.