Just a blog. Whatever I felt like sharing that particular day :)
tag(s): #random-thoughts Last week Maria and I walked from my parents place to the Vélez stadium to visit the team store. On the way there we went by the San Cayetano temple. This was a day or two after the yearly procession to worship San Cayetano, a big event around here given that he is the saint patron of employment and Argentina lives in a perpetual unemployment crisis. Among other crises.…
tag(s): #fútbol #español Estuvimos de visitas familiares por el sur argentino [1] , y tuve dos encuentros tan improbables que quise documentarlos en un post. El gallito en Neuquén Fui con mi sobrino a hacer unas compras cerca de su casa y me presentó al almacenero como "hincha del gallito de Morón". Obviamente como producto de la Zona Oeste de GBA [2] , la mención del equipo local inició una…
tag(s): #failures #link-post #random-thoughts I was reading Reasonably Rocky on Nico's blog (highly recommend). This line hit close to home: I can't emotionally afford this kind of comfort. My wife says I can only allow myself to enjoy things if there's a degree of suffering or sacrifice attached to them. Once I heard Conan O'Brien share on his podcast a similar feeling, and he linked it to being…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #yell-at-cloud #español Soy de esos puristas que siempre quiere ver las cosas exclusivamente en idioma original y con subtítulos. Porque la voz original es parte de lo que pone el actor en el personaje, y blah blah blah. Ayer llegué a la casa de mis viejos y estaban mirando con Juan la serie de Chernobyl de HBO. Con doblaje en español. Obviamente mi primera reacción fue de…
tag(s): #failures #programming #overblown-minor-annoyances Here is a link to part 1 . If you don't feel like reading it: I had an LLM write a minimal MCP server to expose Emacs, and I figured if I am going to use these tools, at least make them work in a way that I enjoy. So I kept iterating on that initial setup. Tools maturing A couple weeks ago I felt like I needed to change the name of the…
tag(s): #overblown-minor-annoyances #failures #programming How I feel about all this I still dislike LLMs and I think they are a disgrace. That said, I've been using the thing more at work - a combination of curiosity and trying to get more of the "I told you so" moments. I also have the feeling that if I don't use them, I am going to be out of a job soon. That's 100% just how I feel, no one…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #español La semana pasada Juan cumplió 13 años. Es sólo un número, la verdad es que la adolescencia es un espectro. En algunas cosas es un pequeño adulto, en otras en pibito. Y cuales son unas u otras cambian día a día. Hace dos meses, más o menos, había ido a buscarlo a algún lado (la escuela?) y empezó a hablarme diciendo: Che, viejo... Todavía me acuerdo y me da una…
tag(s): #failures #programming A couple days ago I read a post by Kev Quirk about moving his code off GitHub and into Codeberg. It resonated with me because I've been meaning to make that change myself for some time now. But... Current status For a while I used Source Hut for new projects. Nowadays it is only a mirror of my own private git server . I don't see myself giving up having my own…
tag(s): #yell-at-cloud #infusions #link-post #yell-at-cloud Quite a while ago I read this post by Annie: Ritualize anything Rituals? I can't stop myself. They're so good. Absolutely breathtaking. Humanity's finest work, perhaps. They make no sense. It's all about beauty, about made-up meaning, about art. I was reminded of it this morning. Usually FRIGGING ALWAYS when I come to the office I prepare…
tag(s): #fútbol #español Muelas del juicio MuelaSSSS en plural porque hoy me sacaron las dos muelas del juicio del lado izquierdo. Me pidieron ir con muchas horas de ayuno (incluso que no tome agua) y con un acompañante, porque había una posibilidad de que usen anestesia total. Y así fue que, por primera vez en mi vida me toco que me duerman completamente para un procedimiento. Todo que viene a…
tag(s): #books #pic #link-post Remember when I mentioned I was behind on my RSS feeds? Well, almost a month ago, Nathan posted about his (mis)adventures getting libraries cards in different counties. The post unlocked some memories... The perilous journey to my Astérix comics I was about 6? maybe 7? I am texting my mom as I write this. Maybe she gets back to me before I finish the post :) Anyway,…
tag(s): #fishing I was about to write either tea or anime reviews, but both would be longish. I am a bit tired and sleepy, today we went out for a hike (plus kiddo and I did a hike yesterday with his scout troop). And also, as the title spoiled, we went out fishing after getting back, so we spent like 2 hours in the sun at Oradell. Today, after like 9 months (or maybe more?) (I CHECKED: closer to…
tag(s): #yell-at-cloud #random-thoughts #fútbol We were chatting today at work about the expanded World Cup format and how many of the weaker teams that qualified for the first time (or first time in decades) put up a decent fight. This was, of course, after the Portugal-Congo game. And during that conversation I had a thought: games like Cape Verde-Spain and Portugal-Congo are interesting mostly…
tag(s): #random-thoughts I haven't been writing that much lately, I realized yesterday that it is because I am in consumer mode rather then author/generator mode. In the last month or so I watched Blue Box (and read the manga), read Hija de la Fortuna by Isabel Allende (and started the follow up novel, Retrato en Sepia). Watched season 2 of Slow Horses. Then watched the three seasons of Spy x…
tag(s): #failures #yell-at-cloud CVS is a chain of pharmacies. I would love to use the town's family-owned pharmacy, but they said they don't carry one of our family's prescriptions and sent us to CVS themselves. A month later, we just transferred everything to CVS. Half sad, half 🤷. It is simpler to go to a single pharmacy for everything... A while ago, CVS added tablets where you check in with…
tag(s): #sorties #pic This weekend the kiddo was in camp (I am writing this as we wait for him to have lunch), and since we were on our own, we did fun things parents do when they are left alone. ANTIQUE STORE TIME, BABY!!! (I mean, we sometimes drag Juan along for these, and I would like to think he has learned to enjoy them. Or maybe he realized complaining is pointless. =P) Our first stop was…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #failures This morning I woke up tired and in a "down" mood, for reasons . Stuff happened, on the way to the office, and then break room. Mood shifted (not 100% recovered, but I'll get there as the day goes by). Admiration On the 3 subway, there was this tall young guy, dressed in a light blue suit, colorful (but not playful) tie, thick black rim round glasses, and a hat.…
tag(s): #meta A while ago I mentioned that I was meaning to move the CSS on the site to a single stylesheet. All the pages had the exact same style anyway, so it's not like it made a difference to have it inlined or use a common file. That wasn't the case initially, when for example pages without img tags didn't have styling for them. But at some point I felt like saving those few bytes wasn't…
tag(s): #useless-facts #film-tv So, about three weeks ago I gave in and watched Blue Box, on Netflix. I mean, their advanced recommendation AI put together such an accurate profile of me...it probably even read this very site. Spied on my email, and my snail mail. Used tracking cookies to follow my every step on the web!!! It is now spot on!!! I can't escape it!!! (Or, errr, maybe I…
tag(s): #programming #overblown-minor-annoyances In case you needed more evidence that people can be complicated (where people = me ), let's take a look at one thing I absolutely hate on the grounds of "correctness" and one another that I only strongly dislike despite being "more correct". Trailing and prefix commas in code I can try for hours to come up with a sentence that expresses how much I…
tag(s): #emacs #programming I am 100% convinced that choosing the simplest solution possible is always the better choice. My reasoning goes like this: if you approach a module/subsystem/function (the level of granularity doesn't matter, it applies at all levels) with the most boneheaded approach possible, your code/architecture/etc. will be stupid simple. This might have "obvious drawbacks", but…
tag(s): #random-thoughts Inexplicable - en español El matrimonio es una familiaridad acogedora, como taparte con una manta en tu lugar favorito del sillón en un día fresco. A veces uno se olvida lo que era sufrír el frío sin tu hermosa manta, no hay que olvidarse de valorarla, cuidarla... Y otras veces, te encontrás que la manta tiene lo que sólo podemos definir como "problemitas", y uno se…
tag(s): #random-thoughts Last weekend the kiddo was in a concert at Montclair University. When leaving the venue, my wife pointed at this sculpture in the entrance hall and said "I want this for our living room" (direct link to image) I told her, "this sculpture represents parenting , that's Juan when we try to have 5 minutes to ourselves". A couple days earlier she reminded of how, when he was…
tag(s): #monty #suzie #pic Remember when the internet was obsessed with cats? Did that die down, or is it just me not being "in the know" anymore? (Could be both). Suzie likes to come to the couch while I watch TV. She usually lays down by my leg, but this time she decided to rest on the longer side of the couch, providing photo opportunities. 😻 (direct link to image) While we are at it, Monty's…
tag(s): #books #emacs #meta #link-post It's been a while since I did one of those "three links with commentary" posts. So, why not? And why not more than three. During the last couple weeks I felt like touching on a bunch of topics from fellow blogger posts, but not quite the drive to write that much, in general. Many times I leave posts unread in my RSS reader, thinking that I have something to…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #failures Yesterday I read Kev's review of the Thinkpad T480 , which triggered some core laptop memories for me. And a while later I got to Alex's post about a different Thinkpad model and his experiences installing Windows 11 . To top it all off, I had been doing some mmm "stuff" in my work laptop and then syncing to personal laptop at the same time, and going back to my…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #programming This morning I was chatting with my boss. He was sharing some stories of his time at DEC, and the early days of our current employer. He told me about the database system he was working on at DEC, that was targeting VMS but then they wanted it to run in Ultrix too so there was a team tasked with creating an abstraction layer, and this team faced a lot of…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #overblown-minor-annoyances It seems my Emacs setup is more or less at a stable minimum . Or at least, a usable minimum. I am at the point where if I don't have my config, I can use the editor perfectly well, but of course I prefer my little tweaks. Anyway! This post isn't about Emacs, but about my new desk setup. Content warning: it is filled with details about how I…
tag(s): #music #random-thoughts #failures #yell-at-cloud (minor edits next morning, I really shouldn't proof read at night) This is grand from me, since there's been a bunch of posts in my RSS feed about people's disillusionment with Apple, and I really despise the topic. ACTUALLY, let me get that off my chest first... Early digression: "Apple isn't what it used to be" I've seen a bunch of recent…
tag(s): #emacs A while ago I wrote about a failed attempt to reduce the amount of customization in my Emacs setup, back then it was the mode line. I had in the back of my mind another area to (try to) simplify, and that is pairing . Emailing with Wouter as he tried different combinations of electric-pair-mode and third-party packages for this, gave me the impulse to see how I would fare using only…
tag(s): #smallweb #random-thoughts #yell-at-cloud We all have read the articles and posts about how now everyone consumes content via AI summaries, and websites keep losing traffic. In the context of the commercial web. Not that my site is impacted by this. Or maybe it is. If it is, I hope Claude picks up all my grammar mistakes and stupid mannerisms. [1] Last Sunday we were away for the weekend…
tag(s): #overblown-minor-annoyances I've thought of this post in the past, but the last couple days I was reminded in a few different ways: A friend shared in a group chat a controversial photo - more on this later. Coming back from a short road trip, we had lunch and got a little cup of ranch with our fries. Already at home, listening to a podcast, there was an ad for Hellman's mayonnaise.…
tag(s): #overblown-minor-annoyances Remember when I was so happy that I needed my phone to enter our community ? But hey at least I found a way to make it better by using, of all things, Siri. Well, about a month ago I figured it was time to change the phrase from "let me in" to something new, and accidentally discovered that you can set more than one shortcut for the same action!!! 🤯 Tech has…
tag(s): #useless-facts #blogging #meta Yesterday Day before yesterday, I realized I haven't posted in a while, not for lack of things to say [1] but because it was a pretty unusual week, in terms of activities, errands and whatnot. And today we went out to a park and hiked 4 miles. This would have been nothing at certain point of our life, but we haven't done something like this a long time, so we…
tag(s): #failures #random-thoughts While Maria is studying, I am cebando mate ( cebador is the one that prepares the 🧉 drink for everyone else) and using my laptop in tablet mode. Except that after about 10 minutes, I already un-folded it twice. Well, three times if we count the impulse to write this now. =P Which would make sense if I had like, visited Libera Chat, or started writing emails.…
tag(s): #bike-rides #random-thoughts #monty #suzie #coloradorapids #pic It's been a while since I uploaded any pictures, and I figured, why not. (direct link to image) I have no idea if I mentioned this before, but Monty had a rash on one side of his body, and after it got better, he developed the same thing on the other side. Bummer. (direct link to image) Many times in my line of work I complain…
tag(s): #emacs #yell-at-cloud #programming I won't re-iterate my hesitations around the AI hype, already wrote plenty of posts on that. But as I said before , I feel it would be silly of me not to take advantage of the resources I have access to at work to...well, at this point it is late to stay ahead of the pack (and I don't believe in such kind of mentality anyway). More like, catch up? Try to…
tag(s): #useless-facts #meta I added delete support to my Paste bin clone, Peanut Butter ! Now when you create a paste, with the name you also get back a UUID, which you can use to delete it. If you don't make a note of the UUID right after creating the paste, tough luck. I want to keep PB simple to use, but having the ability to delete makes it possible to use PB for quick-discard sensitive…
tag(s): #yell-at-cloud #link-post #programming Via Lars Christian's website, I got a link to this post: ai;dr by Sid . The quote from the post that Lars shared caught my attention, I completely agree. Sid says: For me, writing is the most direct window into how someone thinks, perceives, and groks the world. Once you outsource that to an LLM, I'm not sure what we're even doing here. Why should I…
tag(s): #reviews #books Spoiler-free section After my first break up, I read Paulo Coelho's Veronika Decides to Die. The book had a profound effect on me, and then I went on a Coelho binge with my mom. We read like 5 or 6 of his books in maybe a couple months. A few years later, I started re-reading it. I found it boring, trite, even empty. I didn't make it very far into it. The only reason I can…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #español This is a first, a bilingual post. Because I think the story is short enough that I am fine writing it twice. And because I am rebel, it doesn't have the same title. 🤷 Español: "posá para el video" Hace unos días en el podcast de Conan O'Brien hablaron con un oyente que se dedicaba a restaurar videos caseros. En un momento de la conversación hablaron de films…
tag(s): #yell-at-cloud #gaming #español En el podcast de videojuegos que escucho todas las semanas, Café Fandango , usan alguna noticia para hacerle preguntas al público. Esta semana fué (parafraseando) "Qué cosa no pudiste hacer en un juego y te molestó". Desde que no tengo redes obviamente está complicado que conteste (o me entere cuál es la pregunta...) pero escuchar las respuestas de camino al…
tag(s): #failures Yesterday and earlier today The problem with having a public website with your name in the URL is that there are things you just can't say. Like, I can't say "thank heavens I can at least chat with Copilot, because our group chat on MS Teams was silent for over an hour after I brought up a minor design issue I was wrestling with". I really like those small predicaments because,…
tag(s): #yell-at-cloud #link-post Via Andreas excellent weekly linkdump series , I read this post: " The Slow Death of the Power User ". The post is good, although a bit depressing. I don't agree with all of the points it makes, but I recommended it. Sidenote: don't be too much of a downer, even if you are right I am of the idea that it is better to focus the doom in one topic at a time. The…
tag(s): #link-post #random-thoughts I've been a little disconnected from writing lately. In part because I was entertained with a game, and books, but also for an unknown reason. Writer's block? It's not like I didn't have post ideas. Or things that I felt like saying out loud. Anyway...here we are now. Quite a few days ago I read " I didn't fail " by Kev Quirk. It resonated with me in a few ways.…
tag(s): #random-thoughts My employer has offices in Argentina [1] , and just now I was IMing with a coworker from over there. She was telling me she had blood drawn for some tests. I've read somewhere in the past, that Americans are sometimes surprised at how open coworkers can be discussing personal stuff in other cultures. Like health issues, or family dynamics. I don't know how true that is. I…
tag(s): #programming #random-thoughts #meta On his post Why I inlined my CSS in 11ty , ldstephens explains that he achieved faster page loads and an easier deployment process. His post was interesting in a couple ways. As it is known, the content you are reading now is hand-typed HTML. I didn't feel like learning, and then be tied, to one or another tool. Be it a static site generator or something…
tag(s): #random-thoughts #nyc I got off the bus at the Port Authority Bus Terminal. It's not exactly the most glamorous place. Then again, it is a bus terminal, and it fulfills its mission. What should happen in there? We all get off the bus singing "New York, New York" while doing a synchronized dance? Sidenote, there's a plan to more or less rebuild the Terminal, and I have a suspicion it will…
tag(s): #yell-at-cloud #music #español Siempre me pareció tonto el "featuring" en la radio/videos/spotify. "Artista ft. Otro artista" Empezando por el uso de featuring que siempre me pareció una boludés, decí "con", ponele una coma, decí "invitado". Hay mil formas de ponerlo en español! Si alguien que me conoce en persona lee esto se va a reír, porque incluso muchos años antes de vivir en USA ya…
tag(s): #film-tv #reviews Looks like I'm big on parenthesis for titles lately. ANYWAY... We sometimes watch fun movies on Friday night, which usually are pizza dinners too. We used to do almost always animated fare (which I of course enjoyed very much ). But now that the kid is older, my wife is taking the opportunity for us to watch more...well, movies. In a couple years even Juan will abandon my…