Month: May 2025

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2025-05-22 22:29:03

Day 4 of “me week”.

My plan for this week was to do a ton of reading, learning and coding, close all my tabs. Bookmark all the useful links. Clean out my inbox. Hang out in my garden office. Visit all the local coffee shops and eat all the donuts. Play a ton of Balatro.

Instead… I have some nice new shelves in my kitchen and a large, B&Q-shaped hole in my wallet!

This is probably a good thing.

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2025-05-21 20:03:05

DIY project update. This will be tough to tidy up around the edges. But I can’t lie, I’m prettt chuffed with my boxing and the first shelf. I have planed a LOT of wood today!!!

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2025-05-21 09:50:42

A screenshot of the mobile parking app that my local council uses. It has one small “Find parking” box, and then Fuel prices EV Charging Car maintenance MOT and service A widget showing that my MOT is due. A widget with an offer for MOT and servicing. A widget with an offer on car insurance.

YES! YES YES YES!!! A "National Parking Platform”.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/governm

Can I get all this "not-parking" shit out of my enshittified parking app??

Can we compete on user experience instead?

PLEASE!!!!

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2025-05-20 23:13:37

Reading the tech news these days is so dull.

I’d say 90% of my news feed is “company X has managed to shoe-horn the mediocre ‘more machine’ into their product that really doesn’t need it”.

Make it stop!!!!

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2025-05-20 22:52:47

Tomorrow I’m having a life coaching session.

I’ve always been very cynical about the coaching industry. It feels very pyramid-schemey. And it’s expensive, and I’ve never been convinced that I would get value from it.

But the person I’m speaking to has proven themselves again and again and has some specific expertise that I really want to tap into.

Hoping it works out!!!

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2025-05-20 22:22:48

I am ACTUALLY doing this build myself.

This is the old back door of the original house. It’s now an alternative doorway to our “futility room”, but we don’t use it.

I’ve had the idea for ages to make it a little set of “pantry” shelves.

And despite nothing in this godforsaken house being straight – the doorway height varies by 27mm front to back! – this thing is LEVEL IN BOTH DIRECTIONS!!!! 🙌💪

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2025-05-20 13:48:23

Day 2 of "me week". A coffee chat this morning, then a swim. A nice morning start! Then…

I am terrible at DIY. Just SO bad. But every now and then I get an idea for a little project that I think I can do and I go for it. So I now have several metres of furniture board and a load of grab adhesive, and chaos WILL ensure this week. 🤣

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2025-05-19 16:30:48

I stand at the bottom of an enormous tree.

Day 1 of my "ME WEEK”. I started with a trip to the local-ish arboretum that we recently (in a stroke of complete middle-agedness) became members of.

It was AMAZING how fast my thoughts clarified as I walked around and admired the beauty and awe and diversity of the trees.

The return to my town was, frankly, a jolt.

I'd love to start every week like this.

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2025-05-17 12:32:23

If I am guilty of one hypocritical and paradoxical thing, it is of being closed minded about the fact that other people should be open minded.

I won’t compromise on wanting others to compromise.

And the contradiction bothers me greatly.

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2025-05-16 19:50:12

I’m sensing a change in how people are talking about AI.

There's more open criticism. And I feel like even those bullish about it are starting to sound like they don't quite mean it.

Maybe that's me that’s changed?

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2025-05-16 18:04:56

A screenshot of the WordPress editor. I have selected three paragraphs. One is Italic. At the top are symbols. A plus sign implies adding something. Back and forward arrows imply undo and redo. There are block selection and moving controls that I recognise. Then there’s some… err… some rectangles? And a three-line icon that usually means alignment. Then there’s a three dots menu that will be “more” and a button that collapses the controls. On the right is a bar with text and background colour options. And a typography box that lets me choose a size. That has a three dot more menu. Hmm. I wonder.

OK, WordPress. This is just silly now.

I know I'm a top-toolbar guy. And I've looked there.

But how do I make multiple paragraphs italic?

This is basic text formatting. And I can't do it?

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2025-05-15 13:03:56

My website. It says “Hi, I’m Ross. I build websites”

Kept one of those scammy, cold-calling web agencies chatting for 15 minutes while I made lunch. Ended with:

“We do web development. Do you need any help with this website?”

“No. That’s what I do for a living. I do it myself.”

“Oooh, you’re a web developer? Sorry to bother you. Goodbye.”

I mean… is it not clear?

I get what they’re trying to do. But does this high-volume, low-effort sales process work for ANYONE???