Adam T's Home Page

Notes — 2024

December 04, 2024 at 09:43 AM

Reading update: gave up on Mason & Dixon. Life update: questioning the competitive element of youth music programs.

November 26, 2024 at 06:48 AM

Giving up on Mason & Dixon. Maybe a better summer read. And starting the Roth “Zuckerman” trilogy.

November 10, 2024 at 08:33 PM

Just now Google Gemini told me that Matt Lauer, Katie Couric, and Meredith Vierra all graduated from The University of Iowa.

November 03, 2024 at 10:14 AM

“12When you sin against them in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother or sister to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause them to fall.”

How far does this extend? is a question I’ve long had.

October 19, 2024 at 08:04 AM

Up early-ish (but never early enough for my conscience) to ready. Nearing the final 100 pages of Plot Against America. The book is picking up steam and seems headed for a tidy resolution. Taking him to class today - Lady Raider donut party - another party. Then maybe fulfilling my dream of a pickleball late afternoon in the autumn shadows.

October 18, 2024 at 10:13 AM

There was a school lunch worker who often came by my crossing corner and would give me a donut out her car window. I haven't seen them recently. I am worried that they were fired for giving me those donuts.

October 16, 2024 at 02:21 PM

The fact that apple has a global database of ear shapes is both inspiring and very odd and dystopian. I'm not trying to say they're up to anything nefarious - they use them to determine the shapes of AirPods and other heaphones.

October 15, 2024 at 09:08 AM

this is what I would like: for you to preserve my personal website digital garden on into the future forevermore

October 15, 2024 at 09:05 AM

October 11, 2024 at 04:51 PM

is it possible that changing my font will make me a better person? or make me more productive? i feel like i've been secretly asking that question for around 25 years.

October 11, 2024 at 03:55 PM

One little thing I low key love about being a crossing guard is that I can stand at my corner and fart as much as I care to

October 11, 2024 at 02:30 PM

now begins the regression to mean when the talented child sees it isn't enough

October 11, 2024 at 02:08 PM

I had a sleeping dream that i went to a very traditional style church service with the father of one of my kids's friends from school. Then I had a waking dream that I was in the school hallway and a teacher jerked their head to the side in a signal for me to get up against the wall.

October 11, 2024 at 01:39 PM

there are folks in iowa who pronounce the SE iowa town Ottumwa, "autumn-wah." which is wrong, of course.

October 04, 2024 at 02:40 PM

Songs in my head:

October 01, 2024 at 08:49 PM

I've always been a Check the website kind of person, when I want to find out details of an event. But I should give in and be more of a Just check Facebook kind of person.

September 17, 2024 at 02:52 PM

Songs in my head:

September 13, 2024 at 02:10 PM

I am in constant awe and curiosity and filled to the brim with wonder - just by this simple notion: "How do you live? Why are you doing that thing you're doing? Why did you do this thing when you usually do THAT thing (yes, I noticed that you usually do THAT thing, not because I'm weird, but because I am a noticer and I am curious and I care).

September 13, 2024 at 10:04 AM

Songs in my head:

September 11, 2024 at 08:32 PM

I wish that the iOS Music app (no, it's not the Apple Music app - it also plays my personally curated library of purchases and uploads) could sort albums by year. There are so many great 3rd party music apps that do this - but I just can't bring myself to pay another 15 to 50 dollars JUST for this feature.

September 10, 2024 at 09:50 PM

On my reading list for the rest of 24 and into 25:

September 06, 2024 at 05:54 AM

I figured out how to make Apple Podcasts stations work for me: don't ever manually tend to them. Don't swipe anything to remove episodes, don't mark anything as played or unplayed. Let episodes enter and exit stations of their own accord.

This is the way forward.

September 05, 2024 at 03:35 PM

Songs in my head:

September 05, 2024 at 05:53 AM

testing 123. that bad file seeems to be cleared out. now to get the practice charts done.

September 04, 2024 at 10:28 PM

The Medvedev/Sinner match couldn't be much more different than the matches from the last couple of nights.

August 31, 2024 at 06:19 AM

You want to have your thoughts solely in your own spot, your own personal digital garden, if you will, but the lure of BEING SEEN, in the same old places, proves too much to overcome.

August 31, 2024 at 06:00 AM

an iphone really does make the most wonderful paperweight. it can do anything.

August 30, 2024 at 08:28 AM

Songs in my head:

August 29, 2024 at 07:07 AM

Songs in my head today:

August 27, 2024 at 01:06 PM

From the NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/26/nyregion/nyc-bus-subway-fare-evasion.html

Fare beaters might also feel emboldened, experts say, because heavy traffic and a lack of bus lanes means that bus service can be slow and unreliable. For some riders, it is simply not worth the price of admission. The pandemic also reinforced the perception that fares were optional, after the authority made bus rides free for a few months in 2020.

Once you give something out for free, there's no turning back.

August 26, 2024 at 12:59 PM

Songs in my head today:

August 25, 2024 at 10:10 PM

I truly like Apple's "Spacialize Stereo" feature - but I wish I could have it minus the added reverb.

August 23, 2024 at 06:08 AM

What would be the problem with just staying here in my chair by the window and reading novels and po-ems for the rest of my days?

August 23, 2024 at 05:56 AM

On Emily Dickinson: I learned this week that in 2016 an edition of her poems was published which, for the first time, took into account her own prioritization and arrangement of her po-ems. At some point Emily assembled some small batches into booklets, perhaps showing which of her poems she held most dear.

I find it baffling that I had never known this. I have never heard that she did any arranging or other work toward publishing her work. I always assumed that later editors sorted through all the scraps, tried to pin down dates, and published everything all together in the books which exist (Final Harvest, that other newer one), not making any attempt to delineate between a fragment and a complete work.

How can it have taken more than a century for anyone to try and put the Dickinson canon into a form that might bear Emily's stamp of approval?

August 22, 2024 at 06:09 AM

POV: the coffee beans have turned, but you still have another pound of them to grind through.

August 21, 2024 at 08:50 PM

Deciding for whom to vote for pres. is about figuring out who you think is the best manager - the one with the best relationships. It's like being able to perceive the hearts of your teenage kids's friends by knowing who they hang out with, who they get along with.

August 21, 2024 at 02:05 PM

As I thumb through the glossy magazine produced by a local private school, two things stick out to me: generational wealth, and the continued propagation of WASP-y aspirational status seeking. Conventionality. Is that a word? Conventionalness - the condition of fitting into the standard mold.

August 21, 2024 at 08:06 AM

Songs in my head today:

August 21, 2024 at 06:15 AM

The poetry of Emily Dickinson still pricks my soul and haunts me. I remember Ed Folsom's class at Iowa, wherein I was made to memorize a po-em (he always had an emphasis on the second syllable).

Now I've just discovered a "new" edition of her po-ems (from 2016) called "Emily Dickinson's Poems as She Preserved Them." Which I must have. Does the library have it?

August 19, 2024 at 09:26 PM

I used to get The NY Times in print for free from the stands that were placed throughout the University of Iowa campus. You swiped your student ID in the hopper, popped the lid, and grabbed a paper. I would sit at my desk, paper open, with a notebook, and write down notes on articles as I went.

I don't really know why I did this. But I did it for years.

August 17, 2024 at 06:56 AM

Songs in my head this morning:

August 16, 2024 at 02:10 PM

I successfully pushed an update to my personal site that automatically sorted my "Reading" section by the most recently updated page. It uses the .md file into to sort things around. This made me pretty darn proud - because it's exactly how I wanted it to look.

Listen: I'm no web design genius. But an idea and or two, sparked into flame by the info and tutorials available online can get you very far down the path.

August 12, 2024 at 09:36 PM

Today I randomly sang a quote from The National, "I'm going through an awkward phase," in my best Matt Behringer baritone and it made my daughter laugh out loud.

August 11, 2024 at 05:01 PM

This is an official test of the push from the Mac. Using my long sought after method of creating a file via the terminal and then using mate to edit in Textmate.

August 10, 2024 at 11:15 PM

Testing a sync pull

August 10, 2024 at 03:55 PM

The French love for their little Victor reminds me of Hawkeye fans love for Caitlin Clark. Bordering on obsession. I write this while wearing an Iowa shirt bearing her number.

August 09, 2024 at 06:28 PM

When the strings kick in on Wall of Eyes. And you know This isn't a The Smile. It's a Radiohead record. Post-Radiohead. Okay.

August 09, 2024 at 06:29 AM

Decided to go out to Braum's for end of summer after soccer ice cream. The kids were messing around with the salt shaker - one tasted some and remarked "Too salty!"

August 06, 2024 at 07:42 AM

I forgot what I was going to write, just now. But I'm excited to be writing what I forgot to write from my new/old 2014 Macbook Air.

August 05, 2024 at 10:15 PM

Iowa football enters the preseason rankings at number 25. Something to watch this year. I'm hoping to attend a slate of local high school games and soak in and report on their various cultures.

August 05, 2024 at 10:16 AM

Those Stone Temple Pilots records - I think they hold up pretty well today. Core … is pretty MEH. But especially Purple and Tiny Music … they were sort of a tad bit reviled by the alt-rock punky purists of the time … but they sound good now.

July 31, 2024 at 04:18 PM

"I just hope it inspires Mattison to see her papa working hard."

Spoken as the true inner monologue of workaholic parents everywhere. Suddenly realizing that all the time they thought they had went up in smoke.

July 26, 2024 at 09:50 AM

My new parenting book says

July 26, 2024 at 09:44 AM

Months have passed in the story. And I love how when reading a novel, you can fluidly move back and forward in time.

July 21, 2024 at 05:19 PM

We've been muddling through a trying ordeal of a soccer tournament. It's at the beach. All the parking area flooded. And the weather has been bad. On again off again. Now it's on again.

July 07, 2024 at 07:17 AM

The warp and the woof of it all.

July 05, 2024 at 01:18 PM

Let's just take for example, Namibia.

June 18, 2024 at 05:33 PM

Saw Inside Out 2. Enjoyed it and it was worth seeing. Not as thoroughly captivating as the first. BUT - the portrayal of Anxiety was spot on, I thought. The color orange seemed exactly the correct color. And the voice (Maya Hawke) evoked a touch of sympathy but also an edginess - it was always teetering on the verge of losing control - yet continued to stay the course and believe in her good intentions. Powerful.

June 15, 2024 at 08:06 AM

For an unknown reason I'm thinking of the Iowa State Cyclone basketball teams of the early 2000's. Eustachy's teams. And when he showed up at that student party. And the star player was ... someone ... Tinsley. And the big guy — I can't remember his name.

May 14, 2024 at 10:08 PM

I'm getting quicker and quicker to just declare RSS bankruptcy and mark everything for a day As Read.

May 05, 2024 at 11:35 PM

The thrill of finding a new sound or a song that speaks. It still makes my heart come to life and thump.

May 01, 2024 at 06:48 PM

Mowed the grass today. Used one of my N95 masks, which didn't leave me a pile of snot for the rest of the day after.

April 25, 2024 at 07:48 PM

The way some parents converse about youth sports. It sounds like life or death. Maybe it is? Work, little one, to appease the watchful eyes, full of wrath and wild expectations.

April 25, 2024 at 03:36 PM

Nobody cares about my life story, my thoughts, what I'm feeling, my opinion on any matter, what I did today or any day.

April 24, 2024 at 10:49 PM

In the future, I think I might need to become an occasional Apple Music subscriber. I'll do a month or two, compile a list of stuff I'm really liking, cancel the sub, then go on to purchase those records to own outright.

April 24, 2024 at 09:06 AM

I think that my job in the world is just to notice things - pick up on vibes - hear the undertone in a person's voice. To try to be curious and take a closer look.

April 17, 2024 at 06:52 PM

I thought the sound quality of the original AirPods Pro was satisfactory. Even good. But the second gen model is so much better that I feel embarrassed to have held my prior belief. They're my favorite headphones ever.

March 22, 2024 at 11:02 AM

Could every work of art in whatever format be about 12 minutes long? Or whatever the equivalent of 12 minutes of time is in "weight" or amount or quantity.

March 11, 2024 at 12:18 PM

What happened to the young man who used to spend piles of quarters playing Virtual Tennis at the Old Capitol Mall arcade.

February 29, 2024 at 08:29 PM

I eavesdropped on a job interview during our visit to In N Out for free hot chocolate The candidate kept saying how much he liked their burgers and chili fries.

I'm fairly certain they don't serve chili fries ...

Felt a bit sorry for the candidate.

February 20, 2024 at 09:05 AM

Lawson is feeling a bit under the weather today. He was up last night for several hours - hoping he will snooze a bit this morning. I think he might have a fever.

In other news: the churches here were full of sympathy for Israel after Oct 7 - which was good and right. And we prayed for them to recover - and inadvertently also prayed for the success of a murderous military mission - which is now dehumanizing millions of innocent normal people. And where is the church now - where is the sympathy.

February 16, 2024 at 11:38 AM

I had never listened to Sun Kil Moon prior to the other day - but I remember all the acclaim in the mid teens - and after listening to Benji, I just don't get it. Sometimes the songs are lovely, but the rambling of the singing - a vibe I would enjoy in theory - but it just felt dumb and pointless.

February 15, 2024 at 06:49 AM

As I get older I'm increasingly convinced that, truly, nothing good happens after 10 PM. For me at least. Life would be better if I could flip my schedule and always be awake at 5.

February 14, 2024 at 07:45 PM

I've decided that I'll probably need to have Apple Music AND continue to buy music. To actually own and possess the stuff I care about. Or maybe get a record player again and buy vinyl.

February 10, 2024 at 10:28 AM

Do you sometimes feel it would be the best use of your remaining time to sit down and just read as many books as possible? I do. Just to do nothing else at all. Ever. And expire your final breath in the chair of reading.

February 03, 2024 at 10:06 PM

Watching The Banshees of Inishirin

January 30, 2024 at 07:36 PM

I still feel the past and my experiences buried there as if they were the present. The big long now. Memories are bubble up and seem real in the moment and as if they are happening again and again.

January 19, 2024 at 06:18 AM

This is a Joyce-an puzzlement: Carol Oates will write a short paragraph that uses two tenses of "penetrate."

Throbbing notes "penetrating." The Jesters who "penetrated" the very air

It's a feat.

January 07, 2024 at 02:40 PM

There's a couple here, one wearing a Pantera shirt and one wearing a Mudvayne shirt. At least I assume they're a couple.

January 04, 2024 at 06:22 AM

I like my kids to see me with a book in hand, if at all possible. Instead of scrolling or poking or prodding at a device. So I try to be up before them and be reading on the couch.