Track saw or a circular saw

The FAA has not yet issued a final Airworthiness Directive on the seat installation issue. Publication as an NPRM begins the public consultation process, allowing airlines, Boeing, and other stakeholders to submit their comments before the FAA determines whether to issue a legally enforceable AD.

I just started Groundskeeping by Lee Cole. A small town love story about a couple of writers. Really good writing so far (~20%)

Last week I finished King Sorrow by Joe Hill. I think the bones were great, but the author struggled to make the final conflict interesting. Too many threads, not woven together nicely. Still a good read, just didn’t quite land the plane.

I also read We the People by Jill Lepore… a history of the US constitution. Great stuff, fascinating to see the back and forth of parties (and sides of the political spectrum) changing their opinions on amendments. Basically, the party who doesn’t control the supreme court demands amendment and the other party fights it tooth and nail. There were some very sad parts looking at the arguments for (and against) women’s suffrage, emancipation and equal rights. Really gross to look back at the 1850s through 1960s opinion on anyone who wasn’t a white man

I don’t know that specific machine, but some advice in general for making good espresso at home

1. Get a scale so you can measure inputs and outputs
2. Upgrade your grinder before your machine
3. A dosing funnel is really helpful, but not necessary
4. Spritz your beans with a bit of water before you grind to eliminate static electricity
5. A WDT is helpful for declumping the grounds if you don’t have a peak grinder
6. A distributor and weighted tamper can help improve your puck prep
7. You don’t need a rubber mat. Just get a towel to put down. I bought a 50 pack of “car wash towels” and use those for everything
8. Clean your machine at least once a month

I’ve got one Jammy box and one Resolute… I don’t love Canonical, but not enough hate to migrate my hosts to another distribution

I use Apollo + Moonlight. Apollo ships with a virtual display so I don’t have to have anything connected to the PC in the rack

That sounds awesome. Thanks for the rec

How do those compare to Le Carré’s George Smiley books?

Craft: Stories I Wrote for the Devil was a lot of fun.

About 80% complete with We the People a review of the US constitution and efforts to amend it over the 250 years. Really well written and super interesting

about 40% done with King Sorrow by Joe Hill. What happens when you summon a dragon to help with a problem? Really fun and I don’t want to stop reading.

Last week I finished Market Forces by Richard K. Morgan, his third book after the first two books in the altered carbon series. I thought it was just okay, but I liked the absurdist world of late stage capitalism. Unabashed corporations sponsoring coups in emerging markets

You can’t let them in here! They’ll see the big board!

Unfortunately, the answer to all time “travel to the near past” questions is “Buy bitcoin”.

$1,000 investment in 2009 becomes a billion dollars in 2020

Yeah you still have to buy the eyepatch and the peg leg and the parrot

Just started my reread of The Restoration of Rome: Barbarian Popes and Imperial Pretenders after about 20 years. I remember enjoying it the first time. It’s a look at three separate attempts to restore the greatness of Rome (Theodoric in c475, Justinian c572 and Charlemagne c800)

Just finished:

• Lázár: a fascinating novel about an aristocratic Hungarian family from ~1880s through the 1950s. Man, they were awful people
• The Undiscovered Country: Triumph, Tragedy and the Shaping of the American West: I wanted this to be better than it was. A look at the eras of The West through men who epitomized the era… starting in the mid 1700s with George Washington and Daniel Boone, then moving forward to Sitting Bull and Wild Bill Hickok. Unfortunately the book falls prey to the “let me just give you a series of events with varying levels of detail” form of history instead of successfully weaving a coherent narrative across 180 years of history
• The Witch by Marie NDiaye: short listed for the 2026 international Booker prize after not much critical acclaim during the original printing in 1996. It was fine. An interesting story and a unique one at that, but didn’t say much. The translation from French to English was good, I think it could have been fleshed out more and been a better read

The Border Trilogy is fantastic. The first two books are about young men discovering themselves in the west. Book three is a nice coda, bringing them together and closing some threads. Not nearly as violent or bloody as The Road or Blood Meridian.

No Country for Old Men is also fantastic. The movie was very faithful, the book is better but in a different way

I always came down on the Hornblower side. Have you read that series? How do they compare?

It’s an issue with the dairy industry as a whole. They’ve bred cows to be so efficient at producing milk fat that the cows are overproducing. The current dairy pipeline is having a hard time dealing with the excess, so this is one of the options (just sell higher fat milk)

I think it’s great for milk based espresso drinks. Really easy to foam and has a nice mouthfeel. Calories are much higher though, so you have to pay attention to what you’re consuming more

Xiao Xiao 1-4 on newgrounds

Hah! Hadn’t noticed that… no other Lewises in my queue