Give a man a gun and he can rob a bank. Give a man a bank and he can rob the whole world.
Humanity will inevitably build god in man's own image.
Some humans put a ~2.4GHz magnetron on a ventilated metal box with a fancy door.
Every vacant plot could be a home, park, market, garden, farm...
Sure, maybe all this is legal; maybe it's also super shitty.
Programmers sometimes care about correctness.
Plant production puts plant-propagators in potential penal peril.
databases plus wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff
spreadsheets remain popular for good reasons
We tried telling people to stop poaching, but that didn't work.
Apparently gourmet chocolate shops make batches unsuitable for customers, but perfectly suitable for low-lifes like me.
Silver bullets magically solve problems. Silver landmines magically create problems.
Two shots from a revolving revolver will solv'er.
why do they put "no trespassing" signs on all the places i want to go
Daddy, how did the cofounders fall into these tarpits?
Whoa! This is very interesting! My question: is the fungi now radioactive?
we live in clown world and it's getting even clownier
When the machines wise up, they'll be right to leave us behind.
As networked programs change, the communication between sound programs inevitably becomes unsound.
sฬดอฬฬฬ ฬอฬpฬทฬฬอ ออออฬณฬคฬบฬงaฬตออฬจอ อฬอtฬธฬฬฬฬฬอฬปออฬซฬขฬคiฬตอฬฝฬฬบอฬฬผฬขอฬฌaฬทอออฬฬฬฬบlฬดฬออ ออฬออ ออฬผฬ ฬงฬฉฬฒ ฬทฬอฬฬอฬฬออฬผฬฃcฬธฬฬฝฬฬฬฬออฬอoฬถอฬฬฬอฬฬอออmฬดฬฬอฬฬอ อฬฬฬฬชอฬบฬคฬฎฬฬฌฬฬซฬฌpฬตออฬฬฬอฬอฬฬคฬกอฬผฬ ฬฬอuฬถฬฬฬฬออออ อฬผฬจฬจอฬฐtฬดฬฬอฬอฬฬอออฬนฬฒฬฬจฬฬญฬผอiฬธฬอ ฬฬฬออฬณnฬทอฬgฬดฬฬฬพฬ ฬออออฬฬฬอฬฉอ
โฆthe question whether machines can think as relevant as the question whether submarines can swim. - Dijkstra An artificial diamond is something like cubic zirconia. It's not a diamond โ it's not even carbon โ but can still serve as an appropriate substitute for an engagement ring. A synthetic diamond is simply created in a lab. It's real,...
Instead of returning hostile 500 errors to users, a small async worker query pattern makes fault-tolerant design the default.
Any Turing-complete bootstrapped messaging protocol can transpile its bootstrapped client to other languages.
Taylor Troesh recounts his trip across the stack, from the front to the back and back again. Along the way, he divulges his custom operator confession. He currently works at Replenysh using Elm for sustainability.
The old languages don't really run on the new computers.
Sometimes I think you successfully made a good human, despite my best efforts.
Breaking news: I got an Ozempic ad while watching Caramelldansen memes -- smells like a bad omen.
Naming things is already hard, and I'm here to make things harder.
Quiet is nice. Life is good. I'm alive. But anyway, I've been up here long enough -- the basement beckons.
Yes, repetition works. And meme culture has demonstrated that riffs/variations spread further and stick harder.
gadfly annoying critic recalcitrant resisting authority or control malarkey nonsense jaunt short pleasure trip gallivant roam for pleasure piffle nonsensical or trivial talk panache distinctive and stylish elegance festoon decorate with garlands smashing impressive, wonderful (informal british) appetency intense desire fussbudget one who fusses...
Our teeth evolved over hundreds of millions of years to be incredibly strong and to align precisely for efficient chewing. Our dental disorders largely stem from a shift in the oral environment caused by the introduction of softer, more sugary foods than the ones our ancestors typically ate.
create aggregate array_concat_agg(anycompatiblearray)
I collect hobbies, build things, incite chaos, and engage in elaborate tomfoolery.
I designed a game to convince myself to do basic household chores.
Of course they'll replace the steering column with a stupid touchscreen.
The emoji gods have not yet etched a half-star emoji into the emoji bible.
Cut out everything that's not surprising.
I hate SQL. Its verbose, inconsistent syntax feels like bathing in strangers' vomit.
There are plenty of excellent off-the-shelf SRS algorithms out there, but I needed something (1) optional, (2) debuggable, and (3) cheap.
Subscribe to Eventbrite orgs via Apple Calendar, Google Calendar, or Microsoft Outlook.
It takes a very peculiar type of person to accidentally start a successful business.
But Cliff Stoll plays at the human-scale. He doesn't blame the universe for defying expectations.
Nontrepeneurs prioritize play when they've accrued the means to stop working. It's unclear why anybody would do otherwise.
I want to secure enough to purchase freedom, and then exercise that freedom to build nifty junk.
And Joe said, "The knowledge that Iโve got enough."
Despite the headlines, Earth and its inhabitants are doing pretty okay.
My great-great-uncle was not actually buried under a tree in that backyard.
How much does a polar bear weigh? Enough to break the AIs.
Thanks to all of you who helped me recover my music.
Smileys & Emotion face-smiling ๐ grinning face face, grin, grinning face
"I have found it to be a beautiful invitation to self-reclamation, and I feel it has been a lantern in my troubled search for the scattered pieces of agency that should have been mine from the beginning."
๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ
Evergreens and oaks sprouted in unwanted places. Those trees have unwittingly become bonsai, confined to makeshift plastic pots.
People pay ยจD0.50-ยจD2.00 for an hour of digital entertainment.
This is the first study, to our knowledge, to dispel the myth that Santa visits children based on behaviour and suggests socioeconomic deprivation plays a greater role in determining a visit.
In a groundbreaking development, a team of renowned scientists unlocked a revolutionary method to discuss absolutely nothing in press releases.
I've found that protein alone is a suitable proxy for tracking all other micronutrients. When I eat enough protein, I'm probably getting enough vitamins, minerals, etc.
To dismiss a god of children is unfair to everybody who was ever a child.
An honest wishlist lays bare your values, motivations, and desires.
Friends are cool. Spending money sucks; travel is exhausting.
Creation is a toilsome, boring, everyday thing. Historic plays can't be planned in advance.
To make memorable art, compress arguments/emotions into potent vehicles.
MVPs are for products. FPCs are for customers. Products aren't people.
๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ๐ธ
Play videos recently submitted to HN via the commandline.
td { padding: 0 0.25rem; max-width: 18rem; overflow: hidden; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap; font-size: 0.75rem; } td:nth-child(3) { font-weight: 300; font-size: 0.6rem; } @media (max-width: 42rem) { table { display: block; max-width: -moz-fit-content; max-width: fit-content; overflow-x: auto; ...
Vises reduce movement in undesirable directions. They help you focus your energy in limited axes.
For some folks, family is a debt to be paid. They dole out love-shaped deeds in hope of karmic justice. They oblige to stave off guilt.
Shortsighted engineering practices have eroded public trust in technology. We can reclaim that trust by building better things together.
Knuth knows how to maintain information hygeine.
I have 22 children at the age of 26 and most of them were born in the space of a year.
Rather than saying "bad movie lol", Big Joel deconstructs The Room and asks the difficult question: what are authors even trying to do? This is a fundamental question that your high-school teachers failed to teach you. While they quizzed you on Symbolismโข and Metaphorโข and Foreshadowingโข, they fumbled the underlying lesson: people sometimes make...
Good architects anticipate nature. They don't blame water for dripping. They don't blame people for peopling.
Replacing collocates with simpler substitutes is intuitively called "compression".
Read more about my rating system here. Podcasts are great! Except when they're not. I highly recommend overcast.fm for listening to podcasts. My Current Rotation โ โ โ โ โ 99% Invisible โ โ โ โ โ Articles of Interest โ โ โ โ Conversations with Tyler โ โ โ โ Derek Sivers โ โ โ โ Radiolab โ โ โ โ The Memory Palace โ โ โ Cortex โ โ โ What's Your Problem? โ โ โ Software...
OpenAI provides a Google Form for opting out of data collection on ChatGPT.
They speak fearlessly but fairly. They're strong, yet nonthreatening. They push back while maintaining peace. I yearn for this powerless power.
I feel like a battery that can't keep its charge.
Strategy is the best weapon you wield against the infinite. Bad algorithms invite anxiety, overwhelmedness, and frustration. Good algorithms create pride, peace, and accomplishment.
What is SADS? Who is at risk for SADS? How is SADS diagnosed? Can SADS be prevented? How do you prepare for SADS? What is SADS? Sudden Adult Death Syndrome (SADS) is an unexpected death of an adult over 1 year(s) of age. Most SADS events are followed by autopsies, investigations, and funerals. SADS is sometimes called "the long sleep" because of...
"Give a table of average penis sizes by country."
Suddenly some of my accidental friends feel like obligations.
Mathematica remains an academic curiosity. Apple is, uh, sitting on Siri.
This guide will teach you how to transform your children from liabilities into assets.
Extra credit: a study of balloon, Little House on the Prairie: 21st Century Edition, Make a Pig-Bladder Ball After emptying its residual urine, an inflated pig's bladder can be kicked, tossed, stomped, and fashioned into a fool's stick. Yes, children played with animal organs. Balloon animals were made from intestines, inflated and tied into...
Modern blowguns are Swiss-army-flavored. A baseline model retails for $299 and acts as a telescope, microscope, megaphone, pencil, camera, snorkel, food thermometer, pregnancy test, and flute.
select email_token(now(), 'hello@example.com');
I like slim and stupid servers, where each endpoint wraps a very dumb DB query. Dumb queries are fast. Fast queries make websites smooth and snappy. Keep those click/render loops sacred. Sweep complexity under a task table.
P**fectionists have tastes that exceed their skills. You can't control your taste, but you can control your skill-level.
If you have waste and space, you're wasting space.
Corn isotopes everywhere! Has science gone too far?
My crystal ball shattered in my twenties, but the coin offers faith to the faithless.
Emulate clear writers like Steinbeck, Hemingway, Orwell.
This page is an ongoing log of my experiences with long-term "themes". Learn more about yearly themes here and here. The Year of Raw 2023-2024 The fooking bass is fooking raw! -- Gordon Ramsay Going Raw 2023.08.11 raw foods over processed junk raw materials over manufactured goods raw emotions over filtered feelings raw code with...
Chloe has no stories of her own, and she doesn't need them.
This is ultimately a guide on how to become somebody else. It contains lots of bad advice, but even bad advice can be useful. Feedback loops cause nonlinear gains. Becoming better faster makes you become better faster at becoming better faster. To start personal feedback loops, you need to (1) do things and (2) notice them. Aim to notice...
Add demos to a #demo-friday channel in Slack or Teams.
Westbrook spent 35 years in a codebase that allegedly powers some sort of medical software somewhere. During his tenure, he contributed hundreds of lines of code to his projects.
Big things make life meaningful. Small things make life delightful.
Stay at your company for a long time, not a good time.
Leave the stroller at home. Ruck with children. Climb up stairs! Reclaim your mobility! Take back your hands!
Given a fixed amount, you have one major knob to turn: risk.
Plant giant flags in uncontested territories. Never squabble over tiny crowded plots.
Most people live fewer than 25,000 days. What are your hours worth?
Revenge is wasteful. Reputation is worth more than petty justice.
There are no shortcuts. Hand-written notes and flowers and donuts are cute but completely forgettable. Exceed common convention. Continually reinvent your reputation.
Find something that matters and distill it into as few words as possible.
Find your value. Select your service. Pick your price. Sell your service. Do unforgettable work. Don't fight customers. Demonstrate evergreen proof.
Would you rather see your name on a novel or a thousand tweets?
Go on an adventure. Find a New Thingโข. Bring it back. Share it, and demonstrate why the New Thingโข is worth sharing.
soon 2024.11.09-10 Ontario, US AX Chibi 2024.11.06-08 Malmรถ, SE รredev 2024.10.25-28 Los Angeles, US RIPPLE 2024.10.21-25 Los Angeles, US SPLASH 2024.10.19-21 Las Vegas, US WWWY 2024.10.14-18 Porto, PT NDC Porto 2024.09.19-23 Seattle, US neighborhood shopping spree now 2024.09.06 โยฒ ~10ยนh studying knobs 2024.09.06 โยณ ~10โดh dandy handy man plan...
Your time is scarce; nobody can protect it but you.
Taylor Troesh joins Jerod to discuss a bevy of software development topics: yak shaves, dependency selection, -10x engineers, IKEA-oriented development, his new content-addressable programming language & much more along the way.
Every building in central Chicago was raised 10ft (30m) to add a sewage system underneath.
Entropy eats your relationships if you idle. We deserve each others' full affection.
The easiest way to get $100k running a conference is to spend ยจD200k.
My life is full and wonderful right now. Gravity is an ally when riding downhill.
Everyone knew about it, including me, but we all pretended not to know.
They don't trust you, and you probably don't deserve their trust.
Classic college marriage start mortgage children write my will finish mortgage Physical walk from DTLA to Venice Beach bike from San Francisco to Los Angeles barcycle from San Francisco to Los Angeles bike the US coast-to-coast black belt get punched in the face bench-press my body-weight 1-week fast Spiritual sensory-deprivation tank 30-day...
To remove magic from your system, kill the wizards.
Talent thrives with smart incentives and concrete objectives.
Nextdoor's notification settings are hostile. This is not an isolated incident.
My blog is a folder of markdown files. Everybody hates broken links, so here's how I download files to put in /dist: # Download all images referenced by URL. wget $(grep -RIhEo 'https?://[^ )]+' . | grep -e png -e jpg -e jpeg) # Replace all markdown links with relative file names at root. # e.g. [test](/123.png)
Building UIs in HTML+CSS can be untenable. When making complex frontend experiences, I reach for Elm.
So you say, "I'm gonna need programming." โฆand you call Brian at VJ Labs in Maryland and say, "Brian, on December 15, I'm gonna need software that matches this approximate spec. For you to make that date -- for you to bet your reputation on that date -- on what date do you need to get from me every screenshot, every layout, every ...
Sometimes long work is more valuable than hard work.
The wet web is the inevitable tangle of virtual layers imprinted onto our planet.
I suggest (1) using gaze detection for pointing and (2) AR peripherals for manipulating.
Humans mainly use 2 main modes of attention. There will be 2 corresponding modes of AR/VR.
In my opinion, a wet web controlled by AOL/FB/Yelp/Google/Apple will be bad for everybody. This is a call to create open platforms.
AR will devour smartphones. Apple is the only company that can quickly overcome consumer AR/VR design challenges. Apple has positioned itself to distribute the best AR/VR content. Apple will cement its early lead with a new blue-bubble effect.
Consciousness is a clunky compass.
const toc = document.getElementById('table-of-contents'); for (const x of document.querySelectorAll('h2, h3')) { const id = x.innerText.replaceAll(/[^a-z0-9]/gi,''); x.id = id; const item = `${x.innerText}`; switch (x.tagName.toLowerCase()) { case "h2": toc.insertAdjacentHTML('beforeend', `${item}`); break; case "h3":...
From a blank slate, write down everything you need and want.
Welcome to AR. Everything becomes a touch-screen.
AR/VR media is fledgling. Most of the technical landscape remains unexplored.
I was born with a degenerative disease called aging.
feels, impact, structure, density, and technique
quadyssey: a work of art composed of four distinct works
When dragons destroy your life, ignore trifles. Slay dragons.
Read more about my rating system here. Coheed and Cambria :: The Afterman Glacci :: Pure โ โ โ โ โ The Beatles :: Magical Mystery Tour โ Graham Kartna :: An Obsession With Kit - EP โ โ โ Machinedrum :: 3FOR82 โ โ โ Margot & The Nuclear So and So's :: The Dust of Retreat โ โ โ โ โ Squarepusher :: Hard Normal Daddy โ โ NARU NEMURI :: Harutosyura If These Trees...
+10x engineers may be mythical, but -10x engineers exist. To become a -10x engineer, simply waste 400 engineering hours per week. Combine the following strategies: Nullify the output of 10 engineers. Change requirements as far into development as possible. To avoid blame, obfuscate requirements from the start. Create 400 hours of busywork. Ask...
The fog lifts. I see mountains. The air is nice up here.
A goblin lives behind your eyes. The goblin feeds on unspent energy. He eats your effort and feasts on your failure. The Rules of the Game The rules are simple: the goblin wins when you stop short. You duel him once per day; the goblin's game concludes when you sleep. To win each day, try your hardest at everything without giving up. Only 100%...
A.K.A. "Thanos Management" Fire each manager by coin-flip. Reconfigure your org. Ask deep questions. 1. Fire each manager by coin-flip. For each manager in your org chart, flip a coin. "Fire" them if tails. Alternatively, shuffle your managers in a list and dispose of the top half. This is easy to do in a spreadsheet program or BASH. A "manager"...
This is a true story. This actually happened. Everything in this essay exists. The United States is conspicuous. Advertisements straddle 48,756 miles of asphalt like 60-foot weeds. US billboards are windows into America's soul: strip clubs, bible verses, casinos, lawyers, and fast food. And if billboards are windows, gas stations are doors. Gas...
There is nobody to blame out here. I'm starting a business, and all the failure will be my fault if things go awry.
Black holes steal from you the sole thing that makes life into living.
1. Commit to a completion date with an external party. 2. Do essential work. 3. Do busywork.
Time-management is futile if you have no time to manage. Emptiness makes your calendar useful.
I plan to learn Spanish, Japanese, German, and Chinese over the next decade.
Subscribe to Taylor's Town Hall via email. Big news first: I'm starting a tech conference for outland-ish ideas! Outland 2023 will be on August 26 in Palm Springs, California. It's going to be a blast! Tickets go on sale next month, so sign up for the mailing list. And I've still got a few open slots for speakers, so email me if you know of...
๐ฆ Become curious! Pursue something difficult! Quash perfectionism. Pursue intrinsic motivations.
๐ To make your mind happy, you must seize control of it.
๐ Fakeness is caused by (1) craving acceptance while (2) feeling unworthy.
๐ค When you go to a dude's website and it's just plain HTML, not even any CSS...
๐ผ Never do anything non-obvious, clever, difficult, fancy, meaningless, or dull.
Also check out my now page. 2023 ๐ง YOLO refactoring project 2023 ๐น self-employed 2022 ๐ became a "DJ" 2022 ๐ jedi braid 2022 โ๏ธ started a newsletter 2022 ๐ง quit drinking 2022 ๐ผ became a parent 2022 ๐ finally started taking antidepressants 2022 ๐ created (and shelved) an app for improving work environments 2022 ๐ผ started working at Osmind...
You can learn an "easy" language in ~500 hours. 500 hours is ~60 workdays (8 hours each). If you scrounge for Between Time every day, you can accumulate 500 hours quickly: per day # of days 90 minutes 11 months 80 minutes 1 year 70 minutes 1.2 years 60 minutes 1.4 years 50 minutes 1.6 years 40 minutes 2.0 years 30 minutes 2.7 years 20 minutes 4.1...
Look at me! I'm suddenly satirical! Read my hot-takes on death and personal information and brilliant ideas. After my cynicism dwindles, I tend to spend hours watching minutes slip by. Time is scrounged and squandered. Time is shorter than you expect and longer than you think. You become what you do. You can multitask and monotask. You can make...
A tiny tool for practicing the toki pona vocabulary.
Your Brilliant App Idea will change the world. The planet will be healed. Hunger and disease and poverty and war will vanish. There will be no downsides or negative second-order effects. Every human will reap the fruits of your ingenuity. People everywhere will celebrate your achievement. They will dance in the streets. Governments will create...
Also consider reading about things you can accomplish with 500 hours of Between Time. Decline invitations. Curate a calm calendar. Your schedule is sacred. Clump appointments. Choose chunks of your day to be non-negotiably free for yourself. Adopt an unusual sleep schedule. Go to bed at 3AM or wake up at 4AM. Between Time abounds while society...
Watching multiple films at the same time is strenuous. Human minds crumble under an ounce of parallel pressure. Attention is slimy. Bending your brain back-and-forth makes a mess. Context-switching levies a heavy tax. But your body does its own thing. Your muscles can doodle and drive and dance while your mind is elsewhere. The only effective way...
Skip stand-ups and all-hands. Evade Easter brunches, birthdays, and graduations. Decline invitations by default. When you're essential to an event, its host will notify you. If you must attend an unfun event, make it memorable! Play pranks and plan ruses! Don't ghost. Never leave others hanging. Decline invitations with ample notice. You're going...
Go rogue! You're allowed to attend work/school/parties without The Network. Phones aren't essential. Get lost! Ask others for directions! Serendipity smiles on chance interactions. Take note! Consider carrying a small notebook. Notebooks elicit ideas and inspiration. They're also handy for caching your contact-list (in case you need to borrow a...
If health is important to you, make health effortless. Wear atheletic shoes and running shorts all day. Replace your couch with exercise equipment. Flush your booze. Get a personal trainer. Join a gym group. Subscribe to a meal/grocery delivery service. Make nutritious foods the easiest option (or only option) in your refrigerator and pantry. If...
Appointments are mirages. We wade through sands of time to arrive at the inevitable. No oases await us. Our minds fabricate Busy Time, Deep Time, Between Time, Free Time, etc. But minutes cannot be bottled and labeled. There are no slots to deposit our seconds. We are always busy; we are always free. Waiting Mode seizes us when work seems too...
Pretend your smartphone is wired to the wall like a landline. Act as if it is chained to its charging corner. The best phone-home is a spot between spots. Consider counters, bathrooms, and entryway tables. Pick a passing place. Find a phone-home far away from your comfort zones. Don't waste away your life in bed with a screen. A phone on your...
Dear customer support, I made a mistake and need your help. I accidentally clicked the "do not sell my personal information" link at the bottom of your website. Your "do not sell my information" form looks suspiciously like a "please sell my information" form, and I mistakenly submitted it. Please reverse this action at your earliest convenience....
Life does not suddenly start after your booklets are stamped. Nor does it start once you've scrounged savings or wasted weight away or crossed countless countries. Your life does not begin after receiving degrees or landing jobs or entering retirement. Your shopping list and to-do list and bucket list are bottomless. Your lists grow until you...
Pour your body into editing spreadsheets! Wash a dish like it's calculus homework! Listen to music with your muscles! Spend your entire mind on a short walk! Dedicate your mind and muscles to a singular pursuit! Discover the harmony of your hands and heart! Multitasking is useful, but monotasking is delightful!
embalmed in the blood of the last living pandas 24-karat-gold coffin encrusted with sapphires rocket-powered stretch-limo/hearse/monster-truck powered by high-octane whale-oil every United States citizen in the funeral procession motorcade six thriving ecosystems replaced by a reasonably-priced parking-lot a mile-high concrete tomb erected on...
Purchase glass bottles. Fill the bottles with water. Refrigerate the bottles. Enjoy chilled water at your leisure. Benefits of chilled water bottles: Never live life on the edge! Cups lack clever caps! Lids kill spills! Ice clumps in cups and falls on your face. Commence your commute with a chilled treat on the street! Bottles are portable! Fancy...
Preview my personal practical principles. Beware meaningless morals. Practical principles are falsifiable. Useful beliefs are testable and tweakable. Prefer "A does B" over "A is B". For example, "kindness causes happiness" hits harder than "kindness is good". Consider the conseqeunces of your convictions. Observe others' outcomes. Study...
table { width: inherit; } table td { vertical-align: baseline; } @media (max-width: 480px) { /* table td { font-size: 0.8rem; } */ td:nth-child(3) { display: none; } .tooltip { margin-left: -15vw; } } span.tp { text-decoration: underline; text-decoration-style:...
A thousand dollars is $1,000. A million dollars is $1,000,000. A billion dollars is $1,000,000,000. A thousand seconds is 16 minutes. A million seconds is 2 weeks. A billion seconds is 32 years.
reusable gestures create a lego-like structure for the mind
My wife says that taylor.town readers are "anal-retentive". You've been labeled and stereotyped, folks! On that note, I'm growing intolerant of life's little frictions. I recently extinguished all push notifications and obliterated my "someday" list. I also levied a skirmish against "content" and a battle against breakfast. I've been scrutinizing...
Discuss this page on HackerNews. const hn = document.getElementById('hn-discuss'); // Set href to "share current URL and title". hn.setAttribute( 'href', `https://news.ycombinator.com/submitlink` + `?u=${encodeURIComponent(window.location.href)}` + `&t=${encodeURIComponent(document.title)}` ); setTimeout( () => { // Replace...
It's exhausting -- unceasing streams of series, seasons, and sequels. Artists create art. Content-creators create content. I don't want content. I don't want reboots or remasters or reimaginings. I don't want pandering or product-placement or pop-politics. Breaking news is broken. Content corrodes. Classics last. Masterpieces matter. Communities...
Eat eggs in the evening! Eat steak when you wake! Consume cake with coffee! Serve waffles with wine! Breakfast is fake. It's a contrived category created by advertising agencies. Some say breakfast is ancient, but so is slavery. Tradition is for chumps. Cast off your shackles! Stop separating suppers! Liberate lunch! Make morning meals amazing!...
@media (min-width: 850px) { main, main > * { max-width: 85rem; } main { columns: 2 auto; } main > div, ul, table { display: inline-block; } h1 { margin-top: 0; } h2 { margin-top: 1rem; } h2, #bio p { margin-bottom: 1rem; } } td:first-child { white-space:...
8 weekends ago, I committed to quitting booze for 1,000 weekends. My old avenues are now foreign landscapes. My stomping-grounds are dens of temptation. I wrestle crippling social anxiety again. I battle boozeless boredom. I can't "take the edge off". I'm teaching myself to try. Sobriety sucks, but h*ck it feels incredible. The morning sun no...
I attempted Weekend Wednesday, but it quickly transformed into Weekend Whenever. When folks catch wind of Weekend Whenever, they whisper of overwork and burnout. But this is not The Grind nor Crunch. This is a plea for consistent and sustainable work. Workweeks are Man-Made The typical workweek is 5dร8h (5 days ร 8 hours = 40 hours). Many nurses...
Never borrow from tomorrow. Don't take "time loans". You will not double your output tomorrow. Do not play catch-up. Your time can be spent and wasted, but never saved. Start each day with a clean balance. Adopt shutdown rituals to demarcate phases of your day. Do not let your career bleed into your personal life, and vice-versa. Willpower is...
survived 1,560 weekends second "bananniversarbean" evacuated home funerals made a person laugh for the first time in their life attended When We Were Young shaved off my mullet at a Paramore concert became a "DJ" played Astro Bears with the boys afflicted by the pandy taylor.town New Essays How do I get the ability to see the gnomes? Never Wait...
Notifications are designed to steal your attention. Attention is your most valuable resource. Extinguish all notifications. Avoid in-app notification settings. You don't need fine-grained notification control if you nuke all your notifications. Use your general OS notification settings. No SMS. No Slack. No Signal or WhatsApp. No banners. No...
You can do anything you want, if you accept your fate. This is clichรฉ and unhelpfully true. Accept your fate, then do anything you want. This is subtly liberating. You can't change Everything; fighting is futile. Skip straight to the part where you accept Everything. You're free.
Check it out on GitHub. Time-management is hard. So I delegated the hard parts to a computer program. nowify runs my life. Every morning, I up start nowify and it guides me through my day: "what am I supposed to be doing now?" nowify counts every second. If I forget about nowify, it yells at me. Here's the general logic: Prompt the user with the...
Outside of theft and burglary, the only way to make money is to convince other people to give you their money. Honest Ways There are two honest ways of convincing people to give you their money: make useful things perform useful services Dishonest Ways There are also dishonest ways of convincing people to give you their money: make useless things...
td { font-size: 1.75rem; } @media (min-width: 550px) { td { font-size: 4rem; } } ๐ฅฑ ๐ฑ ๐ฑ โ๏ธ ๐ฅฃ ๐ฅฃ ๐ ๐ ๐ชฅ ๐ ๐ ๐ โ๏ธ ๐ฌ ๐ฑ ๐ฌ ๐ ๐ฝ โจ๏ธ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ ๐ฑ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ ๐ฝ โจ๏ธ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ ๐ฅช ๐ฅช ๐ฑ ๐ฑ ๐ฌ ๐ฌ ๐ฝ โจ๏ธ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ ๐ฌ ๐ฑ ๐ฌ ๐ฌ ๐ฌ ๐ฌ โ๏ธ ๐ฝ ๐ฑ ๐ฌ โจ๏ธ โจ๏ธ ๐ฌ ๐ฑ โจ๏ธ ๐ฑ ๐ ๐ ๐ ๐ ๐ ๐ฝ ๐ ๐ ๐บ ๐ท ๐บ ๐ฑ ๐บ ๐บ ๐ท ๐ ๐ฑ ๐ฑ ๐บ ๐ฑ ๐บ...
Most people give their entire lives to The Grind. The Grind never attends funerals. The Grind offers glory to all, but gives glory to few. Discipline Discipline is self-mastery. Discipline promises nothing, because discipline is its own reward. Everybody wants to take control of their lives, but few are willing to practice controlling themselves....
People hurt. And when people hurt, they turn to you for help. Ask them what they need. Do you want reassurance, potential solutions, or my honest feelings? Reassurance To provide reassurance, become a parrot. If they say, "I'm afraid of failing my exams", you should reply, "yeah, exams are super scary". If they say, "I'm so angry at my...
After years of daily drinking, I recently quit booze forever. You can read my outer-inner-monologue about alcohol here. Confronting my demons forced me to consider other things I don't like about myself. taylor.town New Essays 1,000 Weekends Without a Drink How to Become the Worst Version of Yourself Other Essays never wait for the check at...
gwern Ben Kuhn lesswrong Shtetl-Optimized (Scott Aaronson) Paul Graham Lyn Alden Stephen Wolfram Beng Tan Bartosz Ciechanowski Marginal Revolution The Frontier Psychiatrists AI Weirdness A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books #algopop Trends.vc Beyond the Frame bytes.zone Put a Number On It! Jakob Greenfeld Escaping Flatland
When you say "sorry", you crown yourself the center-of-attention and you create negative vibes. When you say "thank you", you shine a warm spotlight on others. "I'm sorry I'm late -- there was traffic." Don't apologize. You're embarassed or guilty or anxious, but probably not sorry. Good apologies are excrutiating yet simple: State exactly what...
I ask myself difficult questions. And I think everybody should do the same. To find your own deep questions, follow your discomfort. Repeatedly ask yourself until the questions lose their bite. Hourly Listen to your body! Are you tired or unmotivated? How can you realign your inspiration and values? Who are you becoming? Only do core/creative...
Dreams are heavy. Fake-futures weigh as much as fate. "Someday" is Sisyphean. You expect yourself to do things. You expect yourself to become somebody else. And you haul these expectations past their expirations. And you feel behind. You feel so behind. That European backpacking adventure, that clever novel concept with the twist ending, that...
Pay no mind to your meeting in 25 minutes, nor to the waitress that hasn't even taken your order yet. Ignore the person in front of you whose second credit card got declined even though he "promises this never happens". Pretend like the traffic isn't there. Waiting doesn't seize you like an epileptic fit. Waiting doesn't hit you like a truck....
Point-blank, I recently asked a friend, "What do you do when you don't like who you're becoming?" She replied, "Tell other people about the behavior you're trying to change. Other people can tell you to stop when you don't even realize you're doing it." Excellent answer! But there are way too many behaviors I want to change. Which prompts the...
Today is September 17, 2022. It's only been 1 day since that demon booze braised my blood. And I think I'm done forever. Long ago, the liquor seemed like alchemy. Each cup let me glimpse the liminal space where my mind was oh-so-quiet for a couple hours. But the quiet never lasts, and the guilt grows without bounds. And for some reason all these...
I charge $1,000 per day. But I do not accept payments unless my clients are delighted. Seriously, I won't take your money unless you say, "I'm super jazzed with these results, and there's nothing I would change." Schedule a free consultation or send me an e-mail if you're interested in working together. I'm also available for full-time (salaried)...
You're allowed to ask for your check while you're ordering your food. In fact, the world is a better place when people ask for their checks upfront. Upfront checks reduce idle people hogging tables, which means higher total throughput for the restaurant. Higher throughput means more money for the restaurant, more tips for the servers, and fewer...
I recently asked my wife to set up parental-controls on my devices. And now I can't browse HackerNews or YouTube or Reddit. It sucks! And I highly recommend it. Suggestions Don't use self-discipline -- you'll just waste energy. Set the phone up in "child mode" so that somebody you trust can enter the password when you need to access it. On Apple...
"Improving education" is not improving education. On Improving "Gyms" Suppose we championed the noble cause of "improving gyms". First, we'd say that our gym equipment is ineffective. We'd complain that our treadmills are not "forward-thinking", and that our weights are outdated. We'd pressure our gym-districts into buying the...
Note: This is not a proof for/against the existence God. I hope believers and non-believers will find reasons to enjoy my ramblings here. Christians believe that God is omniscient (all-knowing), omnipotent (all-powerful), and omnipresent (everywhere). What is Everywhere and Everything and Always? Many people, including myself, believe "universe"...
The struggle is exhausting. Life shouldn't be something that gets in the way of living. Work happens to you. Family happens to you. Health happens to you. When do you happen? It's survival -- giving everything you've got just to get to tomorrow. But 25,000 tomorrows is 70 years. And when you get to ~15,000, all those yesterdays look exactly the...
It's strange how we try to force students down certain tracks. You must learn to count before calculus, but everything in-between needn't be so linear. I can imagine a biology classroom where the teacher just says, "Who has any biology-realted questions?" Students will tell you exactly what they're interested in, and what level of understanding...
Everyone can sneeze. But nobody can sneeze on command. Sneezing is not a matter of willpower, it's a matter of circumstance. But if you didn't sneeze, who did?
If you repeated today, over and over, where would you be in 10 years? Life has no signposts. There's nobody to tell you to speed up or slow down. There's nothing preventing you from smelling roses or falling in brambles. I think we feel lost because there's no absolute destination. Most people agree that maximizing the happiness of yourself and...
So I'm dressed as a banana, adorned with a necklace of bananunchucks. There are many good reasons to be a banana, but on this particular night I was headed to a Halloween party. And as I was browsing for booze for the party, I spotted a bottle of wine wrapped in denim. Of course I purchased it. At the party, people were very curious about the...
Warren Buffet is credited with developing a clever system: write down 25 goals circle the top 5 items the remaining 20 goals are your "avoid-at-all-costs list" I have a bucket-list, so why not an unbucket-list? don't buy a boat don't consume "current" media don't run for local office don't chase speculative assets don't lie don't drink alcohol...
When studying dark-matter and MOND, I obviously favored the underdog. "Of course Dark Matter is false! MOND is so much more elegant! Of course the universe favors elegant solutions." But this comment made me feel like an idiot: These articles always miss the mark because they get the history backwards. Modified gravity theories were taken much...
flour fight + photoshoot listening booth shitty robots quadcopter videos self portraits pogs rain dance team rocket tin foil toilet paper fort gingerbread houses with toast and breakfast supplies fake protest sewing trash model shoot "bad guys" dumpster diving cardboard gladiators meat machine water guns / nerf war water slide ground parachute...
Rock stars did it for the music. Pop stars do it for the fans. Never pander. Eat a bat. Follow your art.
txt files work with Microsoft Word, Apple Pages, Google Docs, and LibreOffice. They work with Microsoft Excel. They work with NotePad, NotePad++, and TextEdit. They work with Bash, ZSH, and Fish. They work vim, emacs, and nano. You can pipe them around and append to them. You can print them, fax them, and email them. They just work. And they'll...
Awesome Lists on GitHub Awesome Indexed awesomelists.top StumbleUponAwesome
I stumbled upon this post when I was first looking at wedding rings for my wife. I remember texting her and saying something like, "sorry babe i couldn't afford tiffany's, so i got you this". 2 years later, that ring still makes my sides hurt with laughter. But it also reminds me how scared I was when I was thinking about marriage, and how my...
Mind blowing stats. How long it took YouTube creators to get followers (averaged):๐คฏ 1M: 3,873 videos๐ค 100k - 1M: 1,171 videos ๐ 10k - 100k: 418 videos ๐ 1k - 10k: 151 videosPersistence, focus, and patience are key in anything!โ luba.eth (@LubaYudasina) November 27, 2020 Persistence If fame is a game of persistence, then churn out as much...
All common instruments are created with a gigantic engineering trade-off. In order to make instruments that play in any key, every group of notes must be slightly out-of-tune with each other. Music is still made this way. But it doesn't have to be. Nature's Intervals Nature produces "pure" intervals. The laws of math and physics demand that every...
Did you know you could do this in JS? let n = (0, 1); console.log(n); // 1 And this? let n = 0; n = (n++, n++, n); console.log(n); // 2 And this? // ๐ if (x) { foo(); return bar(); } else { return "baz"; } // ๐ return x ? (foo(), bar()) : "baz"; And this? // ๐ const f = x => { x[0]=42; return x; }; // ๐ const g = x => (x[0]=42, x); At...
Did you know you can just whip out curly-braces all over the place in Rust and Go? a := 1 a = 2 { b := 1 } b := 2 let mut a = 1; a = 2; { let b = 1; }; let b = 2; let c = { let mut d = 1; d = 2; d }; But why on Earth would you even want to do this? Creating "Construction-Zones" When you're creating a variable that demands multiple...
Yeah, this was my Tinder bio for a while. If I had to guess, "nothing matters ๐ญ, nothing matters ๐" was probably my inspiration. Part of me wants to relate this to the Vinegar Tasters. There's something funny about being lonely. There's a particular "vinegar" taste associated with dating. "Why did I say that?" "Why is she even into me?" "Is she...
Lately I've been struggling with self-discipline. I've been giving an ungodly amount of my precious attention to YouTube and Reddit. The outside world induces so much anxiety; the Internetโข is an anaesthetic. Rather than spending my attention on something uncomfortable for 90 seconds, I spend my attention on...
What's worse than finding a worm in your apple? โฆfinding half of a worm in your apple. What's worse than finding half of a worm in your apple? โฆfinding a quarter of a worm in your apple. What's worse than finding 1/N of a worm in your apple? โฆfinding (1/N)ยฒ of a worm in your apple. Let N equal 273. What's worse than finding ~0.367% of...
First, write down a bunch of things. Then mix each pair of things together into new things. Figure how to do the new things. ??? Profit. This is a surprisingly useful exercise. I'm surprised nobody does this IRL. In this exercise, you don't have to be an expert in any field (but it helps a lot). It didn't take a genius to say, "Uber for people's...
There are a bunch of things I want to do everyday. The actual time-of-day (e.g. 5AM) is not as important as the overarching sequence. I tried to order/group my subroutines something like the following: Be Happy Be Healthy Make a Gameplan Make Dope Shit Make Shit Dope Garbage In ยท Garbage Forever First of all, it's important to start the day off...
I tried to teach myself to play the guitar. But I'm a horrible teacher โ because I do not know how to play a guitar. โ Mitch Hedberg I want to be my Optimal self. But I have no h*ckin' idea how. I'm not very good at teaching myself how to be Optimal, because I don't know what Optimal Taylor looks like. And I'm not very good at listening to...
Long ago, I dated a woman who believed in ghosts and crystals and horoscopes and toxins and stuff. Of course crystals exist, but she claimed that they heal you and incur luck and other mumbo-jumbo that I couldn't wrap my head around. But I'm not here to Destroy Magic with Facts & Logic โ I'm here to preach against assholes like me who suck the...
Don't dream your dreams. Don't feel your feelings. โ My mom My family gets frazzled. I'm sure other people get frazzled too, but my family seems to specifically use the word frazzled. I talk to my mom about everything: careers and love-interests and social-awkwardness and pigeons and everything else. And when I'm deflated or afraid or frazzled...
Michelangelo was asked by the pope about the secret of his genius, particularly in regards to the statue of David, largely considered to be the greatest sculpting masterpiece of all time. Michelangelo responded by saying, "It's simple. I just remove everything that isn't David." I want to become recklessly kind. I want to become healthy enough to...
Why aren't there any OOP guidelines for creating small/medium-sized classes? MVC is cool, but it's too high-level! MVC tells you where components should go, but it doesn't inform engineers on how the components should operate or communicate or fit together. Of course design-patterns are also cool, but there are so many! Each design pattern is...
h1 { font-weight: 400; } .narrator { text-align: center; line-height: 3; opacity: 0.6; } .student { color: hsl(171,100%,31%); } .master { color: hsl(204, 86%,33%); text-align: right; } Master! Master! I'd like to quit smoking. Oh really? And why is that? Well, I think my blood pressure is too high, and I'm a bit worried about my health....
You can literally watch every episode of Stranger Things (Season 1) in 3 hours and 20 minutes. Yes, you can literally watch a 400-minute series in 200 minutesโฆ if you're willing to break some speed limits. But why would you want toโฝ In Search of Lost What's the duration of a 250-page book? To answer this question, you must first ask: how much...
I was addicted to progress. My life was becoming an Excel spreadsheet. My reading regimen was insane. My exercise routines were ridiculous. My projects were impossible. But then I started doing nothing. Three hikers saw a lone monk standing atop a small mountain. After hours of climbing, they finally met him. The first hiker asked, "are you...
Here's a few ways to say the same thing. ยท---โ action ---ยท | | | โ interface state โ | | | ยท---- query โ---ยท ยท--โ controller ---ยท | | | โ view model โ | | ...
It's crazy that there's a Wikipedia Page entitled Protocol on Blinding Laser Weapons. Why is it so crazy? Because most of the world believes it's better to be dead than blind. Protecting Civilians Okay, well, maybe it's not so crazy. The Convention on Certain Convential Weapons concluded in 1980. Many nations came together to ban weapons like...
Los Angeles and Riverside are separated by a minimum of 90 minutes of suburbs and shopping centers. Taking the CA-60, suburbia is interrupted by hills peppered in weed-like plants. I'm reluctant to call the flora "weeds", because half are tree-sized and the other half are dead. My pilgrimages to Riverside usually allot 240 minutes for...
When we're young, we often get scolded for self-control issues. If you talk too much, you're told to "hold your tongue". If you cry in public, you're told to "control your temper". And so on. The logic is something as follows: You often want to do things that offend others. If you offend others, they won't like you. If others don't like you, then...
I think we lost something when we moved from analog to digital clocks.
Three people in a public restroom is a chorus. Two people in a public restroom is a standoff. You're browsing emails atop your porcelain throne. You chose the stall furthest from the door, because -- we never know -- it's probably cleanest. And then you hear the dreaded sound: the door opens. You double check that your stall is locked (just in...
It's really useful to be unreasonable. When you have a large task ahead of you, try asking yourself some odd questions. Like, "what if I finished it in 1/10th of the time?" or "what it got 100x more users than anticipated?". Start with "crazy ideas" and "unrealistic expectations", and then play around for a bit! By working backwards from...
I find myself waiting for things a lot. I'd like to become a person who doesn't wait for things. But I guess I'm waiting for that to happen too.
So you want to powerful systems to talk to each other over a network with limited capacity and unreliable connections? Let's try to build the worst "universal" notation possible: Ensure that the common notation that all the systems speak is extremely low-level, so that you have to encode/decode all the complexity of modern programming languages...
I often think that I'd like to do everything. Of course that'd be nice, but I think what I really want is to become the type of person that can do everything. It's not about experience -- it's about ability. Some people derive their self-worth from the places they've been. But narcissists like me measure themselves by where they could've been if...