microBlog (microRSS)
Anxiety officially reduced
Nov 5, 2024
Well, yesterday day ended well and I feel a helluva lot better. Here's why:
- I got Dropbox working on my laptop, so it's coming with me to Italy.
- I solved an Eleventy problem that was causing me serious grief. I decided that I wanted to have the main feed of site's blog include these microblog posts as well as having a separate feed. While in the end, the solution was simple, I groped for way too long.
- The appointment with the orthopedic surgeon went well. It was good news, bad news. The good news is that I have the surgery scheduled. The bad news is that it's scheduled for March 6, 2025. We're planning another trip to Europe in May, so that might be tight. I've been put on the waitlist in the event a cancellation occurs. If not, and I'm still in a walkable condition, I'll have it done after the May trip (though I'd prefer to enjoy the summer not in physical therapy).
I'll write more from Italia! Ciao!
I'm currently anxious about way too many things
Nov 4, 2024
Just a dump of things I'm anxious about right now:
- The election tomorrow. That's all I need to say about that...except that I sure hope Kamala wins.
- We're flying to Italy tomorrow. It should be a fun trip, but I'm always worried about this kind of trip. It's everything from making sure I've packed everything to the flight being on time. If I had to bet though, it's all probably going to be fine.
- Dropbox on my laptop is shitting. For some reason, sync'ing has stopped and appears stuck. I've tried a bunch of stuff with no success. Perhaps this is God's way of telling me that I should not be taking it on the trip. We'll see.
- I've got an appointment with an orthopedic surgeon today as it's time for me to get my other knee replaced. I've tried physical therapy, I've been doing a lot of strength training, but the grinding and getting into the car is getting pretty painful and I think that there's no other way out. I wrote about my first knee replacement in this post. And while I know what to expect, I'm not looking forward to this at all.
- Our 30-year-old son struggles with what I'd call "doing life." This is a constant worry, but moreso recently.
Well, I said I'd wanted to write more and I thought I'd take this opportunity to do so. If I can't get my laptop working, you won't be hearing from me here until we get back (in a couple of weeks). If I can, I'll be posting from Italy.
Is it really a new design?
Nov 2, 2024
I'd been wanting to redesign my personal website for a while. I've had sketches and ideas, but no will to get started. Then, finally, a couple of days ago, I sat down and started futzing.
What you're seeing now is a modified site design and not exactly something I'd call a complete redesign. It's more of a simplification with some new functionality. The home page is now more an introduction to who I am instead just a list of the last 3 blog posts. I've shifted some of the top nav to the footer, added a crapload of social icons to the footer, and added this new microBlog section.
What you're reading now is the 2nd post of the microBlog. It's intended for short pieces like this one. It's been a while since I had blogged anything of substance and I wanted to reduce the friction of writing and not worry about the length and depth of each post. Also, on the main blog, I've always had a habit of having a hero image and I wanted to eliminate the need for that effort.
The microblog has its own RSS feed. I may change the main feed to also include these posts, but for now the main blog and this thing will have separate feeds. The main feed now includes these microblog posts as well as the main blog posts. Friction has been offically reduced for those pre-existing subscribers.
The first microBlog post
Nov 1, 2024
Now that I've redesigned the home page of this site, I've decided that I want to write more, but in shorter pieces. Hence, this microBlog. I'll still write some longer pieces on the main blog, but this will help me to write more spontaneously and more often. It will be what it will be.
