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content/journal/dispatch-35-january-2026/index.md

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+---
+title: "Dispatch #35 (January 2026)"
+date: 2025-12-11T00:33:58-05:00
+draft: false
+tags:
+- dispatch
+references:
+- title: "2025 Year in Review - macwright.com"
+  url: https://macwright.com/2025/12/07/year-in-review
+  date: 2025-12-18T15:21:17Z
+  file: macwright-com-5fr93r.txt
+---
+
+Some thoughts here...
+
+<!--more-->
+
+<audio controls src="/journal/dispatch-35-january-2026/My Favorite Kings.mp3"></audio>
+
+* <https://ymck.net/app/magical-8bit-plug-en>
+
+### This Month
+
+* Adventure:
+* Project:
+* Skill:
+
+### Reading & Listening
+
+* Fiction: [_Title_][1], Author
+* Non-fiction: [_Title_][2], Author
+* Music: [_Title_][3], Author
+  * <https://johncarrollkirby.bandcamp.com/album/septet>
+  * <https://macwright.com/2025/12/07/year-in-review>
+  * </journal/dispatch-15-may-2024/>
+
+[1]: https://bookshop.org/
+[2]: https://bookshop.org/
+[3]: https://www.turntablelab.com/
+
+### Links
+
+* [Title][4]
+* [Title][5]
+* [Title][6]
+
+[4]: https://example.com/
+[5]: https://example.com/
+[6]: https://example.com/

static/archive/macwright-com-5fr93r.txt

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+[1]Tom MacWright
+
+2025@macwright.com
+
+[2]Tom MacWright
+
+  • [3]Writing⇠
+  • [4]Reading
+  • [5]Photos
+  • [6]Projects
+  • [7]Drawings
+  • [8]Micro
+  • [9]About
+
+Auto Light Dark
+2025 Year in Review
+
+Well, nearly another year in the books. How did it go?
+
+Books per year chart
+
+It’s genuinely surprising to me how consistent my reading stays year-over-year.
+I don’t set reading goals or have a predictable pace, and every year has at
+least a month in which I’m reading nothing, my momentum growth to a halt. But
+at the end of every year, it’s range-bound between 19 and 22 for the past five
+years.
+
+The count is 19 at the moment, but I’m reading a [13]fast-paced sci-fi so it’ll
+probably be 20 by the end of the year.
+
+[14]A Confederacy of Dunces was easily the most entertaining book this year -
+an absolute riot, funny and unique. [15]Things Become Other Things, from [16]
+Craig Mod, was the most affecting book of the year, the only one that made me
+cry a little. And [17]The Fort Bragg Cartel was the most engaging,
+can’t-put-it-down book. If you can stomach the difficult material - detailed
+descriptions of war crimes and domestic abuse - I highly recommend reading it.
+
+Race times
+
+This was a decent year for running, too. I ran five 5ks and two half-marathons
+in 2025, and achieved my simple goal of running sub-20 in the 5k. The thing
+about running a mediocre 19:13 PR in high school and then running mid-19s
+twenty years later is that now I’m in the top 10% of my age group! On a
+relative basis, I keep getting faster.
+
+Mostly I blame the extreme summer heat for some of the higher times: many of
+the races had warnings about high humidity, high heat, and bad air quality,
+warning people from overexertion. A sample from their pre-race email:
+
+    The weather forecast is for temperatures in the low 90s. Please dress and
+    hydrate properly, and avoid overexertion. The Air Quality Index is
+    predicted to be over 100 at race start, members of sensitive groups may
+    experience health effects. Limit outdoor exposure if you are sensitive to
+    ozone. This might be a great night to run easy or tempo effort, please
+    adjust your pace expectations!
+
+That said, I think I could still do better. Running low 19 minute times would
+be lovely and I think within my abilities. I’ve been following an ‘intuitive
+training plan’ this whole time, which in other words means not having a plan.
+2026 I plan to have a plan, and probably the cornerstone of that plan is
+logging many more easy miles.
+
+━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
+
+How’s work been going? I can point to the [18]Val Town Retrospective that I
+wrote for most of the answer to that question. 2025 for [19]Val Town was a year
+of big ups and downs. Simultaneously, the job became both more demanding and I
+became more adjusted to it: it’s remarkable how adaptable people and
+organizations can be.
+
+On a day-to-day level, as an engineer, the codebase has grown to the point
+where it’s a bit difficult to keep all in my head, and there are important
+components that I shamefully haven’t directly worked on. For a ‘CTO’, needing
+to have the system memorized might feel like an no-no, but for an organization
+of this size my job is really to be a general-purpose builder, fixer, and
+understander.
+
+━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
+
+I was really into rhythmic instrumental music: SML’s take on jazz in [20]Small
+Medium Large and [21]How Have You Been are amazing, the kind of music that
+works for focused coding, a dinner party, or a long drive.
+
+[22]Septet by John Carroll Kirby
+
+I loved John Carroll Kirby’s alternative take on jazz too - which can sound
+cheesy, like elevator music, until you get a minute in.
+
+[23]Low on Foot by Slow Mass
+
+Slow Mass’s [24]Low on Foot was probably my album of the year: almost every
+song is marked with five stars in my music library in [25]Swinsian.
+
+━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
+
+I feel unsatisfied with my productive output in 2025. But this is a permanent
+condition I think.
+
+First bike bag
+
+Sewing was the big new thing. I sewed about five bags, including three for my
+bicycle, and rode almost 1,000 miles with them.
+
+Bag 2
+
+It’s a fantastic hobby. Designing the bags exercises my brain in just the right
+ways, it’s tactile and low-tech. My sewing machine was manufactured around
+1970, and works great. I love the learning process involved: my first attempt
+at sewing a bag for the front rack of my bike yielded clear lessons for bag 2,
+things like using stiffer fabric where the bag needs support and trying to
+minimize seams in areas that are on the top, to preserve waterproofing.
+
+Pending another bike, I’m pretty much done with bike bags, but there are plenty
+more projects on the horizon for the sewing machine.
+
+Besides the flashy bags-from-scratch, it’s been useful for simpler things like:
+
+  • Restuffing my couch cushions and sewing them back closed
+  • Repairing the pocket in some running shorts that had developed a hole
+  • Hemming some jeans that were too long, and an oversized shirt
+
+It’s been really rewarding, and sewing goes really well with instrumental jazz.
+
+━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
+
+That said, my free-time coding projects have been fewer. I implemented [26]
+indiepixel, a pixel-art rendering layer in Python for my Tidbyt display. And I
+maintained [27]Placemark, putting time into simplifying it and adding a handful
+of new features, like [28]drawing lines with automatic routing.
+
+But that’s about it? The coding I’ve done on weekends has mostly been
+work-related, and not much of that either. I still have fun coding, but I have
+to say that it’s changed for me. The tech industry just feels bad in so many
+ways, from its open embrace of fascism to the nihilistic startups that
+advertise via rage-bait. LLMs have changed things a lot too: it’s hard to tell
+what people value anymore, and how people have fun. I’ve [29]written a lot
+about LLMs, so won’t repeat it all. See: [30]Would LLMs democratizing coding be
+a pyrrhic victory?, [31]Hallucination City, [32]LLMs pivot to the aesthetics of
+thinking, and more.
+
+I’ve long aimed to diversify my joys: part of finding a love of music, art,
+sewing, running, and so on is that they can serve as backup ways to feel happy
+when the world’s tough. I see some of what’s happening now - people using
+computers to do art, automating the skillful work they used to do, and I wonder
+what this leaves time for them to do: in the excess time, where do you find
+joy?
+
+I’ve been finding most of that joy away from the keyboard, this year. I hope I
+rediscover some of that spark in 2026. I have been having fun learning [33]
+Effect and writing some Rust, and there are plenty of ideas left.
+
+━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
+
+Brooklyn continues to be good to me. Living here delivers on my priorities in
+life: things like never drive and live near friends. By those metrics, it does
+great, and always surprises me with just how much of the world is packed into
+the 97 square miles of the borough, and Manhattan and Queens nearby.
+
+And yeah - the [34]election of Zohran Mamdani makes it even better. This year
+was the first time that I knocked on doors for a mayoral candidate, and so did
+a majority of my friends. It’s pretty exciting. I think that the next few years
+will be great for the city, and though it’ll be really tough to deliver on all
+of his promises, even just having a mayor in office who shows up to the job and
+wants the best for his constituents will be a welcome change from the previous
+administration.
+
+━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
+
+I [35]started this blog in 2011 with a vague photo of San Jose and some
+non-committal prose. So 2026 will be the 15th anniversary of the blog.
+
+Blogging has been, for me, an unalloyed success. It has connected me to people,
+given me a place to develop my thoughts, made some of my work on the internet -
+a place always decaying and forgetting - a little more permanent. I absolutely
+recommend everyone do it.
+
+I know why most people don’t do it: not enough time and too much fear of
+publishing ‘bad writing.’ Maybe ‘nothing to write about,’ too, though this
+never seems that real to me, given how the average person I meet has
+interesting thoughts and ideas to share.
+
+I forget exactly when I removed analytics from the blog, but it was a long time
+ago. Since then I don’t know what ‘takes off’ or ‘goes viral’ and it’s mostly
+fine with me. Lately though, I have been discovering other indie blogs with
+articles that reference or respond to mine, and I really want a way for this to
+be slightly more social. Not fully social of course - no comments and this is
+not part of any network - but I want to know about link-backs. That’s probably
+the focus for 2026.
+
+I think this idea has been going around - my friend [36]Waldo was discussing it
+the other day, and [37]webmentions came up as an option. I’ve tried webmentions
+in the past with little success - not many blogs supported them and I got a lot
+of spam - but it’s worth another shot. It’s hard not to get a little
+discouraged off the jump because webmentions have spam, their predecessor [38]
+pingbacks were ripe with abuse, [39]trackbacks had even more spam, and even if
+I try to find backlinks with [40]ahrefs.io, there are plenty of spam domains
+there too or SEO schemes. The internet is an adversarial place.
+
+In meta-blog news, this blog has been hosted on [41]Netlify since [42]2017 and
+I can’t find a strong reason to switch off. It’s been rock-solid. I’ve been
+using [43]Jekyll since I started in 2011 and it continues to work great, though
+if I started from scratch I’d probably use [44]11ty. It would be nice to have a
+little more power over server-rendering and deploy on [45]Hetzner, but it seems
+like it’d be a step-up in complexity.
+
+━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
+
+Riding the C&O Canal
+
+Photo from riding the GAP trail + C&O Canal this year
+
+    every strange thing you’ve ever been into, every failed hobby or forgotten
+    instrument, everything you have ever learned will come back to you, will
+    serve you when you need it. No love, however brief, is wasted. - [46]Louise
+    Miller
+
+December 7, 2025  [47]Tom MacWright
+[48]@macwright.com on Bluesky, [49]@tmcw@mastodon.social on Mastodon
+
+
+References:
+
+[1] https://macwright.com/
+[2] https://macwright.com/
+[3] https://macwright.com/writing
+[4] https://macwright.com/reading/
+[5] https://macwright.com/photos/
+[6] https://macwright.com/projects/
+[7] https://macwright.com/drawings/
+[8] https://macwright.com/micro/
+[9] https://macwright.com/about/
+[13] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_Is_No_Antimemetics_Division
+[14] https://macwright.com/2025/01/25/a-confederacy-of-dunces
+[15] https://macwright.com/2025/06/29/things-become-other-things
+[16] https://craigmod.com/
+[17] https://macwright.com/2025/12/02/the-fort-bragg-cartel
+[18] https://macwright.com/2025/11/11/val-town
+[19] https://www.val.town/
+[20] https://intlanthem.bandcamp.com/album/small-medium-large
+[21] https://intlanthem.bandcamp.com/album/how-you-been
+[22] https://johncarrollkirby.bandcamp.com/album/septet
+[23] https://slowmassmusic.bandcamp.com/album/low-on-foot
+[24] https://slowmassmusic.bandcamp.com/album/low-on-foot
+[25] https://swinsian.com/
+[26] https://macwright.com/2025/04/12/tidbyt-second-life
+[27] https://www.placemark.io/
+[28] https://mastodon.social/@tmcw/115595261706919222
+[29] https://macwright.com/2023/04/15/ai
+[30] https://macwright.com/2024/07/18/llms-democratizing-coding
+[31] https://macwright.com/2025/11/07/hallucination-city
+[32] https://macwright.com/2025/11/05/llms-thinking-pivot
+[33] https://effect.website/
+[34] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zohran_Mamdani
+[35] https://macwright.com/2011/07/04/hello-internet
+[36] https://mastodon.social/@waldoj/115670295623060834
+[37] https://indieweb.org/Webmention
+[38] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pingback
+[39] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trackback
+[40] https://ahrefs.com/
+[41] https://www.netlify.com/
+[42] https://macwright.com/2017/05/08/https
+[43] https://jekyllrb.com/
+[44] https://www.11ty.dev/
+[45] https://www.hetzner.com/
+[46] https://x.com/louisethebaker/status/1379961867922239497?lang=en
+[47] https://macwright.com/about/
+[48] https://bsky.app/profile/macwright.com
+[49] https://mastodon.social/@tmcw