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The trip from Cleveland to Indianapolis was pleasantly uneventful until about an hour outside of Indianapolis when we ran into a backup caused by an accident. It must have been a big one, because as the delay approached an hour and people were starting to get out of their cars, Ashley found a news brief stating that I-70 West was completely closed and the estimate for opening was another 2 hours!We started noticing a few cars riding the shoulder. After wondering where they thought they were going, we, too, joined them and exited the highway. A convoy of traffic plowed down an “Unknown Road” (Google’s terminology) at break-neck speeds (no speed limit signs were posted). With farms on both sides, this road was not big enough for two lanes of traffic, but we managed when we passed a few trucks going the opposite way. In the end we lost about 30 minutes and made it to the hotel just before 6:00 PM. ...

Ashley posed with a spot-on “Grabber” from The Black Phone More info: Days of the Dead 2023 – Indianapolis

He got his cake. More info: Days of the Dead 2023 – Indianapolis

At Screamer’s Costumes in Detroit, MI. More info here.

Terrified of Clowns? We got up at 5:30 AM and were on the road to Detroit before 6:30 AM. We needed to get to Screamer’s Costumes before they opened, so we could meet David Howard Thornton (Art the Clown) from the Terrifier film series. We arrived just before 9:00 AM, and it was good that we did. There were probably 200 people in line in front of us by then. We finally got to meet him and Amelie McLain (the Little Pale Girl) just before 1:00 PM. It was a long day of standing in line, but it was made tolerable by a few cosplayers who entertained the crowd and took photos. It was also a great day weather-wise: sunny and 80 degrees. Luckily the line was outdoors but under an overhang that prevented us from standing in the sun for hours. ...

I go out walking every morning. My usual route takes me around my apartment complex and the apartment complex next door. Last Wednesday’s walk was no different. I was up stupid early - before 6:00 AM and out the door shortly thereafter. When rounding the corner next door I saw a pile of hardware garbage near the dumpster on the other side of the garages. There was a tower PC case, opened, that looked pretty gutted (although the hard drive was still in it - sigh). There were a couple what looked to be older stereo components another computer that looked to be in pretty good condition and a nice (if not pretty well-used) desk lamp. ...

I made an effort today to do my weekly routine from the Chrome Browser on my Linux Laptop. I had to install it and sign-in and set up some extensions, but now it looks and acts pretty much just like my Chromebook. It was more of an experiment to prove that I can interact with my note system from anywhere. Given access to Google Chrome, it’s even more seamless. On one hand, I revel in the familiarity of a common system that gets the tool out of the way and lets me do the work I want to do. On the other, I worry about lock-in and the ability to convert this information to other formats or access it from other entry points. ...

How often have you seen something like this? The authenticity of host '111.222.333.444 (111.222.333.444)' can't be established. RSA key fingerprint is f3:cf:58:ae:71:0b:c8:04:6f:34:a3:b2:e4:1e:0c:8b. Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? The temptation to quickly type yes and hit the enter key is great. But do you know why you are seeing this message? You should only get this the first time you connect to a new host. After you respond yes the host gets stored in ~/.ssh/known_hosts, and you won’t get prompted the next time you connect. ...

I regularly have directories of files I want to back up in case of disaster. Usually these are files that change often, and I only want to keep recent versions in case I want to revert or recover changes. (Git? Git, who?) I have used this script over and over as a simple way to archive a directory to a location with a date-stamped filename. It also cleans up after itself by deleting files older than X days. I stick it in CRON and let it run on a schedule and I always have an archive of the last X days of the files in my directory. ...

I don’t buy this theory that simply writing things down somehow reduces stress. All it means is that those things are now on a piece of paper or some kind of digital list, usually in our pocket at all hours of the day, mocking us for not being able to finish them. Maybe instead of optimizing our means of capturing ideas, we need to optimize our brain’s spam filter. Good ideas and important reminders will rise to the top, and if we think about them once we’ll think about them again. Matt Wood - The Important Stuff Will Come Back ...