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Reading List More from Naz Hamid — Journal + Links
Tagged by Scott and Luke and in thoughtful return, I’m answering the Blog Questions Challenge here. Some of these answers may overlap with the answers I gave Manu for his People & Blogs series, so I’ll do my best to do something a bit different. Please visit Manu’s P&B site though, and read through many of the excellent interviews there. Much credit to Bear Blog for these questions. Why did you start blogging in the first place? I noted how I appreciated the early bloggers, in particular from the Pyra Labs/Blogger crew, but to go back even further, I was fond of journaling early. Much of that was in the form of drawings as a child, then coupled with text. It wasn’t until I read about how musicians like Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam would keep copious journals, and in particular, Henry Rollins’ Get In The Van, showed me that documenting your life was important as a record of a lived person. Rollins would later read from these journals early in his transition from full-time musician to spoken word artist, and the storytelling inspired me. Since I was online, and web design had captivated me, it all came together. What platform are you using to manage your blog and why did you choose it? I’m currently using the lovely static site generator, Eleventy (11ty). It pushes to a GitHub repository, which triggers a deploy to Netlify. After using so many different platforms over the decades, with my posts and data semi-locked in MySQL databases, the idea of a fast, file-first, SSG was the way I absolutely wanted to go when I started blogging at this domain. Steph Ango’s File Over App is a thoughtful read on data portability. Have you blogged on other platforms before? As mentioned just before this, yes. I started with Geocities, Livejournal, tried Greymatter, then Movable Type was the first to make it all click. I got really comfortable and pushed that system far — Gapers Block was the most involved version that I had done with multiple blogs running under one instance with different layouts and sections and includes all over the place. Dean Allen’s (RIP) Textpattern stole my heart away for many years after MT got acquired, and then I stopped blogging when Weightshift became my focus, and social media started to bloom. Weightshift used various CMSs for clients: MT, TXP, ExpressionEngine, CraftCMS, Wordpress, etc. I toyed with Tumblr, and other things, but eventually restarted with Jekyll, but quickly switched to 11ty. How do you write your posts? For example, in a local editing tool, or in a panel/dashboard that’s part of your blog? Most everything starts in Bear. I have a master note of ideas, that links out to other notes and I keep adding new ones, revisit others, and check off published ones. When do you feel most inspired to write? Whenever an idea strikes. This can happen at any time and drafts are started anywhere. I generally publish in the evening though. Do you publish immediately after writing, or do you let it simmer a bit as a draft? I used to be more immediate with my publishing decades ago, adhering to a near daily schedule. These days, some thought and care goes into each post, and if possible, I like to add a touch of flavor to a post, like the rotated album covers for the Music in 2024 post. What are you generally interested in writing about? How we as humans live in a world ever-changing because of technological influence and society’s adoption and adaptation to it. I love travel so posts about cultures and countries, as well as overlanding and camping domestically. And personal things that are more feeling the feels. Who are you writing for? Myself first, but through a lens of, “this information or thought could help someone else, and/or I’d love to share a different perspective that’s unique to me.” What’s your favorite post on your blog? 2023 in the Rearview is a big one, and I worked on that for a while. Taken for a Ride is a good one I think about taking a Waymo autonomous vehicle for the first time, but I like the sort of pieces that come from a more emotional and resilient place, like Let This Be a Moment, that allow me to work through things. Any future plans for your blog? Maybe a redesign, a move to another platform, or adding a new feature? I’m very content with 11ty. I’m constantly evolving and refactoring the design and code where I can see improvement. This is a lovely mode to be in: it’s iterative like software development than constantly new like marketing. As for features: a work section (underway), and better ways to showcase my photography, which is a longtime interest and activity for me. Tag ‘em. I’m going to tag Bix, Ethan, Gosha, Grant, Matt, Piper, Rachel, Simon, Susan, Thu, and Winnie. Read on nazhamid.com or Reply via email
We are tenants with landlords who want to make sure that we can’t leave the building or go hang out with friends elsewhere, all while showing us how happy we should be with the limitations imposed on us. — Den Delimarsky A long, weighty one, but very worth the read. Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
01/05 PREDATORS, AMERICAN GREED — Steven Soderbergh Director Steven Soderbergh's media recap of 2024. It's fascinating to see how many movies he watched multiple times, and the reverse watch of the original Star Wars trilogy. Phantom of the Menace twice too? Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
I’m including the most memorable, impactful, or beloved works of—creative genius, or something, that I’ve encountered this year. I’m not a critic; I am mostly just talking about things I liked. These are tremendous to me. I hope they can be tremendous to you, too. — Anh The list is great, but this one is also visually gorgeous. Best experienced in a browser near you. Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
It’s idealistic and very millennial of me to reminiscence the early days of Web innocence, unbound creativity it hosted and wonderful lack of monetisation of virtually every aspect of being online. We can’t turn back time. But, individually and collectively, we can strive for better as the Web evolves as a home for work, knowledge, community, and love. We can resist the ongoing enshittification and corporate capitalism. So I jotted down an non-exhaustive list of what I’d love the future Web to be. — Karolina Szczur A great list. Visit original link → or View on nazhamid.com →
More in literature
In my family we can’t get away from the “Y” chromosome. Having children is known as “going to the Y.” I have three sons, no daughters, and my brother, who died last summer, was my sole sibling. My mother had five brothers, no sisters. My father, two brothers, no sisters, etc. Little girls and by extension, women, remain mysteries to me, even more so than they are to most men. I envy my friends with daughters, though I’m not complaining. My sons are healthy, smart, seldom boring, often funny and have never been arrested. Today is Michael’s twenty-fifth birthday. He is my middle son, a first lieutenant in the Marine Corps, a cyber officer stationed at Fort Meade, Maryland. He is a walking balance of left and right brain. His interests include mathematics, etymology, history, rock climbing and literature. We can keep up with most of each other’s conversations. About Michael I have few worries and no regrets. Talking with other parents, I know how fortunate I am. Dr. Johnson had no children of his own but was devoted to his stepdaughter, Lucy Porter, the daughter of Johnson’s wife, Elizabeth Jervis Porter Johnson (1689-1752), known as Tetty. Lucy was born in 1715, six years after Johnson, lived in Lichfield with his mother and served in her shop. She died in 1786, two years after her stepfather. Johnson had always assumed a fond, fatherly role with Lucy, who became one of his most frequent correspondents. For this most stoical of men, the death of loved ones was always shattering. In his 1974 biography of Johnson, John Wain notes his emotional state after his mother’s death in January 1759: “His letters to Lucy Porter are pitiful; he leans on her, begs for her help and comfort, asks that she shall stay on in the house and let the little business go on as it can, and is content to leave all the details to her and take her word for everything. ‘You will forgive me if I am not yet so composed as to give any directions about anything. But you are wiser and better than I and I shall be pleased with all that you shall do.’” Lucy was his close contemporary, a mature woman, which is not the same as raising a child from birth. The love is real but less blood-deep. Johnson suggests this in his Rambler essay from November 13, 1750: "It may be doubted, whether the pleasure of seeing children ripening into strength be not overbalanced by the pain of seeing some fall in the blossom, and others blasted in their growth; some shaken down by storms, some tainted with cankers, and some shriveled in the shade; and whether he that extends his care beyond himself does not multiply his anxieties more than his pleasures, and weary himself to no purpose, by superintending what he cannot regulate." Johnsonson intuitively understood a parent’s vulnerabilities and limits. Michael has never fallen, been blasted, shaken, tainted or shriveled. Still, one worries, quietly.
Poems read aloud, beautifully The post “The Fig Tree” by Ruth Stone appeared first on The American Scholar.
A pun is best delivered without announcing itself as a pun. Those ungifted at wordplay tend to underline, boldface and italicize their every attempt at a pun, most of which are already feeble. Thus, the pun’s bad reputation and the ensuing groans. In contrast I love a good, subtle, almost anonymous pun, which ought to detonate like a boobie-trap. The resulting intellectual burst of recognition is pure satisfaction. English is amenable to punning because our language is forever gravid, draws from so many sources and tends to be overrun with synonyms and homonyms. The OED defines pun precisely and without a nod to the comic: “The use of a word in such a way as to suggest two or more meanings or different associations, or of two or more words of the same or nearly the same sound with different meanings, so as to produce a humorous effect; a play on words.” But of a specific kind. Charles Lamb tended to take a shotgun approach to punning, assuming at least one of the pellets will hit its target. Take this passage he wrote in a letter replying to one from his friend John Bates Dibdin on June 30, 1826: “Am I to answer all this? why ’tis as long as those to the Ephesians and Galatians put together—I have counted the words for curiosity. But then Paul has nothing like the fun which is ebullient all over yours. I don’t remember a good thing (good like yours) from the 1st Romans to the last of the Hebrews. I remember but one Pun in all the Evangely, and that was made by his and our master: Thou art Peter (that is Doctor Rock) and upon this rock will I build &c.; which sanctifies Punning with me against all gainsayers. I never knew an enemy to puns, who was not an ill-natured man.” Lamb’s bilingual pun is based on Matthew 16:18: “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” It was a favorite of another master-pungent, James Joyce.
The life cycle of a candle The post Greg Ito appeared first on The American Scholar.
