iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 54m

No, but I'm not going to answer you.

text message from a number I don't recognize saying, "do you know who I am?"

bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 5h

I took a half day friday, had the weekend plus 3 days off. Now two days back at work followed by a 3 day weekend. Nailed this schedule.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 07/10/2026

@ngons yeah, I think sometimes they are a good forcing function to get you to put your stuff out there without stressing yourself over making it perfect, but it can also add stress to perform daily.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 07/10/2026

Decided to not "do" Inktober. I'm still sketching daily, but it's mostly going to be exercises and practice stuff for a while. Some of it looks cool, a lot does not. I wasn't following the prompts anyway. I'll post now and then if I come up with something cool or at least interesting.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 05/10/2026

Wandered upon a still life with a bowl, fish, plastic fork, tennis ball and empty can of Vienna sausages.

bowl, fish, plastic fork, tennis ball and empty can of Vienna sausages arranged on a log

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 05/10/2026

#inktober2026 day 4, a day late. More texture studies. Don't like them all, but learning with each thing I do that I don't like

a 3x3 grid with different pen and ink textures in each cell.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 03/10/2026

#inktober2026 day 3. No prompts. A structure for exploring crosshatch values. It's occurred to me, not for the first time, that it'd be interesting to generate some designs algorithmically and then render them by hand. Did not do that here, but throwing that idea on the list.

3d hexagon columns shades with crosshatched pen and ink.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

#inktober2026 no prompt. I feel bad that I seem to be the only one ignoring the prompts. Oh well.

a series of random circles that look a bit like they were cut out of a surface revealing a texture on the layer below, said texture bring wavy lines.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

#inktober2026 day 1. Not following prompts. Focusing on creating textures for a while, then might move on to values.

a grid of bars rendered with curved lines. in black ink on white paper

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 29/09/2026

So, I was in an art supply store today. And... yeah, I bought another mechanical pencil. :(

a silver colored metallic mechanical pencil.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 28/09/2026

I just saw two Amazon reviews for the same product. Both had the same video and the exact same script but voiced by to different generated voices. A few minutes I saw a review for another project with one of the same voices. I'm do not like the modern world.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 28/09/2026

Listening to some Bob Seger tonight. Thanks @toddanderson

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026

I wonder if these technical pens are suitable for tattoo usage.

About this item
Not suitable for tattoo usage
Contents: 3 isograph pens, 1 Tikky burgundy 0.5, 4 ink cartridges
The Isograph has a refillable ink reservoir. Its patented push-on sleeve makes for easy access to the ink helix for fast cleaning
Its push on sleeve makes for easy access to the ink helix for fast cleaning
Not suitable for tattoo usage

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026

I was using a self-made stencil just now, and suddenly had a memory that made me stop. My mind was blown because I had not thought of this thing in many decades, but it was one of my favorite toys when I was a kid. youtu.be/_gpmGxagNaA?si=BpfLtEoBbdT…

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026

As he was talking I was looking at friends I knew in the audience and we were both like WTF and laughing. Later, several people remarked on it and asked me who he was and if I knew him. Nope. No idea. Whoever you are, thanks for that. I think of it from time to time and smile. :) 3/x

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026

So my time comes up, I go on the stage. This gentleman comes out and gives the most amazing, flowery introduction I have ever had in my life. "I can't tell you how excited I am for our next speaker. This is a person whose work I've followed for years and has been a huge inspiration to me...." […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026

I just remembered an anecdote from the first major tech conference I spoke at - in the Netherlands. I was nervous of course. About 30 min before my slot, an older gentleman came up and said he would introduce me. He asked my name, what I was going to talk about, a bit of my background etc. 2-3 […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026

Some texture exercises. Funny. While taking this picture, my phone interpreted some portion of it as a bar code. Looked like a phone number. Then it lost it and I could not get it to see that again.

5 horizontal strips of pen and ink textures.
vertical lines at different intervals
random patches of randomly angled parallel lines
a weave pattern of alternating horizontal and vertical lines
larger areas of randomly angled parallel wavy lines
a scribbled pattern with varying areas of value

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026

They did cancel several local Ed Sheeran concerts. Maybe that's a good thing? Apparently we're supposed to be mad at him, which means he probably voiced a bad thing. I honestly have no idea.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 26/09/2026

The news outlets are going all out to make this storm look like the end times. It must suck to have to do that. It's barely raining and there's no wind to speak of here. They're filming from the coast, where, yes, there are waves crashing at high tide. It is the Atlantic Ocean and all. It may […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

Now since then I've done tons of algorithmic drawing and even used manual drawing techniques as inspiration, but never from the viewpoint of "this is better" or easier or faster. And never tried to go head to head with anyone drawing by hand. In fact, I appreciate them more and value their work […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

I may have shared this in the past but... Years ago when I was actively doing pen and ink work, an acquaintance told me "it would be easy to do that with a computer" and copied the cross-hatching style I was doing, with the attitude of, "see, you don't have to waste all that time doing it by […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

Not actual numbers probably, but roughly accurate. Sad because I expected to keep working in my career as long as I could. Only this year did it become "how early can I get the F out of this mess?"

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

"pencils down" - 37 signals will write no more code by hand.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

Watching the DHH RailsConf Keynote - asked to watch it for work (we are a Rails shop). It's difficult. This guy is a cross between an annoying cartoon character and fingernails on a blackboard. That's without even getting into the content and his personal viewpoints.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

ooh, my Internet radio has an update. That's actually great to see.

Internet radio display screen saying "Updating, please don't power off..." with a progress bar.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 25/09/2026

This laser-cut nested cube given to me by Jared Tarbell in the mid-2000's surfaced yesterday. It's about 1 inch square, and came in a single sheet - separate and put together yourself. Jared was the first person I saw doing this kind of physical stuff with lasers.

laser cut wooden cube. the edges are notched to fit together. there are random circles cut in each face that let you see into the next nested cube.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 24/09/2026

OK, signed up for a month of StartPage. It does what it said it will do - no more sponsored results. Cool. If this works out, I'll probably do a year.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 24/09/2026

By "do something" I mean I either need to find a different search engine (and I'm burnt out on that) or pay to remove sponsored results. I just might do the latter.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 24/09/2026

I need to do something about Start Page search. I'm pretty happy with the results in general but... I do a search. The first link looks right. I move my mouse there and click on it, but in that interval it takes me to do that, a full page of sponsored links […] [Original post on mstdn.social]

startpage search. search term "shows". A full page of sponsored search results. at the bottom of the page is the result that immediately appeared just before the sponsored ones showed up.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 23/09/2026

cute and funny, but ... she has pretty good taste in music I will say.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 23/09/2026

Just remembering a few years ago, my daughter comes down and asks me if I ever heard this song, it's so amazing... plays it on her phone. Me: Blue Monday Her: YOU KNOW IT??? Me: um... yeah.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 23/09/2026

Sketching some patterns recently.

2x3 grid of pen and ink posters with pencil shading.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 23/09/2026

I coded something tonight that could prove to be very useful. I'm not 100% sure what to use it on just yet, but I'm going to toss it into my library and something will come up someday.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

@toxi I'm surprised he didn't just rebrand it America Intelligence.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

@andypiper Back when I used to actually answer my phone for unknown callers, I'd get more generic ones "I'm calling from the support department" "The support department of what? What company are you calling from?" Surprisingly, they always struggled for a sensible answer to this. I would have […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

If you asked me a week ago how many mechanical pencils I had, I probably would have said five or six. Apparently it's a few more than that.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

Oh... and The Night Manager is pretty much Our Man in Havana (admitted by LeCarre), which I watched recently. It stars Alec Guinness, who is the best George Smiley in Tinker Tailor and Smiley's People.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

The Night Manager was a good book and a decent series. Perfect Spy, meh and meh. Russia House, good novel, so-so movie. Looking Glass War and Call for the Dead, both pretty good novels and movies. Murder of quality was OK in both formats. Anything beyond Tailor of Panama is still on my […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

There are amazing LeCarre novels and so-so ones. There are amazing movies/series based on these novels, and kind of crappy ones. The Tailor of Panama is a kind of crappy movie from a so-so novel. Tinker Tailor (BBC), Smiley's people, Spy Who came in from the Cold, amazing movies/series from […]

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 20/09/2026

A classic I've never gotten around to... And probably won't

audio book cover
michael kamp
picture of an evil looking, blood spattered white rabbit
title: crazy cannibalistic coked up rabbit carnage
3 stars
2026 1h 25m English unabridged

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 20/09/2026

Another one inspired by a zentangle pattern.

a series of bezier curves rendered as a chain of small connected circles with a double line border on each side.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 20/09/2026

Inspired by a zentangle pattern. Seems simple, but kind of tricky to code though.

black and white curved stripes with random circles overlaid. the circles are rendered with xor so the black parts of the background are white and vice versa.

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bit101 @bit101.mstdn.social.ap.brid.gy · 19/09/2026

I cc'ed my daughter on an email to some other relatives. She said the email seemed so formal. I was surprised and asked why. her: you used periods me: so punctuation is "formal" now? her: no, but there were no exclamation points.

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