iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 08/10/2026

For years I've been trying to track down exactly where the original "Figure 53" illustration came from that inspired the name of my company. I thought I knew the original author, but the more I research it the less I am sure. The search is turning up some GREAT stuff, though.

Page 116 from La machinerie théâtrale: Trucs et décors (Theatrical Machinery: Effects and Scenery) (Paris, 1893) - "a reasoned explanation of all the means used to produce theatrical illusions"

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 30/09/2026

Saw this whiteboard in a therapist's office, so I decided to compare it to Jev's answer. Whiteboard tally: Yes - 21 No - 79 Taco - 1 (Extremely coincidentally, Yes + No votes add up to 100.) The human answer to "is a hotdog a sandwich?" is 79% NO. Jev's answer to that question is 77% YES.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 30/09/2026

I haven't checked the references, but fwiw I was curious and:

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 27/09/2026

Also these; self portrait under stars in West Virginia

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 27/09/2026

i haven't been practicing my picture-making nearly as much this year (it's been a year where a lot has been disrupted), but here's a few photos from recently

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 27/09/2026

Each of the three design templates can be exported in one of four social media layouts (2 x Instagram / 1 x TikTok / Square), with different safe zones applied per layout. I've been using this stuff for 9 months now and it still keeps blowing my mind.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 12/09/2026

been thinking about this poem a lot since Berry died I never felt much resonance with the story of Adam & Eve gaining forbidden knowledge and thereby losing paradise, but this poem finally unlocked it for me

The Peace of Wild Things
When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Wendell Berry.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 10/09/2026

"Well young man... when the models were _first_ invented, they took up ENTIRE ROOMS! To achieve the same amount of artificial intelligence that you now have in your wrist watch!"

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 02/09/2026

listen. it's VERY simple. A goes to B, B goes to G, D goes to 2, C goes to 1, and E goes to 3. in short, E, C, D, A, B is now 3, 1, 2, B, G and please don't keep asking

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 01/09/2026

For the past...10 years? 15 years? More? My personal home page has been exactly one Wendell Berry quote, which I found in the appendix of a book. chrisashworth.org

"Live a three-dimensioned life; stay away from screens."

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 01/09/2026

Rest in peace fellow Kentuckian Wendell Berry. He wrote one of my favorite poems.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 01/09/2026

thank you PNC for whatever you did here; i'm sure we must have wanted it

screenshot showing a bank fee of $209.39 for a mysterious "corporate account analysis charge"

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 27/08/2026

meeting with a tax specialist about a specific kind of filing and i'm completely mystified by what they think our job categories might be

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 11/08/2026

cute mushroom couples (and a mushroom family) from our morning walk

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 10/08/2026

There's a QLab-copy out there for a specialized piece of hardware, and it uses QLab design language to make people feel safe and good, but it doesn't use consistent spacing or even line up the UI elements. Like, I'm mostly mad because you did a *bad job* ripping me off. Rip me off correctly!

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 05/08/2026

One organization in Baltimore talked about creating a central event calendar for Literal Years but...never produced anything. AI allows me, as a volunteer, to publish charmcity.theater as a free service to the city. I manually review the updates. I think this is good, not bad. Recent feedback:

Cannot say enough how life changing y’all making this website has been. It’s helped everyone I know, whether they’re super into working theater or just casually wanting to attend it.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 02/07/2026

hadn't gone more than 30 meters down the trail this morning when we spotted a scarlet tanager (I wish I had a nicer lens, or had a way of getting closer, or both!)

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 02/07/2026

a whole family of common yellowthroat warblers here on Martha's Vineyard

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 28/06/2026

I'm a few houses down the road from the place David Lilienthal bought in late 1948. I'm reading volume 2 of his journals, which opens the day after America dropped the first atomic bomb. This paragraph on atomic energy brings to mind some questions we might ask today about artificial intelligence.

"The effect of this research, as it moves into non-military fields, upon our governmental and economic life may be very great. Industry will try to get control, and at first will be successful. But as it goes on, it will be clear that no such control over the destinies of us all can be left in the hands of private corporations."

the front gate to the Lilienthal property, covered by a blanket of fog

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 26/06/2026

"dad, can we do a photoshoot?"

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 26/06/2026

morning visitors (bluebird, flycatcher, downy woodpecker, cowbird)

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 24/06/2026

breakfast in a hotel in Norway: fresh bread, yogurt, handmade chocolate, fruit, coffee, tea, five kinds of cheese, four kinds of pickles, three kinds of fish, two kinds of cake breakfast in a hotel in America: variously shaped carbs, sausage product, eggs poured from a box

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 16/06/2026

even though 8th graders stopped going to school almost 2 weeks ago, my loyal, sentimental, devoted daughter wanted to go to the very last day of 8th grade first day of kindergarten / last day of 8th grade 😭

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 12/06/2026

trying on a new avatar from last week's magical trip to Oslo. I ran up through a public art park near the city; didn't have a camera of my own but my host Martin snapped me exploring this light and sound installation in the forest 🤩 I would love to see it at night, and already dreaming of going back

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 03/06/2026

Imagine. Imagine a Baltimore transit app that showed where transit paths have "holes and cracks" hahhahhahahhahahhahhahHhasob

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 26/05/2026

unexpected jokes during code review are one of life's little joys (thanks @siobhandougall.com)

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 22/05/2026

22 years today ♥️🌈 🩷❤️🧡💛💚🩵💙💜

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 18/05/2026

neighborhood update: bees 🐝

"A neighbor reported a large nest of bees or wasps in the ground on the hill down toward the stream at the end of Deepdene. Bees are our friends, but not our close friends."

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 12/05/2026

school systems want my 18 person company to sign distinct binding contracts every time we sell a $600 product. meanwhile the Canva CEO is out here telling 60 million students "the hackers *promised very nicely* to delete your data and not extort you"

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 15/04/2026

i'm not much of a car guy but i've been reflecting about how that is partially because so many cars are UGLY and BORING walking the dog tonight i'm monologuing to myself as I walk down the street looking at all the parked cars: "uhg, d'ya see? boring! boring!! boring! BORING! ... oop"

a (Japanese?) car i have never seen before

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 30/03/2026

neighbor who has been awaiting trial for cooking meth and who has in the meantime been cutting down random neighborhood trees to cook more meth kept in fact cooking meth while we waited months for the city or police to do anything about the guy cooking meth (they did not) anyway no one is hurt

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 04/03/2026

p.s. we're holding auditions this month

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 04/03/2026

i took a break from work yesterday to get my head out of computers and AI. I'm co-directing a production of Eurydice early next year, and I wanted to explore photos for that show. My co-director Tessara stepped in as a temporary model, but now I want to actually use some of these...

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 22/02/2026

I was clearing out old files yesterday and found the rental agreement for the apartment I was living in when I wrote the first QLab code. They've fixed it up since we lived there (and now it costs a lot more! Listed for $2000 a month now — we paid $695). www.apartments.com/115-pine-st-...

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 12/02/2026

Noting with amusement: In Star Trek, being part of The Borg means that "you" think like "it". (In seriousness, though, this doesn't seem novel; humans have been thinking like the stuff we expose ourselves to forever.) arxiv.org/pdf/2409.01754

The heading of a paper entitled "Empirical evidence of Large Language Model’s influence on human spoken communication"

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 01/02/2026

hi yes so in the course of a single Sunday worth of Clauding, I converted the design spec from @voxel.org's brand package into a specialized macOS app that allows us to easily generate large format posters to send to our local print shop... I'll give a video tour of this app soon, but 🤯

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 01/01/2026

In 2025, my second year of running, I turned 46 and logged 740 miles (about 2 miles a day). I also ran my first half marathon. I was proud of this because it was despite some injuries (e.g. a broken toe in January), and while still running a company, a theater, & being a dad.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 22/11/2025

I am in Philadelphia for one night. I leave by train early tomorrow morning. I just discovered the Philly marathon is tomorrow morning. The station is inside the race route. I visit the marathon website to learn when the race begins. The "information" page redirects me to an AI agent.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 11/08/2025

three long exposures under a full moon

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 07/08/2025

this kite is named "Squeaky the Octopus". we don't know why.

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 06/08/2025

a 1 second slice of today at the Flying Horses Carousel — the oldest operating carousel in the United States. IMO the best part of it is the music from the 1923 Wurlitzer organ. do you prefer the color or the black and white?

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Chris Ashworth @chris.ashworth.io · 02/08/2025

this hotel has a TV tuned to a Fine Art Auction show and i am obsessed the sales pitches (a focus on anything hand made, uniqueness, stature, lots of mention of "the attention to detail") what effects they want you to think the art will have on your life or space the entire vibe