iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 04/09/2026

This isn't too far off, but I've seen quizzes with 10 questions rather than 60 that seemed more accurate (with sound questions only, not vocabulary). I've never lived in New Jersey, though, and most similar quizzes correctly place me in the Philadelphia area.

Your dialect map
Redder areas talk more like you; bluer areas least.

You talk most like someone from New Jersey — about 58% of your answers match a typical resident.

Cities most & least like you
Interpolated from the nearest survey responses.

Most similar
New York, NY (55%)
Boston, MA (55%)
Philadelphia, PA (55%)
Least similar
Oklahoma City, OK (44%)
Dallas, TX (44%)
New Orleans, LA (45%)

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 19/08/2026

Pinyin IME keyboard conventions (v for ü) creeping into actual product labels.

Part of a shoebox with text:
女鞋专家
Nv xie zhuan jia

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 18/08/2026

Older (yellow point access blocks on the right side of the street) and newer (gray/beige high rise towers further in the distance) styles of Chinese apartment construction.

A street with four 6-story (or 7?) buildings on the right side, with taller towers visible in the distance past the end of the street.

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 15/08/2026

I don't know the answer to your question... but I'm in China right now and the conversion of basically everything that a decade ago would have had a 2 stroke engine to now being electric is sure great for air quality. Seems like there's a store selling e-scooters on every block.

Sidewalk in front of a store in China with a lot of electric scooters.

Sidewalk in front of a store in China with a bunch of batteries and spare parts and behind, a lot of electric scooters.

010

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 22/07/2026

OK, spent a little bit of time lining this up with this administrative map of Hubei province. The largest purple patch in central China looks like it's Hanchuan (in the NE), Xiantao (Center), Honghu (SE), and Jianli (SW). The smaller purple patch just to its east looks like Daye.

Slightly blurry photo of detailed administrative map of Hubei province, with per-county colors and thin purple lines delimiting prefectures and thick purple lines delimiting provinces.

040

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 22/06/2026

Dear @theguardian.com , that headline is very easy to misread (either by swapping MP/PM or skipping a line).

[ UK politics live ]
Andy Burnham sworn in as an MP after Keir Starmer resigns as prime minister

000

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 26/04/2026

MBTA seems to have received red line cars 1960-1963; just saw them sitting at the platform at Alewife.

New MBTA red line car, number 1963. Looks very shiny and clean. Says "TEST TRAIN".

MBTA red line cars 1963 and 1962, displaying TEST TRAIN.

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 23/02/2026

A good view of the snowstorm...

A double hung window from the inside of a house, with the screen and storm window covered in enough snow that you can't see much on the other side.

2100

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 16/01/2026

Maybe the true way is the common (but not universal) Chinese practice of stamping date of manufacture, and then writing the shelf life in prose? (Then you actually know how old it is.)

English language label sticker on top of an original Chinese label on a yellow good package, including the text:

Date produced: See on package
Shelf life: 270 days

000

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 22/12/2025

Just a little bit different from this photo taken in Hong Kong (July 23, 2016). (Look carefully at the shadows.)

A streetlamp in the middle of a pedestrian plaza in Hong Kong, with some high-rise towers behind. The streetlamp is perfectly vertical and has a glass globe around the light fixture. The globe's shadow is centered on the base of the lamp post.

020

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 25/11/2025

Probably not the most dangerous thing for Turkeys to do today, but crossing Mass Ave in front of the 96 bus (at Waterhouse St) probably isn't the best move.

2 Turkeys in the street, in front of an MBTA 96 bus and next to a station wagon

120

L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 28/10/2025

There's a significant chance that within the next few hours Hurricane Melissa will break the 1935 record for most intense Atlantic hurricane at landfall by barometric pressure. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of... and www.nhc.noaa.gov

Screenshot of top rows of table at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Atlantic_hurricane_records#Most_intense_by_minimum_barometric_pressure

Most intense by minimum barometric pressure
edit
Most intense Atlantic hurricanes
Hurricane Season By peak pressure By pressure at landfall
mbar inHg mbar inHg
Wilma 2005 882 26.05
Gilbert 1988 888 26.22 900 26.58
"Labor Day" 1935 892 26.34 892 26.34
Melissa 2025 892 26.34
Rita 2005 895 26.43
Milton 2024 895 26.43
Allen 1980 899 26.55

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 12/10/2025

I got that sort of upgrade on a flight from SZS to IVC back in January 2016.

The controls of a Britten-Norman Islander (ZK-FWZ), viewed from the right front seat.

Aerial view of Oban, Stewart Island, New Zealand, with a spinning propeller in the upper right corner of the photo.

Runway at Invercargill Airport, and the terminal, with the runway running left-right across the view.

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 01/10/2025

I report the ones that get through as spam. Most don't, since they're detected as spam already. Also the ones that address me by name usually use one of my parents' names, not mine. Some database somewhere has that, but I never give my phone number to campaigns or in my voter registration.

You reported this as spam

If you change your mind and want to keep receiving these messages, tap “Not spam.”

Not spam

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 07/08/2025

Before our recent move, in the suburbs of Washington DC, the (larger than bug) animals that gave gardeners trouble were deer. Now in the suburbs of Boston (and closer to the city center) it's all rabbits.

a deer in a neighbor's yard, looking straight at me

two rabbits in a neighbor's yard, on the grass, but near shrubbery, both facing sideways and looking at me suspiciously

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L. David Baron @dbaron.org · 15/06/2025

A related organizational tie, for the en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Glee_Club , has five lines representing a musical staff. (It was usually worn for daytime choral concerts, but evening concerts were white tie.)