iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

we do road trips in this family

Map of Places I've Been in the United States.
Never been: 5 (Alaska, Arizona, New Mexico, Michigan, Maine)
Passed Through: 15
Visited: 23
Stayed a While: 4 (CA, CO, KS, MN)
Lived there: (MT, NJ, NC)

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 24/07/2026

- from “The World Goes On” (László Krasznahorkai)

I DON'T NEED ANYTHING
FROM HERE
I would leave everything here: the valleys, the hills, the paths, and the jaybirds from the gardens, I would leave here the peacocks and the priests, heaven and earth, spring and fall, I would leave here the exit routes, the evenings in the kitchen, the last amorous gaze, and all of the city-bound directions that make you shudder: I would leave here the thick twilight falling upon the land, gravity, hope, enchantment, and tranquility, I would leave here those beloved and those close to me, everything that touched me, everything that shocked me, everything that fascinated and uplifted me, I would leave here the noble, the benevolent, the pleasant, and the demonically beautiful, I would leave here the budding sprout, every birth and existence, I would leave here incantation, enigma, distances, the intoxication of inexhaustible eternities; for here I would leave this earth and these stars, because I would take nothing with me, because I've looked into what's coming, and I don't need anything from here.

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

As a social experiment, I’m considering taking a week and seriously responding to every low-effort spam email I get:

Email text: “Hi Erik, saw you guys have this cool focus on user research and high fidelity design really makes a difference for your clients. I’m curious,”

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 03/06/2025

Definitely hiring this group for lead gen, their precise, real-time data seems excellent

email: "Hi Erik, Looks like Purpose UX's core work revolves around dental care. Spending time on outdated leads or wrong contacts affects your bottom line. Our personalized data service offers precise, real-time contact data on dentists."

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 23/05/2025

Great piece! One correction: I think this should be “Shopify”

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 06/05/2025

seems like a healthy market:

Job listing for a Senior Product Designer from LinkedIn - US, remote, full time, pay range 104K - 197K. Posted 1 day ago, received over 100 applications, is no longer accepting applications.

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 07/04/2025

Where’s Waldo, beginner edition

A picture of a child’s bedroom with a fat fuzzy tummy and legs emerging from under the bed

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

On chinstrap beards: (from Christopher Buehlman’s “The Blacktongue Thief”)

Quote about chinstrap beards: “if you wear a beard like that, you basically saying ‘I have no hope of getting laid but you won’t like what happens if you punch me’”

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 28/01/2025

Aristocrats ponder farming (from Sea of Tranquility by Emily St John Mandel):

Passage of two useless aristocrats musing about how to run a farm: “I suppose it’s quite hard work, farming?”

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 16/01/2025

Reading Nicked by MJ Anderson, so far I’m loving it

Passage from nicked by MJ Anderson where a relic hunter professes to be a true Christian, concluding with the phrase “it did not matter that no one believed him, or that he did not expect them to.”

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

This is the forecast that has school closed tomorrow? Even for NC this is extremely weak sauce

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 08/01/2025

Watched Total Recall with the kids over the weekend - no one can convince me that the Cybertruck isn't just the car design from that movie floating around in Elon's ketamine-addled brain as "coolest thing ever"

Angular, cybertruck-looking car from the move Total Recall (1990)

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 07/01/2025

Somehow pushed myself to get out and run today

Meme of a bro in sunglasses and hat saying “I am straight up not having a good time”

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 27/12/2024

"It gets easier. Every day it gets a little easier. You gotta do it every day —that’s the hard part. But it does get easier."

Screencap from Bojack Horseman showing the old monkey running talking to an exhausted Bojack about running

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 27/12/2024

In 2023, I had 12 weeks where I trained 0-1 days / wk In 2024, I had 1 week where I only trained 0-1 days /wk In 2023, I had 15 weeks where I trained 5+ days / wk In 2024, I had 29 weeks where I trained 5+ days / wk I didn't go farther or faster really, just got out there day after day

Bar graph of # of training days per week in 2024:
0 weeks with no training days
1 week with 1 training day
6 weeks with 2 training days
9 weeks with 3 training days
7 weeks with 4 training days
13 weeks with 5 training days
16 weeks with 6 training days

Bar graph of # of training days per week in 2023:
6 weeks with no training days
6 weeks with 1 training day
4 weeks with 2 training days
10 weeks with 3 training days
11 weeks with 4 training days
10 weeks with 5 training days
5 weeks with 6 training days

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 27/12/2024

I ran 800+ miles this year. I may not have speed, I may not have endurance, But what I do have is consistency:

Bar graph of miles run Jan 1 - Dec 31 from Garmin app
showing 800.1 mi total distance, 15.4 avg weekly, 66.7 avg monthly miles

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 16/12/2024

from www.instagram.com/instachaaz

Mockup titled: "Googling stuff then vs. now." Then: "The thing you want", Now: "AI bullshit, sponsored result, sponsored result, sponsored result, people always ask callout, view product gallery, ...."

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 28/11/2024

How I feel after thanksgiving dinner:

A fluffy white and black cat passed the fuck out

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 28/11/2024

Parents remarked on our new couch but I had to correct them - the old couch wasn’t ours, it was the dog’s

A Great Dane snoozing in a very beat up couch

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Erik Johnson @ejexpress.bsky.social · 17/09/2024

if any bluesky folks are going to be at UX Yall this week, hit me up! i'm giving a talk / rant on "AI" (specifically, the hype around current models and the implications for tech jobs) #ux #ai #uxyall