iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 29/09/2026

I saw this and can't unsee it so now you have to see it too.

A "FurReal Snuggles the Smiling Sloth" that looks roughly like a small faerie creature who has cut off a sloth's face to wear as a skin, pinning the edges of the lips into a creased expression evoking Jim Carrey as Hannibal Lecter.

A close-up of the thing that will eventually murder an entire small town.

Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 27/09/2026

My wife and I spent almost two weeks on Vancouver Island, and it was so beautiful I forgot to take photos. I got a few, but I wasn't just pulling my phone out every five seconds. It feels really nice to experience something and not feel the burning need to document the whole thing.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 20/09/2026

Just fuck everything forever. I hate it here.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 12/09/2026

Here's a chaser: This is my local book maze and one of my favorite bookstores on the planet: Robert's Books in Lincoln City, OR. (The video's sped up to 2x speed because it was originally over 5 minutes long.)

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 12/09/2026

All of my prose books are ebooks now, but this is my comics shelf:

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 04/09/2026

They got this pretty spot-on. In addition to the map colors, it said I spoke "most like someone from Oregon", and my closest city matches were Portland, OR and Seattle, WA. I've lived my whole life in the Pacific Northwest - 18 years in Oregon, 27 years in Washington, and I'm now back in Oregon.

A map of the U.S. with bands of color representing where Luke's spoken dialect most resembles. Red is "Most Like" and blue is "Least Like". The reddest parts of the map encompass the Pacific Northwest and California, with the bluest parts being the deep south and far northeast.

Makes total sense, since I've lived in the PNW my whole life.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 03/09/2026

Okay, for those of us of a specific age, this album fucking rocks. They basically re-recorded - or in some cases covered - the whole soundtrack with new arrangements. Stan Bush and Vince DiCola worked on their respective songs, and they have a few guest performers.

The sleeve for the new album "Transformers: The Movie: The Reformatted Edition, displayed in a "Now Playing" stand next to a turntable playing the "Energon Pink" vinyl LP.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 03/09/2026

Behold: My favorite piece of weird-ass branded merch I ever got from the Nintendo company store while I was there. No idea why this exists, unless they were just selling the random sample batch some merch company sent in to Licensing. Not sure if this was ever available to the general public.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 02/09/2026

Y'all, I finally got it. AND IT'S SO PRETTY

The complete set of 2024 World Book Encyclopedias. The spine forms an art-deco, retrofuturistic image with a spaceman, an old-school rocket, a moon city with a dirigible over it, and several planets, all in an awesome pink-orange-purple-light blue color scheme.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 01/09/2026

"We see AI the same way we see other technology: as a tool..." This line gets regurgitated by every "AI" user. It, and the shitstains who utter it, can fuck off into the abyss. It Doesn't. Fucking. Matter. how useful a tool is when it is foundationally based on theft and harm.

A post from the web game Outlier on their use of AI:

Does Outlier use AI?
Yes. AI is one of many tools we use to build and operate Outlier. We use it to help improve the game, develop new featurs, troubleshoot and fix bugs, assist with customer support, research ideas, and help with writing and development.
AI doesn't run Outlier or make the final decisions. The concept, game design, rules, scoring, product direction, and decisions about what becomes part of Outlier are ours. The voice of the game is human designed by us, and AI writes iun it rather than inventing it.
We see AI the same waqy we see other technology: as a tool that helps us work faster, solve problems, and build a better experience for players. It helps us create and improve Outlier, not replace the people behind it.

So... yeah... fuck these guys.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 01/09/2026

For some reason, even 30 years later, it still catches me off guard that Laurence Mason - who played Lord Nikon in Hackers - also played Tin Tin in The Crow.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 31/08/2026

The problem is there's no way to tell the difference until you have one in hand. Even then, you won't know until you try to use it or, like I did, run benchmark tests on it. This is the actual packaging of one of the counterfeits I received:

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 30/08/2026

Sixty seconds of zen for your timeline.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 29/08/2026

I didn't get any good pictures or video, but I accidentally stumbled close to a family of sea otters investigating something on the sand. We all froze for a sec, and they decided it was time to hit the waves.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 29/08/2026

There are 10x more snadpipers on this beach than humans.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 29/08/2026

This is why I will always love the Oregon Coast. Perfect, bright, temperate summer day, and in the several miles of open, sandy beach in my view, I can see *maybe* ten people.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 26/08/2026

As of today, MY ENCYCLOPEDIA IS IN THE MAIL! This time, I just went ahead and ordered it directly from WorldBook.com. It was on sale! It cost more than the nonexistent copy I ordered from eBay, but it'll also be brand new. And, more importantly, COMPLETE.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 25/08/2026

Since Linux is my full-time daily driver now, I finally picked up a custom Super key for my keyboard.

A black ergonomic mechanical keyboard, but the "WIN" key has been replaced by a metal keycap that looks like a Question Block from Super Mario Bros.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 23/08/2026

I love my FiiO M21 music player, but it has two faults in some situations: The Bluetooth connection is TRASH, and it's kinda bulky for use when doing active things like yardwork or working out. I loved my old iPod Nano... so I picked up a Shanling M0 Pura. And it ROCKS. LOOK HOW TINY IT IS

A Shanling M0 Pura digital audio player, placed next to a standard sized poker chip for reference. IT REALLY ISN'T THAT MUCH BIGGER

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 12/08/2026

I finally have my full set of Shinwa rulers (6", 12", 24", 36"), and I will say again: These are not only extraordinarily well-designed measuring tools... they are genuinely beautiful objects. The matte finish, the font choice, the way the indexes are cut and colored... they're basically perfect.

A set of four Shinwa rulers, ranging in size from 6 inches to 36 inches, set on a black cutting mat with a white grid.

The rulers themselves are very nice stainless steel, and everything about them is optimized not just for function, but form as well. The indexes are engraved to an extremely fine detail, and the font choices for the letters are not only easily readable, they are elegant and beautiful. The surface of the rulers is ground to a fine matte finish that defuses direct reflections in such a way that the numbers and lines are never obscured or unreadable.

For objects so simple, the fusion of aesthetics and functional design are basically perfect.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 11/08/2026

Welp. I got scammed, I guess. I thought I could trust something from Thriftbooks's official eBay account, but I guess not. After paying almost $500 for a 2024 World Book Encyclopedia set in "Very Good" condition, I received a SINGLE VOLUME, and it was practically destroyed, at that.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 07/08/2026

I was literally putting everything back in place, readying to just reassemble the controller with the original black button instead of the translucent purple one. It was ENTIRELY RANDOM CHANCE that I spotted this:

A green 3D-printed "Bench" - a small boat used as a calibration print for new 3D printers. It looks like a cartoon fishing boat and is about 2 inches long by about 2 inches tall.

Inside the "cabin" of the boat sits a tiny, translucent purple object, which turns out to be the button that I dropped while working on my wife's Switch 2 controller.

This Benchy sits almost 6 inches off the surface of my desk.... That's how big a bounce this part took when I dropped it.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 07/08/2026

This is part of the tchotchke shelf on the back of my desk. There's a bunch of stuff up there. I looked in every single place below the level of that shelf. Silly me.

A partial pic of the back of my desk, focusing on the tchotchke shelf I mentioned in the previous post.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 07/08/2026

During the process, I fumbled some things and dropped this part:

A tiny, translucent purple "C" button from a Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller, sitting on the bright yellow surface of my desk.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 07/08/2026

Today, I was working on repairing a minor issue with my wife's Switch 2 controller.

The bright yellow surface of my desk, strewn with the parts of a half-disassembled Switch 2 Pro Controller. I've already done a shell-swap on the controller, so all the parts are translucent purple.

In the background sits a low shelf loaded with a bunch of random tchotchkes, including a Pokemon Ultra Ball, a Nintendo pocket knife (yep), a Legend of Zelda Pin, and two 3D-printed "Benchy" boats.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 29/07/2026

Is there anyone out there who can explain to me where this opinion of Nintendo comes from? I've seen it spewed from the keyboards of many an anonymous internet gamer, and as a lifelong Nintendo fan who worked for NOA for over a decade, I genuinely don't understand.

Screencap of a Bluesky post in response to Mat Piscatella that says:

"but nintendoomed and also nintendo is literally the most evil company worse than nestle"

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 25/07/2026

Well, that's our weekend sorted.

Two copies of Splatoon Raiders for Switch 2.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 23/07/2026

Dollar-for-dollar, note-for-note, I've never in my life had a better pair of earbuds than these. Yes, they're wired... and that's a good thing. They're stupidly named - TRUTHEAR x Crinacle Zero:Red - but for $55 you won't find a better deal or better sound. headphones.com/products/tru...

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 22/07/2026

I love my 3DS. More than even I realized, when I found out I had way more nostalgia for DS and 3DS games than I knew I did. The AYN Thor delivered that nostalgia in the absolute perfect way: Playing games less as how they are, more as how I *remember* them. It has finally, truly replaced my 3DS.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 21/07/2026

I couldn't get Sony's official 30th Anniversary DualSense controller. It was too limited, too expensive, and a pain in the ass to try and get. So I just made my own.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 17/07/2026

My wife and I have quite a bit of original art; most of it is original comic book art. Last month I was alerted to an auction for something from my childhood, and managed to win an original piece that not only calls back to my childhood, but speaks to me as an adult:

Original art from Garfield. It depicts a three-panel comic strip.

Panel 1: Garfield walks into frame from the left, toward his full food bowl. He says, "Next week I'm going to turn eleven."

Panel 2: Garfield seated with his mouth wide open, holding his food bowl in his front paws, using it as a catapult to fling his food into the air toward his waiting maw. He says, "I wonder if I'll be older and wiser."

Panel 3: Garfield in the same seated position, still holding his food bowl, his mouth still open, but his face is covered in his food, as he clearly missed his mouth. He says, "Probably just older."

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 13/07/2026

Sell your book in five words "Bourne Identity meets Iron Giant"

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 12/07/2026

I love the confidence I've gained in repairing and modifying stuff I own. On the mod side, I've installed dozens of shell swaps for consoles and controllers now. So, when I can't afford or can't get the insanely limited-edition Playstation 30th Anniversary PS5 DualSense... I'll just make my own.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 12/07/2026

In addition to being an emulation powerhouse, I'm genuinely pleased with how my AYN Thor (Max 512) runs PC games via GameNative. Every indie game I own runs flawlessly, and although I haven't tested a lot of AAA games, it runs Borderlands 3 like a CHAMP with a solid 40-50fps.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 11/07/2026

It's really great. I bought my wife the standard Trimui Brick, but I have an affinity for handhelds with aluminum shells, so I got myself the Brick Hammer (I got the charcoal-colored one in this pic). I used RetroGameCorps's guide to get MinUI set up on it, and I love it.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 08/07/2026

Here's a little thread on my opinion RE: gaming handhelds and why I think this pictured combination is the best value, hands down: First and foremost: It is my opinion that the only two TRUE contenders in the modern handheld market have ever been the Switch and Steam Deck families. 1/?

A Nintendo Switch 2 with the Mobapad M12 HD controllers attached, which makes the whole device look very much like a ROG Ally or Lenovo Legion Go S.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 08/07/2026

We? WE?!? Who the fuck is "we", @dwallacewells.bsky.social? WE - those of us classified as human - didn't pick this. Never wanted this. Maybe you should pose this question to the meat popsicles in the fucking tech sector who forced this on all of US. "WE". Go the fuck away with this bullshit.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 08/07/2026

Today, I begin the (hopefully not too) arduous task of fully setting up my AYN Thor. I've done this for many emulation handhelds over the years, and it's always varying degrees of pain in the ass. This part only has to be done once, though, and the end result is always worth it.

My AYN Thor, a dual-screen, clamshell video gaming handheld that is very much a modern, powerful version of the 3DS (just without the 3D). Mine is black, and photographed against a solid walnut background.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 07/07/2026

Well, Mobapad has now made the Switch 2 the best handheld gaming system you can buy. And having played games on a Steam Deck and a ROG Ally, I don't think it's even close, especially taking price into account. These controllers are damned near perfect, IMO.

A Nintendo Switch 2 tablet with the joycons replaced by the Mobapad M12 HD controllers. They're full-size modern controllers with full-size analog sticks and buttons. With these attaced to the Switch 2, the whole package looks very much like a Lenovo Legion Go S but with a significantly larger screen.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 07/07/2026

Y'all, there is an OCEAN of difference between the Chinese handhelds you could get even 5-6 years ago and now. This AYN Thor is as premium as any device you've ever held. Everything from the packaging to the industrial design is FUCKING IMMACULATE. This thing is GOREGEOUS.

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 07/07/2026

HEEEE HEEEEE HEEHEEHEE TEEHEEHEE HEEEEEEEEEEE

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Luke M. @geekelite.geekerific.com · 02/07/2026

Another reason I love living on the Oregon Coast:

A screencap of my weather app showing lows in the 50s and highs in the 60s for the next week.

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