iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

More ways that "AI" wastes my time: now I have to go through automatically generated meeting transcripts and make sure the hallucination engine didn't misattribute others' words to me, or mine to anyone else.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

20 y/o me would be delighted by the size of my library and CD collection and then I would show him how to access the ebook and MP3 collections and he would be amazed

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Our local red-shouldered hawk has noticed that we moved our snack bar (goldfish) into a temporary tank while our pond is getting maintenance and is trying to figure out how to get past the netting

Red-shouldered hawk, dappled by shade from a tree, perched on the edge of an outdoor fish tank; a decorative tiki is in the background

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Got the latest flu and COVID shots today. Now it is time to relax and let my immune system do the heavy lifting.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Completely unsurprising, given that I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. mydialect.us/quiz-standar...

Heat map showing that my survey responses are closest to San Francisco and furthest from Nashville.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Post something Random for a better September.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

I tried out the new vertical tabs on Chrome, but I had long since adapted to horizontal tabs by naming all my tab groups as emoji, and it looked really weird to have just the emoji along the side and all that empty space.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Also beware false profits. If someone is dumping negative externalities (like atmospheric CO₂), they’re a bad investment!

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

“I had a lot of things to do today But you know what I did instead I took a nap It was a very good nap”

Shorthaired brown tabby with white is happily sacked out on outstretched human legs

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

High protein equivalent for a Wendy’s Frosty with a #ninjacreami: 16 oz Fairlife chocolate milk 2 packets Swiss Miss reduced calorie cocoa ¼ tsp vanilla extract Mix with frother. Freeze. Top with 4oz Fairlife; use Creamiccino setting. Detach ice from pint walls with a butter knife. Respin.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

Optimist: The cup is half full Pessimist: The cup is half empty Senior Engineer: This cup has 100% surge capacity.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

What's your favorite Bible verse? Wrong answers only.

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Orcspiration @orcspiration.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

YOUR FOES WOULD SEE YOU SLEEPLESS: RESIST AND REST.

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Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Philosophers often bring up the "principle of charity": a willingness to assume good faith in an interlocutor and treat them accordingly. It's good to do in many circumstances. But it is worth formulating a principle of not being a fucking mark. If not during the rise of fascism, then when? 12/

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

I often note that ⅓ of the population will vote to immiserate themselves as long as they get someone to look down on, and the rest of us need to out-organize them. This brings up another thing we need to organize around: heeding observable reality.

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Premee Mohamed @premeemohamed.com · 28/07/2026

Artisanal handmade gods on Deitsy

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Ted Aronson @foolish.computer · 27/07/2026

I think the strongest evidence that @WEATHERISHAPPENING is actually an interdimensional being with spiritual connections to powerful eldritch gods is that they apparently somehow negotiated a mid-month start date for their new apartment lease.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

It is warm enough to wear shorts, but my fluff creatures are offended by sitting on my unclad shins, so I have a quilt on my legs to indulge them.

Brown tabby with white snoozing on outstretched human legs, paws outstretched

Fluffy brown tabby snoozing on outstretched human legs, paws crossed in front of her

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A.M. Tuomala @amtuomala.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

I love the asking more than the answer: whence maladies come, what airy substance burns, of what the heavens are made. Miasma, phlogiston, ether-- How splendidly we failed! How gladly we ask again, the first question and its unnumbered daughters: What is this glorious world, and how can we know it?

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Dollop of 'Ween 🫠 @dollop-of-mayo.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

the thing about politics is everything is politics this distresses certain extremely comfortable people and that's funny

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Iron Spike @ironspike.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

This shit with Taylor Farms is exactly what I’m talking about when I say you may say you “don’t do politics,“ but politics are more than happy to do you. The microbes political bribes got out the door and into your intestines don’t particularly care that you find it all beneath you.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

Located a mention of a previous incarnation in The Evening Journal, Wilmington, Delaware, November 26, 1920

This horse is pastry fiend!
Owner frantic since Dobbin ate doughnuts and formed violent craving.
Animal chases bakers' wagons.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

My mother started reading The Hobbit to me as a bedtime story when I was five. I was so enthused by it we went into The Fellowship of the Ring, and I got impatient waiting for bedtime and started reading ahead on my own.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

Where are we going, and what are we doing in this handbasket?

Fluffy brown tabby curled up in handbasket, looking at the camera

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 04/07/2026

“What did Larry find that _wasn’t_ a truffle?” is a great setup for launching different kinds of story.

A small operation in Oregon that hunts truffles with a trained dog has added an unpaid trainee. A cat named Larry accompanies the handler and the truffle dog into the woods every outing, works a patch of ground a little apart from them, and digs with tremendous confidence in places where there is nothing.
The handler says Larry has never found a truffle and shows no sign of understanding the assignment. He does not use scent the way the dog does and he does not respond when the dog makes a find.
He simply digs his own holes nearby and then inspects them. "He thinks he's on the team," the handler said. "He is emphatically not on the team."
TRUFFLE DOG FINDS THE TRUFFLES -
'TRAINEE' CAT DIGS RANDOM HOLES AND FINDS DIRT

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

Continuing the chain of posting random pictures for luck in July.

Shorthaired brown tabby with white curled up on a red blanket. She is facing to the right with one paw upturned as if in some emphatic gesture.

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derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 27/06/2026

Thank you for the donation! And sorry for taking a while to get back to you. This fundraiser received so many questions that I've been working my way through everything in batches. I'm attaching my answer here with alt-text. Let me know if you can't read it. Thank you again!

Hi Max!

Thank you for the kind donation! I apologize for the delay in getting back to you. This fundraiser received a ton of replies, so I've been working through all the questions in batches. I'm writing to you through this document because I think your question deserves a thoughtful response. I plan to post this with alt-text, in case it's helpful, but please let me know if it doesn't work. I can try another solution.

I love all sorts of styles, especially if they can be tied to culture. Even better if they were rooted in some regional identity or practice. So naturally, I love Aloha shirts. The style, as you probably know, comes from the plaid "palaka" work shirts that field workers (often those harvesting pineapples and sugarcane) wore in the early 20th century, which were eventually made from "pareu" printed fabric that arrived in the region via Tahiti. Asian American tailors eventually developed the style we know today — a short, boxy body with short sleeves and a camp collar, typically made from crepe rayon and silk and decorated with certain motifs. These shirts were commonly bought by tourists who brought them home as souvenirs.

As the mainland became increasingly enamored of Hawaiian culture and the American middle class grew during the postwar years, Aloha shirts became pseudo-status symbols because they signified that a person had time for leisure. The idea of wearing an Aloha shirt at home while serving drinks to guests from your tiki bar represented a kind of aspirational yet accessible lifestyle. Granted, many Americans didn't differentiate much between Hawaiian, Tahitian, Samoan, or Maori cultures — much of this scene was made of a mix of things that vaguely felt "tropical exotic" — but I think our current conception of the style is very rooted in this history. This, along with the fact that Aloha shirts were part of California surf culture, which gave them a youthful appeal (although those people eventually aged out, so some people associate Aloha shirts with Jimmy Buffett concerts).

Hedi Slimane brought them back into fashion about 10 years ago, when he was creative director of Saint Laurent. He teamed them with skinny black jeans, lambskin double riders, and sleek jodhpur boots with Cuban heels. This helped reframe them as being youthful and cool in the modern age.

I love all sorts of Aloha shirts and their "vacation style" derivatives. If someone is thinking about buying one, I think they're easier to wear in simple designs — two or three colors and with simple motifs. Although simpler designs don't have the charm of bolder options, they're easy to pair with items like raw denim jeans, olive field jackets, denim trucker jackets, black double-riders, and so on. Plus, as a friend of mine put it, "there's always a risk of looking like an '80s movie nerd or party animal in these things." If that’s a concern, I think a simpler design is a bit safer.

If you're looking for one, try Two Palms, Reyn Spooner, RRL, and (my favorite) Sun Surf (available at Self Edge). Buck Mason also has a blue-white palm print this season that looks very versatile (they call it their "draped linen deuce coupe camp shirt”). Additionally, Proper Cloth can make them made-to-measure if you can't find ready-to-wear options that fit. Granted, if possible, I think the best ones are made in Hawaii, sort of like how it's not champagne unless it comes from the Champagne region of France. If the shirt was not made in Hawaii, I think it's more accurate to call the style a "vacation shirt," not necessarily an "Aloha shirt."

I really want a "Duke Kahanamoku shell shirt," either in black or brown. Named after a native Hawaiian surf legend, the original version has been a collectible for decades, but it's expensive and hard to find (because it's vintage). Sun Surf has a repro version that I've always wanted to buy. I'm including a photo of my friend Peter wearing one (his is the Sun Surf version).

If you're interested in this history, Dale Hope's book "The Aloha Shirt: Spirit of the Islands," published by Patagonia, is a great read.

Thank you again for the donation! And more importantly, thank you for rescuing those ferals! I’m generally heartened to meet so many people who care about animals on Bluesky.

A photo fo a man sitting on a motorcycle. He's wearing a black leather motorcycle jacket with a black Aloha shirt.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

My ballot has been counted! (Dropped it off at the library on Saturday afternoon and got the notification on Sunday night.)

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 28/05/2026

My wife got a cat-shaped heating pad and Nero is now worried about his job security.

Fluffy brown tabby with a pensive expression loafing on a bed next to a cat-shaped heating pad

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 19/05/2026

This is a cat checkpoint. Relinquish your most recent cat picture

Shorthaired brown tabby with white lounging on a red blanket covering human ankles.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 19/05/2026

Given recent events, you may be wondering if you’re fully exercising the political power available to you. I’ve learned some things they didn’t cover in high school civics. 🧵

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

ANNOUNCEMENT: since reality itself is currently implausible, April Fool’s Day has been canceled for 2026.

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NE Ohio Regional Sewer District @neorsd.org · 12/03/2026

good night, sewers. good night, streams. good night, operations and maintenance teams. good night, settling tanks. good night, stream banks. good night, engineers, scientists, crews, managers, inspectors, analysts too. a good night for us means serving with care. good night, sewers, everywhere.

overlooking a series of circular water filled tanks of a sewage treatment plant at night.

lights line a long brick building on the horizon as a blue-black sky is stark behind a veil of thin puffy clouds in the distance.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 17/02/2026

This a CAT checkpoint. Show me the most recent cat image on your phone.

Fluffy brown that snoozing on human lap, with her paw over her nose

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rstevens 👻💨 @rstevens.bsky.social · 09/02/2026

closed borders are anti-snack and that’s enough for me to oppose them

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 09/02/2026

Valentine Daleks at my local Costco

A bouquet of flowers in a red glass vase with Dalek-esque rivets on the sides

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 19/01/2026

Nero and Phryne doing their night shift work: keeping my wife's feet warm. #CatsOfBluesky

Two fluffy brown tabbies curled up on a red polar fleece blanket, looking at the camera operator as if to say "Why aren't you in bed yet?"

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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg @theradr.bsky.social · 09/01/2026

Our job is to keep showing up and taking care of each other. And knowing when to pause to refill so we can go back to doing it more. Everything else is commentary.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 01/01/2026

Happy New Year from Pacific time!

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 27/12/2025

@darkhorse.com I got your "Holiday Savings from Dark Horse Digital!" email. Remember that comics collection I had with you on digital.darkhorse.com before you closed your service? Send me the whole thing as CBZ or PDF files, or as gifts at Kobo Books, and I'll consider spending money with you again.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 21/12/2025

@exaggerated.bsky.social I'm enjoying FILLING YOUR WORLDS WITH WORDS and just got to the bit about the thumbs up gesture, which reminded me of some advice I got as a software engineer many years ago: never ever depict hands in a user interface. Whatever it is will be an internationalization problem.

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Max Kaehn @mithriltabby.bsky.social · 18/12/2025

I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together. (I often misattribute this to the "Walrus Sutra" when talking Buddhism.)

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