iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 30/03/2026

As someone who was researching and documenting impacts of the housing foreclosure crisis in 2008…👀

Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 25/12/2025

We both simultaneously said: “nurse shark!” because they hang out near us when we’ve gone snorkeling and they seem like lil sweeties.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 06/12/2025

Caturday energy already dialed up to 11 over here…

Action shot of fluffy gray cat with white paws and muzzle. The photo catches the cat in mid-air, about 4 feet off the ground, forelegs outstretched, leaping from a fireplace mantle onto the sofa several feet away.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 23/11/2025

Regardless, your sense of color and rhythm that comes through in the piece is stunning!

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 23/11/2025

Gorgeous! If you’re open to indulging my curiosity, I’d love to know more about how you achieved the circle motifs. The edges don’t look like appliqué (too soft?) …so I’m wondering if you achieved it with a dye/print technique (reminds me a bit of sun prints!) or if the fabric had it already

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 14/11/2025

Honestly? That may be the ultimate superpower. Seriously badass.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 28/09/2025

“Yeah, we're dragging people into the office and forcing some of them to again live in high COL areas, but is that *really* enough misery? I'm sure we could do more, but budgets are tight.” “Ooh! Got it! What if we also made them see each other’s gnarly FEET on the daily?!”

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 25/09/2025

Of all the chotiners, this one made the cats jump when I LOLed

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 21/09/2025

This one, y’all. He’s such a little evil goblin, and yet he has my whole heart.

Close perspective portrait shot of fluffy grey and white cat on his person’s chest, gazing up at her. It’s not immediately clear whether it’s a look of love or attempted mental telepathy to make treats happen.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 02/09/2025

Week 6 of making flatbread instead of buying bagels or other breadstuffs. First time trying a yeasted recipe. This stuff is SO cheap, so easy. This is a bit more than half of the batch. I don’t have a stand mixer, a ton of counter space, or any real skills, so if I can pull it off most folks can

A skillet and a plate sitting on the front burners of an older stove with a red teakettle on the left rear burner. The skillet has two pieces of flatbread cooking on it; the plate has a stack of finished flatbread

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 31/08/2025

Ahh I’m going to have to keep an eye out for a decent used one…

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 31/08/2025

Looks fantastic! I’ve been experimenting with flatbreads, and noodles might need to be next on my list. Do you need a pasta machine to get them thin enough?

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 24/08/2025

I ❤️ that I instantly got this reference

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

…and most people are fighting fires. So again, it’s a two-tiered threshold dynamic. (1) the threshold to automate/bulk *a* process, (2) the threshold to acquire & gain competence with a tool/system to make & maintain automations readily. Once 2, then yes 1 goes down, but needs lots of 1 first.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

In an org context, higher-ups punt that stuff down to someone else, and downline folks don’t have power to demand better (or need to spend clout & make a hard business case). And for individuals, it’s still about juice/squeeze and context. Sure I love fixing bulk ops! But not if I’m on a deadline…

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

I suspect it’s easier to think about this if you take it to specific personas and situations. Who is the person experiencing what repetitive task at what level of aggravation? And how does that fit in with their other priorities and the people breathing down their neck?

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

I’m not referring to LLMs to write code. When I say “user” I really do mean your typical user, my typical biz client. No one’s coding, they’re just out there doing business

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

“Small” tasks are also misleading, because most often to be useful, small ≈ specific. And specificity is more fragile. That’s why a lot of users now just throw the task into a LLM chat and hope/try to pick out the right bits…bc it blunts some of the work without fighting for every detail & edge case

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

I’m not assuming intense interventions or state of the art solutions. My own lil systems include dozens of the tiniest macros and automations imaginable, as well as bigger ones. But even for me, that carries some overhead cost — if nothing else, cognitive load of remembering what they all are

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

I get you. But people spare half a sec thinking that and then just get on with things. It’s not worth emotional energy to a degree that becomes observable. If it’s in a tool they use a lot, are invested in, and has an active user community, maybe they’ll upvote a feature request. If not, why bother

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

It’s far too easy with JTBD to forget that for most users, most of the time, the most salient word is not “job” it’s DONE

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

I think that among other things, a lot of normies implicitly have a greater internalized sense of “is it worth it?” than tinkerers do. I say this with love, as a non-normie who needs to actively evaluate where and why I'm drawing dopamine. imgs.xkcd.com/comics/is_it...

Classic xkcd comic “is it worth the time?” illustrating a matrix of task frequency x time saved to show how much time spent automating still delivers a payoff.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

In the “a little dark but distant enough” and intriguing, I recently read & loved Alien Clay and Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (the latter is the first of a trilogy that IMO falters as a whole, but the first book stands on its own and is very fun)

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

In the former category: Legends & Lattes, and the prequel Bookshops & Bonedust. Both are charming and fun. Less lighthearted but great escapist fantasy, impeccably executed: The Scholomance series by Naomi Novik, also her book Spinning Silver. All so tightly plotted, she’s changed how I see craft

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

I totally get it! Ok so I’ve got a selection of SFF genre I can recommend, some on the lighter/I-need-to-feel-ok-about-the-world-again side (I see in the thread you’re already onto Becky Chambers) and some in the heavily-intriguing-take-you-out-of-current-concerns vein

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 18/08/2025

This is amazing! I always want to go back and shore up gaps in my understanding, but I’m so focused on applied work, pure theory material tends to slip out of my brain 😵‍💫

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 18/08/2025

Genre preferences? (in/out?) Recently read _Of Monsters and Mainframes_ and was pleasantly surprised by how well it held together through the end. It’s fun in a loopy-campy-absurdist way, but never gets into sloppy, overly repetitive, or self-indulgent territory.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 14/08/2025

They normalize pretty quickly! That said: I recently broke down and got a “computer Rx” pair as well (just single-vision so way cheaper but optimized for that distance) and that has been a boon for longer working sessions. Something to think about if you notice eyestrain.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 12/08/2025

No joke: I drove past the Wendy’s in my neighborhood this afternoon, and their street-side sign read: “Misery has arrived. Good luck!”

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 05/08/2025

One of my coping strategies is to get basic in whatever forms make sense at the time—enjoying simple competence at simple things. I’ve always been a cook, but this spring I started making things from scratch I’d ordinarily buy. Here’s a batch of tortillas I made this evening! Super good, sooo cheap

A brown ceramic plate stacked with freshly made flour tortillas. A cast iron tortilla press can just be seen in the upper left of the photo.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 02/08/2025

Writing longhand, drawing out ideas with pen(cil) and paper. Repeated opportunities for low-key, layered observation and emergent curiosity (i.e., deeper noticing) over time. Play.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

This is how I learned about these pliers, and now they’re going on my list. Thanks!

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 19/07/2025

Ohhh I’d love the chance to read that book again for the first time. Hope it’s as beautiful for you as it was for me.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

“We know these lemons/limes work great!” ➡️ “Ehh those limes are inconvenient. These are cheaper and faster. Limes are limes, amirite?! Go capitalism!” ❌💀 Not to mention the whole dismissal of indigenous *expert* wisdom part… 2/2

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

The history of scurvy lives rent-free in my head! I don’t know how to compare scale in this instance (~2M agonizing scurvy deaths over a couple of centuries vs…enshittification of significant but diffuse consequences over a rapid timescale) but the parallels are particularly poignant 1/2

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 13/07/2025

Reilly here to remind me that I have other hangers, I don’t need to be so finicky. Happy Caturday!

Siamese snowshoe cat conked out on his back on a messily made bed with light purple quilt and clothes hangers laid out like the human is working to put away laundry. The cat is sprawled out and blocking access to the hangers, his white belly exposed and white paws curling into the air like he is making biscuits in his sleep.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 07/07/2025

Is it me, or do the levels of flailing enshittification seem to be accelerating? Like, huh…they really are out of any good ideas.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 05/06/2025

Ooh flashback! I spent summer ‘88 temping at a AAA, fielding frustrated calls from people desperate for their TripTiks in a heat wave. I started pitching in to make them in between calls and on my lunch breaks to help keep up with the demand. Haven’t thought about that in years and years!

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 05/05/2025

Today turned more stressful than expected…had to take this little urchin to the vet, and now she’s scheduled for surgery next week. Life’s always going to throw curveballs like this, but damn if they don’t hit even harder amidst the current chaos

The photo is of an adorable calico cat snuggled within a pile of vibrantly patterned throw pillows, looking up at the viewer

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 03/04/2025

Good. Let them all be indelibly and forever linked to the devastation. It should haunt their every waking moment from this day forward.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 01/04/2025

It’s truly awe-inspiring. And while I know he doesn’t owe anybody any particular length of time, and certainly not more than he’s already given—I’m rooting with EVERY fiber of my being for him to go 24h20m and seize that historical note away from Thurmond’s ghost.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 01/04/2025

I am fine with “pointless stunts” like this every damn day. I will never tire of Dems standing up and articulating the damage for 19+ hours and counting when the other side can’t string five true words together in their defense. Keep. It. Coming.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 01/04/2025

I think the objective is to show the way. This is leadership. The willingness for our legislators to stand and speak is a renewable resource, Booker is priming the pump.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 28/03/2025

The con only works if you keep the shells moving…

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 20/03/2025

My (limited!) understanding was also that presidential immunity under the SCOTUS decision doesn’t automatically apply to subordinates. So the underlying criminality needs to be a drumbeat.

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Shelby Chartkoff @schartkoff.bsky.social · 15/03/2025

I can’t follow your logic to the same conclusion. There was very strong messaging against capitulation, w/ coherent messages tying this CR to further abuse by the administration that Schumer muddled. The fragmented messaging is *also* on Schumer. Anger at him is about getting into array, not out.

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