Wednesday, 10th December, 2025

This site still exists. I wonder if I can freshen it up a bit and then start posting again. It has all sorts of little projects behind the scenes, like converting to DayOne and Tiddlywiki plus the stats page and some other pages I made but never finished or made a menu for. As much as I like micro.blog, I’m not sure it’s the right place for this site.

I’m thinking that I should put my main domain on micro.blog and use it for whatever - given I don’t use the current site whatsoever, then this one can be my journal style site where I don’t really worry or care about what goes on it or how it sounds. It really just is a personal journal that I put on the web as in some roundabout fashion that makes me feel accountable to actually write in it. This is good, as I like writing about whatever in it and if something makes me do it then I’m all for it.

I’d like to have a few interesting pages on here, like books I’ve read or something but I should really add a menu (I said that already). The CSS is a bit janky and maybe needs sorting out such that a menu exists. Given ChatGPT and friends have appeared since I made this site, perhaps they can solve it for me in 2 seconds. In fact I’m writing this in VS Code, and there’s a AI agent right next to this box which probably can do it.

In fact I could just flip the DNS and that’s all I’d have to do, given I’ve not written anything on my main site.

I do have my radio blog, where I was diligently documenting my radio hill walks but after I started doing so many, I fell behind and it was hard to catch up. I also write them up on the SOTA forums and that’s probably a better place for them, although I could just copy and paste the content across.

Saturday, 28th June, 2025

I’ve been looking at old macs. Specifically 2012 Mac minis. Mostly as they’re cheap, circa £40, and upgradable. Still slow on second gen intels and DDR3, but you get macOS (some older version) and then I could play with Tinderbox. Probably a waste of £40. It would be the third time I’ve bought a 2012 Mini 😅

Been lovely weather here today, and been outside a lot. Listened to the iPod whilst mowing the lawn.

Need to spend some time to sync more music, rip some of the cds I found and maybe make a couple of playlists.

Luckily I’ve been outbid on all my old iPod bids so not winning a bunch more.

I should get back on the tiddlywiki setup. The theme and blah can be worked on later. The basic infrastructure needs to be setup then I can start using it.

Friday, 27th June, 2025

Did the iPod mod. It was very easy, and now I have a 128GB ipod with a new big battery. It’s also lighter than the original due to the SD card vs. the hard drive. Sorting out restoring it on Windows was a little bit of a faff as now there are four apps that used to be iTunes: Apple Music, Apple TV, iTunes and Apple Devices. You need Apple Devices and to unplug/plug the iPod to get it to trigger downloading the iPod software. After that it was fine. Now to add music to iTunes and then sync it. Played some music on it. Very enjoyable. I like the Echo Mini for its robustness, if it gets dropped I don’t think anything will happen to it, whereas the iPod still feels little bit fragile. However, I much prefer the menu system of the iPod.

My USB DVDRW also arrived, so I can copy CDs onto the computer, or even make CDs. Was looking for the 30 pin iPod cable and came across my wife’s CDs and DVDs in a folder. She kept all hers, was just me that thought it was smart to get rid of them.

Considering a CD player and amp to listen to things. Although perhaps that’s unecessary, as I can just load them onto the ipod etc. and listen to it. Then not be tethered to a certain location. But would be nice to just play a CD without faff. Reddit suggests finding a used DVD player that also does SACD and has optical out for direct digital transfer. Not started looking but will think about it.

Making some progress on the new tiddlywiki. Still looking at the design/layout. Probably should just stick with the default but can’t help myself.

Sold the Xbox, which is nice. Was worried it would still be for sale when we’re on holiday. Wex photographic emailed to say the X100VI is in stock. So expensive though.

I already have a camera and laptop and desktop and and and everything!

Wednesday, 25th June, 2025

Thinking of going back to tiddlywiki. And this time for everything…

What holds me back is CSS customisation. I’m sure it’s not hard but I can never seem to break in to figure it out. Perhaps this time ChatGPT can help me. But everything else is nice. Probably going to make a new one and set it up, import things and so on.

Finally listening to my snowsky echo mini. Sat in the garden at lunchtime. It’s nice. I’m still going to be making a modded iPod but this is fun.

Tuesday, 24th June, 2025

Managed to get an iPod 5th gen from eBay and then ordered some mods. New bigger battery and 128GB SD here we come! Was getting frustrated with eBay listings and trying to min/max it on cost and condition etc. Glad it’s done now.

Looked at MacBook airs in Costco. Was a dangerous move, although still struggle to justify £1000 on a web browser.

Still undecided about websites.

Wife did finish a nice photo book last night and it made me realise I should take more photos. Need to sort out the film simulation settings on the X-E4 as I don’t like the current ones and it puts me off.

Why does it feel like I’m going to try and find a Tinderbox equivalent on github.

Sunday, 22nd June, 2025

I should know better than to try and win auctions that end on Sundays. It’s when everything sells for the highest price. People are paying a lot for 20 year old device. It makes me question why I’m doing this but also I wonder how much more expensive one already modded actually is. The internet does pump up the price of certain models as they’re “the best”.

I should just focus on auctions ending mid week and bide my time. Also my uncle in law is giving me one, but that’s likely a later gen and I do want to mod another one first before making a meal of that. Particularly as later gen ones are harder to open.

Also conversations with people on eBay is difficult, buyers and sellers. Best try to avoid it where possible and fewer replies is usually better.

It would be fun to make an ultimate mod one too - with usb c, and Bluetooth. Basically what an iPod would be today.

Saturday, 21st June, 2025

Fixed docker issue with some magic grep.

After a while I decided Apple Music wasn’t where I wanted to keep my library. Too many things to work around and then still paying. So for now it’s navidrome on the server pointing to my music folder. Some nice native apps available on all OSs and devices, and seems to be working fine. I need to finish off getting album art and maybe try and sort out tags with musicbrainz but it’s a lot of effort. Yet to load any music onto the echo mini thing, but mostly as I’m sat at the computer whilst sorting this all out.

Get down the route of thinking MacBook is the right choice, but then think about going Linux and cost savings and open source etc. But the MacBook is nicer 😅

Listed the Xbox on eBay and all the controllers but did everything separately. Looked at the lenses but not sure about those.

Read some reviews of Apple Music…tempting to subscribe to that…ideally move the whole family over to it. Bought a CD for the first time in …a minimum of 12 years (now I want to try and figure out when I did buy the last one). The 40th anniversary edition of Brothers in Arms.

Friday, 20th June, 2025

Spotify premium is due to expire in 3 days. I’m thinking I don’t need it. I only listen to a handful of songs and albums. I have some music which I ripped from my CDs a decade+ ago and some other random stuff I’ve picked up since. So I’m deciding what I’m doing. Options are navidrome or similar server with my music on and apps to stream it. Or copies on my phone and devices or maybe iTunes/iCloud solution?

After what felt like a trip down memory lane of 2012 sorting out music libraries, I remembered about iTunes Match. Well I remembered there was something like it. Add you music, it checked them then gave you access to the files in the cloud. Not sure if it needs iCloud space or it just works. I think at the beginning it was free but now it’s £22 a year. This means I wouldn’t have to sync my phone to keep music in check, I could just manage it on the computer and then stream via Apple Music app my music.

The catch is I have to use iTunes to manage my music. Maybe that’s fine as I don’t have that much but I dunno…iTunes doesn’t like FLAC or OGG and most of my music is in those two formats. I can easily convert them though. I’d still have to pay £22 a year for the privilege. But it would be via the music app and have nice integration…except stream to Google mini speakers we have. Although there was something I used to run on the server to act as a bridge.

Hmm. I seem to have deleted half my docker compose file by fat fingering some keys in vim but then saving the file without noticing. Not sure I have a backup. Ugh.

Also this music thing somehow is convincing me to get a MacBook Air.

Thursday, 19th June, 2025

I’ve thought about the usefulness of a web based script manager and now I’ve found one, I’ll give it a spin later. Hopefully they follow through on their roadmap, although useful as is. I’ve ended up with lots of scripts, mostly organised, but not very discoverable and so I forget what I’ve done and problems I’ve already solved.

Can’t decide anything. This site, wikis, blogs, etc. Part of me wants to install ikiwiki and just use the bare bones, anti-theme, nothingness for everything - blog, wiki, notes, etc.

Saw a blog post about activitypub on Wordpress, it’s all good, but I’m not interested. Actually, I would like to have my own handle, so I’m not tied to a server/instance/topic. I guess I have to run my own server to do that. In which case, why not make it a weird, text only, over gemini server.

Wednesday, 18th June, 2025

Press play on the cassette as you’re about to hear it again…

Maybe I should bin my other blog and just use this one.

Was writing up my two big hikes and radio activations on the SOTA forum last night, and I remembered that brief period were I tried using discourses as a blog. It’s not made to be a blog but it sure is convenient. Write up my story with maybe 20-30 pictures, so easy. Wordpress was also so easy.

I like the X-E5 but I also like the no lens choice X100 series. Luckily I can’t buy either of them.

Sunday, 15th June, 2025

I’m not sure about this. Spent a while with micro.blog and think I’m okay with it. Gone with the micro.one subscription which is very good value at $10 a year. Doesn’t quite have everything of mb full - biggest miss for me would be no theme customisation. You can install theme plugins and do custom CSS but that’s it. A few themes have micro hooks where you can customise parts of them without messing the main theme. Can’t do that. Some have settings to change stuff in a config.json. Can’t do that. However, several stock themes are nice and think I have one. Still, can’t help think that I want to tweak it a little.

The upside is I have several apps on my phone and web for adding photos, posts, books, pages, etc. with minimal effort.

You know what though? I still don’t write anything. So why bother.

Also this site to DayOne is nice but the motivation to write here is because someone might read it. If I write to myself I know no one will read it.

I also don’t want to put “random shit” in my blog. This whole site is random shit (and it’s my blog) but I feel like it’ll mess up my main site. (Hence I never write anything there).

Like today I saw DPReview’s commentary and first look at the X-E5. I’ve been thinking about the X100 series and getting rid of my xe4 and lenses but now I’m thinking … what about the X-E5. I even quite like the film sim dial as you can save recipes to it, and I always set a hot key/button to those.

I thought about writing a post on my new main blog on micro.blog about the X-E5. But it feels pointless as it’s just me going “oh look at that (everyone already knows) maybe I should get one (no one cares) or maybe I shouldn’t (now I’m being annoying)”. Brain says: you can’t write that on your blog. It’ll be bad. It’ll look bad. What a pointless thing to do.

Meanwhile over here on Fondoftea I spend each day going “maybe this; maybe that.” and think nothing of it.

I think this is my third time trying micro.blog. I just don’t quite like it. Not sure exactly what it is, as it’s a very comprehensive service with lots of features. Im not interested in a community and when I do try I struggle to find anything. Searching my emojis is cute but nothing comes up. Searching via words also seems to have nothing. Then seeing one part of conversations appear in my feed is just weird. At least this time it’s cheaper. I suspect I won’t last.

Sometimes I think I should use mastodon and just post stuff to that. But I also don’t care or want to. I don’t want something to spend time on. I like discovering new things but I also don’t need to.

I do return to “delete it and don’t bother” from time to time. I’ve deleted apps before and then never missed them.

And so, I don’t know what I want or should do.

Saturday, 14th June, 2025

Reading the X100VI website makes me want to get one, and sell all my other Fuji stuff to soften the blow. It does have quite a bit more than my X-E4 and my previous X100F. I don’t use a “big camera” that often anymore (which is a shame) but it’s nice to have one and think I’d prefer the X100. I’m always debating about which lens to pick and I still don’t use several of them - likely bought after reading reviews or blog posts where people say the xyz mm is the hidden gem or secret weapon and proceed so say how unique the rendering is and the colours and blah blah blah. I buy it, use it, and go “I don’t know what they’re talking about but I won’t admit it”. Then never use the lens as it’s an annoying focal length.

Probably my problem is solved by the fact the camera isn’t in stock anywhere.

I try not to get sucked into stupid arguments online but it still happens from time to time. I get annoyed with myself and think that the best way to avoid it is to delete my accounts. Probably that’s just as childish.

The 3D printer is annoying. Nothing sticks to the base plate and keeps coming off. I’ve cleaned it and calibrated it but still stuff comes off. I’m not sure if you’re supposed to replace the base plates periodically? I see there are 3rd party ones which are supposedly stickier.

I’ve also been thinking that I might end this blog…it’s had a good run for four years but I might move it to a DayOne journal. I’ll still write out stuff but being private means I can go even deeper or cover items I don’t want to put online. I’ve thought about having this plus a separate one but that’s too much. I think it’ll help me add to the family journal if I’m already in DayOne. I’ve had DayOne for 15? years now, it’s such a nice app. I hope I write a bit more on my main blog as a result. I’ll leave this repo, so I could come back if I didn’t like DayOne…for some reason. I did move for a while to Tiddlywiki and then back, so perhaps this is just the same thing.

Friday, 13th June, 2025

I’m thinking of not renewing a couple of domains. It’s not much money but I don’t need them. It includes this one. I usually buy domains over the summer holidays when I come up with “good ideas” which of course I don’t do anything about once I come home.

I’ll move this site somewhere, although also thinking of not having it and actually writing on my main site.

Or I’ll just do nothing, the domain will renewal automatically and life will continue.

By the time this mp3 player arrives I’ll have moved on. Mostly because I’ve still not picked any headphones. I can’t tell how “open” open headphones are and it seems these are more common in smaller headphone styles. Probably I should just buy the cheapest ones and see how they go.

I need to cancel my eBay alerts as it just makes me want to buy things.

Tuesday, 10th June, 2025

Well I had a great day today. Summit in nice weather, a new Munro, 8 points, a summit to summit contact with a nice guy I’ve met via radio, decent run of contacts, found the geocache at the top, and no issues with timing and back to work meeting on time. Obviously would’ve been better if I hadn’t had to go to work at all…probably would’ve done a big loop of 4 hills but there’ll be there the next time.

Fallen far behind on my summit trip write ups. Tbh posting the photos and a few sentences is all I really need to do.

Started adding to DayOne family journal again recently. It is so nice. I thought about making a SOTA one. Convert all my blog posts into it and add new entries there. This is probably a dumb idea, but I could make a real book out of it! No one would want it but it would be fun to actually make a book. Maybe? Or maybe I just import my stuff into DayOne and have them print a book for me.

Also I’ve started geocaching. It’s fun and plenty near home and work. Need to get the kids in on it. Although they might be disappointed when there’s nothing actually in the cache other than a notebook. Some do have toys but that’s it. Maybe we could hide one and get some codes for things that move about so we can follow them.

One thing at a time.