(Don’t go back to) Blogville

Hello. I’m revivifying this blog; let’s see how long I’ll stick with it.

First things first: If you subscribe to this site’s RSS feed, you might get a flood of notifications of new posts. If so: sorry! (Or maybe your feed reader is sane and doesn’t show you posts from two-and-a-half years back?)

I’ve been … not discontent, exactly, but not fully satisfied with the software that has been driving the site for the last 14 years. So I’ve switched to Hugo, which generates static HTML pages, rather than generating it on the fly for each request. That basically required me to reimlement the site from scratch. Along the way I did a modest bit of redesign — nothing especially noticeable, but I’ve added a dark mode design among other things, and cleaned up how the site renders on small screens like phones. See the colophon if you’re interested in a bit more detail.

Other stuff: I’ve cut way back on my social media use lately. My Twitter account, or accounts, have gone fallow; I’m not really posting on Instagram; &c. On the other hand, I have a new microblog called Blurt! that fills Twitter’s “let me get something off my chest” need (but not, like, interacting with friends), and it has its own RSS feed. I haven’t gotten photo posting working there yet, but it’s on my list of things to do, at which point I can close up the Instagram shop in good conscience too.

I went for a walk back in 2017. That was pretty surreal; I still don’t know how to describe it to people when they ask. I had originally planned about five months (!!), but realized after about a month and a half that I missed my family too much, so bailed out when I reached Paris. I might go back and cross the Alps someday.

The kids are good. The dude is in his last year of middle school; the bambina is in her last year of elementary school. They’re big dorks. Meghan’s doing well too.

Anyway: Hi. I hope all has been well with you. Get in touch and let me know how you’re doing.