Christmas Day was this week and, I hope, at least some of our OFB readers are continuing the celebration with the Twelve Days of Christmas. As we do and as a New Year beckons, what do we carry from this holiday time into life?
Looking for something more unusual than a gift card to give this Christmas? Here at OFB we have a sampler of options that are (mostly) inexpensive and useful for those with a wide variety of interests.
When you write about an ongoing project it’s always risky that it’ll go south afterward. My attempt to link my home and office together with Netmaker last week had such a southerly flow.
I’ve been spoiled by the cloud. A decade and a half after I first used Dropbox, and years after iCloud made the dream of secure, seamless “login and forget” cloud sync a reality (most of the time), it seems obvious that all of my stuff should be available from every device I have whenever I need it. But what about content too big to keep on the cloud?
Today I was looking for a photo from the end of last year and inadvertently stumbled on one of my uncle from then. My Uncle Jay went on hospice a few weeks ago amid a sharp decline. The difference of a year was shouted from that picture.
My feed on X has filled with posts from officials of Ukraine, Romania and the Netherlands touting the opening of the European F-16 Training Center in Romania. Highlighting this was a video of Ukrainian pilots showing off their newly acquired skills in piloting said aircraft. The word “resolve” comes to mind given that I can write that sentence at all — for a long time, the West refused the beleaguered nation access to advanced jets. “Resolve” also speaks to the dangerous test ahead hinted at in that hesitancy.
There’s something lost in the instantaneous gratification of today’s technology. Anticipation.
Viewers paying close attention to Apple’s first prime-time product announcement event on Monday were treated to the most impressive product highlight: one that wasn’t even spoken. The whole event was filmed on iPhone.
With freezing temperatures nearing, I started the annual pilgrimage of my plants. Armed with past success overwintering geraniums, peppers and various other non-hardy plants, I wanted to up my game. A little talked about Wyze accessory to add a smarts to a grow light is at the center of my plan.
The worsening of our global situation, including two sparks that appear more volatile than an unfortunate duke meeting a bullet ever could have been, should be a wake-up call. Our politicians have driven us to the brink of a world war by their myopic plans forged by reelection efforts and not our (or the world’s) good.