rebecca ackermann has a new piece in the oakland review of books, a review of sorts but also about life here or anywhere, and it brings me peace https://www.oaklandreviewofbooks.org/the-wall-marlen-haushofer-review/
VICTORY! EFF, our co-counsel and our clients have won our lawsuit against the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. A judge agreed OPM violated the law when it disclosed millions of federal employee records to DOGE agents. The court will decide the remedy at a later date. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/10/victory-court-rules-opms-disclosure-personal-records-doge-unlawful
been helping with an archival survey and today is our last day onsite! sad to be leaving the old things, soon to return to computer
I knew this day would come: it is time to reckon with my zotero file attachment storage
a morning litter scene: four empty bottles of pedialyte, an empty bottle of ensure, a pack of marlboros
Woman holding a frog https://tessa.lapl.org/cdm/ref/collection/photos/id/109076
Downtown Los Angeles, panoramic view https://tessa.lapl.org/cdm/ref/collection/photos/id/96563
making a kale salad like it's 2012
standing in a soma coffee shop and overhearing a convo between two guys that sounds exactly like llms chatting
@rollovereasy re: richmond sushi: TEKKA the goat
ice cubes. in your home! on demand! what an invention
obligatory kimberly guilfoyle in the news pic
it’s been nice to be doing something where I’m locked in a room away from computers for six hours a day, looking at cursive from the 1800s
it's so-called columbus day, so it's time to share this bit i wrote about the origins of the holiday
let's be mindful of what we celebrate, friends. the legacies we help perpetuate can darken the future, and tarnish our souls...
Looptober 11 - Karaoke version of "Hi Christa!"
Go ahead and sing along!
michael lewis was on kqed forum this morning talking about his new book on doge and cuts to the federal civil service.
sending <3 to folks here captured in this story. transcript isn't up quite yet, but recording is.
https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101915623/michael-lewis-on-the-civil-servants-who-tried-to-stop-doge
this week in pies
- sesame pumpkin
- buttermilk chess (a little too dark, because I mistook pooled butter for raw center when doing the jiggle test). this is the one that’s sugar cream adjacent, going to take to a midwestern friend’s housewarming and top with persimmons and maybe pomegranates I got on the drive up from LA last week
I feel like when I post federated and things potentially leave my reach I need to state - I have never used an LLM for software development, and I’m highly skeptical of their use. but I am interested in how people are using them in contexts where they’re not forced to
I guess there’s a third part to this thread. many small (important!) organizations aren’t able to make decisions in longterm contexts because they lack predictable and sustainable resourcing, especially for things that are effectively support or operational costs for their mission. resources (grants, volunteers, etc) are often short term and cobbled together to make it work. I think llms for software development reflect that reactive paradigm
I’m struck by how common llm usage is by low-resource non-tech orgs for things previous modes of software development never served well. volunteers working without input or oversight is one of those models. I don’t know that llms will fair better stewarding technical applications longterm, but (and perhaps because) they enable more featureful replacements now for aged software. I worry about maintainability & lockin. but it’s hard to argue against *now* 2/2