With 2024 behind us, I can finally post my list of best reads for 2024. Each year, I have a goal of reading 100 books. I didn’t make my goal in 2024, reading 85 books, but that is because many of them were very long. So rather than including the 10 best reads, I am…
For years, I’ve wanted a personal archive system that allows me to easily search all of my documents, email, and other information in a useful way. Over the last few months, I’ve finally built the first iteration of what I am calling my Personal Archive System, or PAS for short. Back in September, I wrote…
On December 22, 1996, I left work early to do some holiday shopping at the Northridge Fashion Center. Among the things I bought was a new book for myself: The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark by Carl Sagan. I bought the book, according to my diary, because “I read about it…
I am of two minds when it comes to spoilers. As a reader, an audience member watching a film, or a middle-aged adult playing a video game—I’m not particularly bothered by spoilers. For me, a story is about the journey, not the destination. The notion of spoiler alerts seems to turn this around. Spoilers are…
Updates here have been too few and far between. I’ve recently completed the first phase of a major personal software development project (more details to come) and with that major effort behind me, I see the possibility of more frequent updates coming in 2025. In the meantime, I thank everyone who has stuck around despite…
I haven’t been active on social media much the last few years, but when I post here on the blog, the posts are automatically pushed to Twitter (X). I’m moving off X to Blue Sky and so future posts will be relayed there. For those interested, here is my Blue Sky profile: https://bsky.app/profile/jamietoddrubin.bsky.social. Also: I…
Lately, I have been working on a series of small archiving projects. I have been gathering 35 years of digital data, and organizing it locally, mostly in Obsidian. I’m working toward a single, text-based archive that can serve as the source of a personal LLM that will take over the role of traditional search. I…
We were in Europe recently for a few weeks, and spent a few days in the beautiful city of Budapest, Hungary, a city rich in history. Our hotel was directly across the river from the neo-Gothic Hungarian Parliament building, a building I could stare for hours, if I had the time1. There was much to…
Twice a day I take a two-and-a-half mile walk through the Bluemont Junction part of my town. I walk from our house down to the park and then follow the bike paths along what is known locally as the Bluemont Junction trail. Sometimes, I stop at a local 7-Eleven for a soft drink or a…