My choice of distro is just a compromise and close enough to serving my needs. All distros have pros and cons, and I use different distros for different use cases.

But is it Numberwang, Mr. Numbers Guy?

The name is too confusing, some befuddled man would end up using it on his junk.

I’m a responsible adult, which is why I only grow living plastic plants.

The minimal furniture and a sense of free space are great for my mental health. A cluttered home to me feels like a cluttered mind. I don’t want to live in a cage of excess stuff, much like I don’t want to carry unhealthy mental baggage with me, pulling me down. You may see a sparse room, but I see freedom from sensory fatigue. I see freedom.

Oh yes, it’s time. I have been looking forward to this the whole year. I’m going to start my annual read-through of The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. I’m pretty sure I could spend the rest of my life just reading this one book, so I limit myself to reading it only once a year. Don’t mind me, I’m off to tramp all over Middle-earth.

Gentoo is great. I used it for a few years 20 years ago and I still think the package manager is the best I’ve ever used. I wouldn’t use Gentoo today, but I’m really glad I went through the install and maintenance process. It didn’t make me a guru, but I did learn a thing or two about Linux.

It’s a really good book in my estimation. Do enjoy!

Yes, I finished it. It’s not a long story, given that it’s just a typical day from one prisoner’s perspective. It was a good book, but also didn’t have a lot to sink your teeth into. In this sense, even if it was written a 100 years earlier, The Dead House gives a more in-depth look into Russian/Soviet prison camps. Anyway, turns out prison camps are miserable places, where you have to scheme to get enough (and still too little) food and clothes and pretty much everything else you need. Russian winters are cold, and prison personnel cruel and prone to make arbitrary decisions. Yeah. Though I have to say, how this got published in Soviet Russia is a bit of a mystery to me, since it’s pretty critical of the state.

I do intend to read more on Gulags, but I’ll save that for another time.

I’m reading Stalin: New Biography of a Dictator by Oleg Khlevniuk. Dictators feel timely, but also I felt like I didn’t know Stalin’s life well enough, despite how important he is in the story of the 20th century.

I also just finished Henry David Thoreau’s essay Civil Disobedience. My local library had put it on display and it felt like a bit of a cheeky gesture. Unfortunately, I didn’t like the essay all that much, as I find Thoreau’s writing disagreeable - even when I agree with him. Perhaps he’s just not my cup of tea.

No, I haven’t read any Hobb after Liveship, unfortunately.

I loved the Farseer trilogy, but I didn’t get very far in to Liveship traders. It’s been a long time, so I don’t recall exactly what it was, but I didn’t like it at all. I actually gave my copies to someone who seemed really in to the books. I hope she gave them a good home.

I just started reading One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. It’s tells the story of a day in the life of a prisoner in a soviet prison camp, set in the early 1950’s. I picked it up because the premise seemed interesting and also reminded me of Dostoevsky’s The House of the Dead. Both authors had first hand experience of Russian prison camps. Seems like an interesting read and I’m surprised I’ve never heard of the author before, even though he won a Nobel prize for literature.

Here’s a tip I learned so very long ago: Never shop hungry.

That being said, I’m really careful about what I buy anyway and plan my purchases so that I end up using everything. Fresh foods can still spoil because I didn’t spot a moldy spot, but that’s pretty rare. Dried foods are great.

Honestly I have little good advice to give aside from awareness and planning, since I am by nature perfectionist about my food and budgeting and can’t relate to the meme.

postmarketOS, though they are in the process of migrating to systemd. Not that I personally mind terribly much, even if it feels like a bit of an odd choice. So maybe I should say Alpine.

This is quite amazing to me since it seems to be the actual case. The people who were saying we shouldn’t listen to him, but watch what he does, were openly advocating for a man whose word they know means nothing. It’s perplexing. Politicians are an untrustworthy lot one and all, but god damn, the open and naked willingness to vote for someone whose position they can’t know, whose promises carry absolutely no weight, that’s truly stupendous.

They are at once admitting Trump says horrible shit, but also that he’s an inveterate liar and that makes it better somehow. Both him being honest and dishonest should be equally disturbing. That’s some next level cognitive dissonance.

Glad I’m not the only one. I read the first part and stopped, because I was getting nothing out of it. I have no intention of finishing that book.

Yeah, it’s definitely not a light read. Really good though.

Still working on Lord of Chaos, but I popped in to my local library to pick up V for Vendetta by Alan Moore for rereading because of… You know… Reasons. It felt timely.

Learning to appreciate small everyday things is a great way to live.