Rob Fahrni

NPR: “That decades-long reign of service ended Thursday, when Queen Elizabeth II died at her Balmoral estate in Scotland, at age 96.”

RIP.

Six Colors: “Then there’s the Dynamic Island, a stark reminder about the limits of rumors emerging from Apple’s hardware supply chain. Everyone who reported on the size and shape of the new cutouts on the iPhone 14 Pro models was absolutely right—and yet couldn’t see the forest for the trees. The cutouts were only the start of the story.”

I was only able to see a small portion of the event but it happened to be the new iPhone introduction.

They’re not too different, with one extremely cool exception. The notch has become a smaller cutout at the top of the phone and that allowed Apple to blend it into user experience. It’s called Dynamic Island and I’m trying to find an excuse to use it in my apps. 😁

Robert Reich: “I have a serious question for people who have power in America and who continue to deny the outcome of the 2020 election and enable Trump’s Big Lie: What are you saying to yourself in private? How are you justifying yourself in your own mind?”

I ask this question all the time and I think it’s because some of them actually believe it. Others are just so hungry for power and destroying our democracy they’ll do anything to make it happen.

They’re part of a cult.

LAist: “Despite calls to conserve power, California’s energy demands were at an all-time high Tuesday.”

California is a beautiful state, arguably the best state in the nation. It has a powerhouse economy, it’s the home of tech, it has beautiful cities, mountains, beaches, you name it, California’s got it.

But it also has big problems to go along with the rest. Fires rage out of control every summer, water is hard to come by, and with our new climate reality extreme heat puts huge strain on the power grid.

I miss California but I don’t miss these problems. 🧡

I love how Spotify calls their locked-up "podcast" platform "https://t.co/G4bfRixW8a" -- it's the way Machiavelli would do it. If you're closed, say you're open -- and let everyone debate whether you're scum or just an opportunist.

— Dave Winer (@davewiner) September 3, 2022

A lot of us believe folks like Spotify, with proprietary systems, should give their podcast like audio a different name. They’re clearly not open, don’t have an RSS feed, so they’re not podcasts.

Fast Company: “The overarching issue here is that Mastodon is trying to be too much like Twitter when it really ought to be more like Reddit.”

This is an interesting take but I don’t see it. Mastodon is a great Twitter like experience and I love having my own instance.

I’d love to see Twitter’s Bluesky effort bring federation to the system so systems like Mastodon could join it. 🤞🏼

The Washington Post: “The insurrectionists of Jan. 6 busted into the Capitol, hit police with fire extinguishers, flagpoles, bats, stun guns and pepper spray; they threatened to kill the vice president and tried to overthrow the 2020 election. And now, they want an apology.”

Each and every one of the insurrectionists needs to pay a price. They tried to overthrow the will of the people. That includes Donald J. Trump. At a minimum he should be banned from holding any state or federal office. He also deserves some jail time. Regardless, he’s a horrible person.

Rukshan: “RSS is a great piece of technology that people who use the internet today are unaware of or not using. There has not been any significant development in RSS for the last 10 years, and that’s fine.”

This is a nice little piece on RSS, one persons journey back to it, and how it makes consuming articles better.

If you need an iOS Feed Reader, give my app Stream a try. It’s completely free to use and offers a tip system if you find it useful. Yes, shameless self promotion. 😃

Teen Vogue: “By that summer, Starbucks, a multibillion-dollar company, was reporting record-breaking sales, while many of us couldn’t afford to pay rent and buy groceries in the same week. It was at this point we realized we needed to take things into our own hands if we wanted anything to change.”

When I can’t find a good local coffee shop I’ll seek out a Starbucks. I wouldn’t classify it as the best coffee I’ve ever had but it’s good and satisfies. I think of them as the McDonalds of coffee, you know you’ll get a consistent cup.

Anywho, they’ve been real jerks to their workers over the course of the pandemic, as have many other places.

As a place known for great benefits prior to the pandemic it would be really nice if they could reevaluate everything they do and make Starbucks the best place in the country to work. If you want to stop unions, take excellent care of your partners.

Barn Finds: “Dodge released its B-Series range of commercial vehicles in 1948, and our feature Pickup is from the first year of production.”

It never fails to amaze me how many beautiful old cars and trucks are sitting in barns or fields rotting away. It also makes me wish I had tons of money to spend. I would become a collector. A collector and restorer of old, beautiful, cars and trucks.

I love Barn Finds.

I have Bipolar II Disorder.

So what is it? Well it’s a mental disorder that causes my brain to bounce between highs and lows.

”However, in bipolar II disorder, the “up” moods never reach full-blown mania. The less-intense elevated moods in bipolar II disorder are called hypomanic episodes, or hypomania.” - WebMD

I can’t pinpoint when it started for me. I suspect it began after I had sudden death in 1985 at the ripe old age of 17. That was a very stressful time for me and I was treated for depression for a while after I left the hospital.

For years and years I would become depressed and not want to be around people and question why I was alive. I couldn’t bring myself to self terminate, due to my Christian upbringing that said it was a mortal sin, a sin that sent you straight to hell, but I sure wanted to have a crash and die or wish that someone would come along and kill me. I would isolate. I could not stand being around other people. Everything was negative.

Then, I’d get happy. So amazingly happy. I could do anything and do it really well — at least that’s what my brain told me. 😃

Those moments were great. I still enjoy them to this day but I know what’s happening. By knowing what’s happening I can curb my enthusiasm a little bit. Not be so loud and in your face about things. That’s helpful for my wife especially. She’s lived long enough with me bouncing off the walls. 😄

For the longest time I would try to figure out why I felt so good at times. Was it my diet? Was it the amount of sleep I got? Was it a combination of the two? It was extremely frustrating because I could never figure it out.

Thankfully at the age of 50 my doctor figured it out and sent me to see a psychiatrist who confirmed her diagnosis; Bipolar II Disorder.

At that time I was put on meds for my depression. We tried one that didn’t work but the second choice worked like a charm. I get down once in a while, but everyone does, the difference is I don’t believe I’m useless and I don’t want to be dead. I just get a little blue.

It’s nice not falling into that deep dark abyss any longer.

Some folks may think I’m sharing too much. I don’t. I’m not embarrassed by it. It’s a health condition like many others. I can’t help it but it’s treatable. In fact having folks know I have this condition can help them understand what may be going on with me at times. If I’m bouncing off the walls, taking at 5000MPH, and generally way over the top, I’m probably in a hypomanic episode. I love them, but they can be annoying for others.

Anywho, there it is. I’m not crazy or insane and I’m not a danger to others. My brain just does some strange stuff on occasion.

I have Bipolar II Disorder.

What kitty? I don’t see a kitty.

If Flynn wants to cuddle and you don’t want to — normally I’m cool with it but I’m guarding the knee — just throw a blanket over him and he’s happy as can be.

Gotta understand your kids and their needs. 😁

Harrison Co.: ”If the point of a compass was centered on Fresno, California, and a 100-mile radius was drawn, the circle formed would reach across the most vital and productive growing region in the world. Although this 100 Mile Circle covers less than 1% of the total land mass of the U.S., it produces nearly one-half of its fresh fruits, vegetables and nuts – more than 250 different crops rich in the vitamins and nutrients essential to human survival.”

Over the years I’ve told many people the San Joaquin Valley feeds the world. I always had a feeling they didn’t believe me.

Yes, the San Joaquin Valley is critical to the worlds food supply and it’s constantly in trouble. Drought is a huge problem in the valley. There just isn’t enough water to go around any longer.

What happens when crops can no longer be grown there due to climate change? Things will get ugly.

Christopher Sauveur: ”Indeed, when I started implementing more complex inspector views, with several text fields with or without steppers, or a color picker, everything became painfully slow. The SpriteKit view renders generally at a flawless 60 frames per second (as long as you’re not using an Intel iGPU). But everytime SwiftUI has to update the inspector view (during movement or even just by typing inside a text field), the render would go down to a very unstable 10~15 fps. It was unacceptable.”

This is a really nice read about a developer using SwiftUI with SpeiteKit. He really gave SwiftUI a fair shake and was able to create a really nifty application.

SwiftUI is another one of those mind bending experiences. To be good at it you have to fully embrace how it’s meant to work, not try to shoehorn your way of thinking into it.

Go with the flow.

Haaretz: ”American democracy is imperiled, under a constant domestic assault against its institutions, traditions and mores. Joe Biden knows this and made fixing the problem the rationale for his bid for the presidency. Now Biden has been convinced by historians that the danger is more imminent than even the January 2021 insurrection attempt suggested.”

President Biden’s speech sent many a Republican to their fainting couches with a case of the vapors.

The President did the unexpected. He called out the MAGA forces, and their orange leader, for attempting to destroy our democracy. Rightfully so.

The MAGA movement must be destroyed if our democracy is to survive.

For the umpteenth time, I say Apple needs an App Store ombudsman. An advocate for developers like Shihab here. https://t.co/R3APum2uin

— John Gruber (@gruber) September 2, 2022

Not good. Not good at all. Hope he can appeal and get this straightened out. https://t.co/YXSLI0gTtU

— Ged Maheux (@gedeon) September 2, 2022

Reading this about Shihab’s Aviary Twitter client really bummed me out. After seeing it I checked out the description for some other popular Twitter clients and they use the same language as Shihab.

Are all third party Twitter clients going to have to change their descriptions or be tossed out of the store or is this a one-off that will be corrected?

I hope he’s able to get his app update accepted soon.

Taylor Built Solutions: ”Given all of this focus on app and web development why would you want to learn C++ these days?”

I’m definitely biased but I think it’s fine to learn C++. I worked in the language for 20+ years and found it agreeable. Sure, it has pitfalls, but once you understand those it’s easy to live with them. The new language standards certainly help developers stay away from danger zones.

Dan Rather: ”It was clear to anyone who had an ounce of appreciation for what the job of the presidency entails, to anyone who respected the constitutional order of our government, to anyone who worried about the health and safety of this nation, to anyone with a moral compass, to anyone who prizes the common sense of purpose that great leaders can summon, that Donald J. Trump had no business anywhere near the presidency.”

Who doesn’t love Dan Rather? I think he’s doing better work today than he did when he was a news anchor.

Slate: ”I can recommend a cure for that, though it might be a bit strong for Lucy’s taste: A good old-fashioned Stephen King fantasy-horror epic. Happily, there’s a new specimen: Fairy Tale. Like its predecessors in the King canon—especially The Eyes of the Dragon, the Dark Tower series, and The Talisman (co-written with Peter Straub)—it’s sometimes grisly, sometimes tense, and sometimes a bit goofy.”

My wife and I are fans of Mr. King so I’d imagine this book will make its way into our home.

Dr. Drang: ”A couple of weeks ago, I decided to cut back on my RSS feed reading.1 Not by reducing the number of feeds I’m subscribed to, but by filtering articles to eliminate those that would just be a waste of my time.”

As a creator of a feed reader I think this is a brilliant idea. Perhaps some day I’ll be able to add regex support to Stream?

I only have about 100 other features to complete. 😂

Paul Lefebvre: ”In my continuing series of Atari BASIC programs I wrote in the 80s as I was first learning to program, I present Atari Painter.”

I have a soft spot in my heart for the BASIC programming language. My first gig as a professional developer was working on accounting software written in BASIC, some dating back to 1968. It had all the nifty features of BASIC like goto and gosub but we also made use of Microsoft’s very modern Professional BASIC. The new code was nicely structured with functions and sub routines and we even leveraged some third party assembly language code for various parts of the app.

Barn Finds: ”There were three stars of the quasi-classic 1980 movie, The Blue Brothers: Saturday Night Live alum John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, and a 1974 Dodge Monaco, dressed up as a retired Chicago police car.”

Quasi-classic? How dare you sir!

The Blues Brothers is a great 80’s film. Great cast, a fun premise, and fantastic music.

If you’re ever in the mood for a fun 80’s film this one is worth a watch.

Today marks four weeks since my knee replacement.

I know it’s only Tuesday but it’s been a good week. I’ve been walking more naturally and my leg is feeling stronger, turns out your quadriceps are really important to recovering from a knee replacement.

Today I went to my first physical therapy session outside of our home. I was kind of worried they’d drive me in the ground but they didn’t. The two things we did work on were; quadriceps strength and flexing the knee by extending my leg straight out and flexing it by pulling it back toward myself.

My hope is to be able to flex my leg to 120 degrees. I haven’t been able to do that in close to 20 years. I can currently bend it to 90 degrees, which I believe is better than I could do pre-op!

Oh, I also switched over to a cane today. Bye bye walker.

I’m getting there. 👍🏼

Kim is taking Kolby to the doggy groomer.

I think it’s time for a nap.

I was finally able to sleep in my own bed last night. The stairs are no longer an obstacle. Sure, I have to be deliberate about how I walk up them, but it’s easy enough.

I managed to sleep from 10PM to 6AM. That’s the best sleep I’ve had since before my surgery on August 2.

As a result I’m feeling much better today. I’m not nodding off like I’ve been doing for days and days.

Here’s hoping I continue to get the rest I need.

This is my favorite part of the morning. It’s quiet. Our puppers, Kolby, and our kitties have been fed and Kolby has been let out to do his business. I have my coffee — on the couch with an ice pack on my knee — composing this post.

Sweet silence.

Ars Technica: “Brian Kernighan said hello, asked how their US visit was going, and dropped off hundreds of lines of code that could add Unicode support for AWK, the text-parsing tool he helped create for Unix at Bell Labs in 1977.”

It’s so encouraging to see a legend of computing going strong.

Steven Beschloss: “I didn’t intend to return to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis so soon, but the combination of his latest nastiness combined with the emerging approach of his newly decided Democratic opponent, Charlie Crist, made it clear that the Florida race for governor represents more than the question of who will lead Florida into the future. This is shaping up to be a battle between leadership driven by anger and cruelty and leadership that believes kindness and compassion must define our fate.”

I can’t for the life of me understand why people vote for someone so cruel. He has every trait that made Trump such a disaster and he’s a lot smarter than Trump, which makes him even more dangerous.

Democrats are winning because they are the party of freedom. The freedom to choose. The freedom to make a living wage. The freedom to love. The freedom to vote. The freedom to live on a sustainable planet.

Republicans are losing because they are a cult that worships a moron.

— Bradley Whitford (@BradleyWhitford) August 24, 2022

Platformer: “Zatko maintained his public silence for eight months — and then showed up on Tuesday throwing bombs.”

My initial reaction to this news was it would help Musk get out of the Twitter deal. Now I don’t think it’ll help him.

He’s still gonna need his $54.20 per share.

There’s also the ever popular musk.social sitting out there for a $1MM donation to Planned Parenthood. Quite a deal!

Puck News: “‘It’s not been a fun morning,’ Stacy Spikes told me today from New York, where he’s been prepping the new and (hopefully!) improved MoviePass.”

I totally took advantage of MoviePass in 2017. I saw a few movies and it was so worth the price.

This new and improved version could be a boon to movie theaters looking to put butts in seats in our endemic COVID world.

Macworld: “The problem is that, with a month or so to go before macOS Ventura goes final, the System Settings app in the beta is a bit of a disaster. Unless things change in a hurry, Apple is in danger of replacing one of the worst system apps in macOS with a new app that’s just as bad or worse.”

I would love to know why this new OS app is so klunky. I haven’t experienced it myself but from all accounts it’s a real mess.

Now, it could be the app is waiting on some changes from the SwiftUI team to fix some nasty bugs or, perhaps, we’re seeing learning pains from the developer responsible for the app? It happens to the most seasoned developer when you have to make that brain shift to a new paradigm.

If it manages to ship in a buggy state with a terrible user experience it doesn’t bode well for SwiftUI. Who wants to invest their time in a technology that’s not ready for prime time?

Of course SwiftUI is the future of app development for all Apple Platform based applications, it’s just really ugly at the moment.

SwiftUI is amazing until you're totally blocked on something dumb like a custom back button.

(Yes, you can hide default and add your own. Yes, that breaks back swipe. Yes, you can override the pan gestures. No, you can't prevent it from fucking up a NavigationPath.)

— Craig Hockenberry (@chockenberry) August 26, 2022

Fresnoland: “In 2021, the Fresno area experienced 69 days over 100 degrees – a record-breaking number of days, according to data from the National Weather Service. There have already been more than 50 days over 100 this year.”

I was born and raised in the great San Joaquin Valley of California. Yes, it’s hot, no way around it, but these increasing days over 100 degrees isn’t good in so many ways. Climate change is real and we’ve screwed ourselves. The human toll is just getting started.

Jalopnik: “Tesla CEO Elon Musk is none too pleased with Tesla drivers who are pointing out major issues with the company’s Full Self-Driving software, according to Insider.“

Have you seen some of the very damning videos of Tesla’s running over child sized mannequins? It’s really disturbing and Musk isn’t happy about it. He wants them pulled. So much for open feedback.

Fully Self Driving vehicles is a pipe dream at the moment and Tesla is experimenting right out in the open. Tesla’s are dangerous cars when used in FSD mode and it should be banned from general use until Tesla can consistently demonstrate it works.

The UC system was free for Californians until the late 60s when Reagan, then Governor, cut state funding.https://t.co/E5Mf2NPN1c

— Derek Powazek (@fraying) August 24, 2022

Yes, believe it or not, University of California schools were once free to attend. As a nation we need this to come back. Make all State Colleges and Universities free. If you want to go to Harvard that’s fine, you can pay for your education. It gives folks choice and will make America a better place.

I had my final in home physical therapy session this morning. I’m always excited for PT days to see what the therapist has in store for me. Today was pretty straight forward. It was basically graduation day.

He had me walk about 10 feet, turn around, and walk back, all without the walker. It felt really great to be able to do that.

After that we chatted about how it felt. Then I had a do a timed version of that. While seated I had to stand up, walk 10 feet, turn around, and walk back. All controlled. It’s not a test meant to break records, it’s meant to compare to the same movement earlier on in the process. We didn’t do it early on so there’s nothing to compare to, but it felt natural and the leg felt strong.

The final exercise today was to do as many “sit-to-stand” as I can, in 30 seconds. Using one of our dining room chairs I would go from the seated to standing position and back to seated. I was able to do seven reps in 30 seconds. It also felt great! Toward the end my left quad was feeling it. That’s a good thing. These exercises are about strengthening the muscle structure around the knee. It’s working. 😄

To round things out he measured how far I could bend the knee. He’s been doing this all along. Today I could get to 90 degrees. I could t do that prior to surgery.

I’m pooped out because I’m very out of shape and still nowhere near a 100%, but I’m very excited about my progress and really happy with the overall improvement to my knee.

Exciting day!

Progress has slowed a bit. Last Thursday I woke up with a painful left ankle. I figured it was from physical therapy and was just sore.

It wasn’t just sore. I couldn’t work it out and I couldn’t walk properly because of it. I called the doc, she had me come in on Friday, and decided it could be one of three things; a stress fracture, blood clots, or tendinitis.

I got an X-ray which eliminated that possibility. The next order of business was to check for blood clots.

Saturday rolls around and it’s still painful, but as the day progresses I notice it’s feeling a bit better.

When I wake up Sunday I notice most of the pain is gone and I can walk pretty normally. Seems like it must have been blood clots.

As I get started this morning I feel like I’m back where I need to be to move my recovery forward. 👍🏼

I’m on week three of my post knee replacement recovery. This week has been full of ups and downs. I’ve had swings from great days to disappointing days.

Yesterday I had my left ankle — the ankle on the repaired leg — checked for stress fractures. Thank goodness it was negative. Could be blood clots, could be tendinitis. Not sure yet.

Overall it was still the right thing for me to do. Hiccups are part of recovery.

I went back to work this week. It was really nice to get back in the swing of things. It was tiring but fulfilling. I’m looking forward to a return to normal.

Felix Krause: ”Introducing InAppBrowser.com, a simple tool to list the JavaScript commands executed by the iOS app rendering the page.”

Felix found interesting JavaScript injected into Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.

At first I thought this was a custom browser. As I read on and thought about it I realized it’s most likely the Apple supplied browser component supplied by their platform; WKWebView.

I use this very component in Stream to view feed content. It’s a critical part of many iOS and Mac apps.

In Stream support for JavaScript is turned off. To date I don’t see a reason to have it on.

The Verge: ”It turns out that JavaScript, the programming language that web developers and users alike love to complain about, had a hand in delivering the stunning images that the James Webb Space Telescope has been beaming back to Earth.”

Back when I started writing software for a living it was all about C. It was ubiquitous. If you wrote apps you did it in C.

Today the language of choice is JavaScript. Sure, we have all kinds of languages these days, but JavaScript seems to be king.

It looks like the James Webb Space Telescope uses a very old version of JavaScript, but why would it need a super modern one? It was also what we had at the time it was built

BBC: ”Twitter says it calculates the number of fake accounts through mainly human review. It says it picks out thousands of accounts at random each quarter and looks for bot activity.”

I think the man is going to be forced to purchase the company. His shenanigans end here.

Will Musk be able to get Twitter to turn the corner once the purchase is complete? Who knows. 🍿

Still waiting for you, Mr. Musk.

In 2006 and Apple Developer membership (small company/individual) cost $500 per year. pic.twitter.com/IGzUWIfM87

— Dad (@GeekAndDad) August 19, 2022

Wild how much a developer membership used to cost.

I’m happy it’s $99 today. At $500 there’s really no way I could justify keeping mine year-over-year.

Associated Press: ”SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Apple disclosed serious security vulnerabilities for iPhones, iPads and Macs that could potentially allow attackers to take complete control of these devices.”

Upgrade all your devices, today.

Molly Knight: ”After ten days of feeling the horrible flu like symptoms everyone else with Covid gets, things started to improve, then got rapidly worse. I couldn’t stand up without vomiting. The world was spinning off its axis. I couldn’t look at computer screens, my phone, or a television without feeling like I was going to pass out. Sometimes my vision would go black for no reason at all. Walking unassisted was not possible. Being alone was not possible.”

It is wild to see how COVID treats folks so differently. This is an absolute horror story.

I have a friend who suffered from long COVID and had to learn how to walk again. Two plus years later she woke up and things had gone back to normal. She’s one of the lucky ones.

Bottom line: COVID is still with us and it’s no joke. Do what you can to avoid catching it. Be cautious.

My cousin had to return to in-person work, got COVID from her boss, and passed away today. She leaves behind 13-year old twin girls, a husband, a mother who will now have to bury her last surviving child, and family who will forever miss her smile. The pandemic is not over.

— Elise V Mike, MD, PhD (@EliseVMike) August 16, 2022

Tragic. I have no words to describe how tragic this is. A family destroyed overnight. 😔

Robert Reich: ”After January, Liz Cheney will no longer be in Congress. But her role in American politics is not over. She is now the de facto leader of the Trump opposition — in the Republican Party and also, in a larger sense, in American politics.”

I don’t agree with 99% of what Liz Cheney believes, but I 100% agree with her regarding Trump. He has us on the precipice of a second Civil War and is destroying democracy a bit here, a bit there. If he’s not stopped and we cannot stamp out Trumpism we’re in big trouble.

Apple can’t revert to Sys Prefs because it would be an admission that this slide is wrong. So they’ll ship the abomination which will also show that the slide is wrong. pic.twitter.com/k5KtCEOkaB

— Paul Haddad (@tapbot_paul) August 16, 2022

Is negativity the right word if the framework is actually lacking pretty majorly on at least one platform and the people criticizing it genuinely want it to be better? https://t.co/vtOha9yOTT

— Collin Donnell (@collindonnell) August 16, 2022

John Gruber: ”But the basic fit and finish of Ventura’s new System Settings is just bad. It feels like there’s something deeply wrong with Swift UI that, even while in-progress, so many little layout details are apparently hard to get right.”

Most of the complaints I see and hear regarding SwiftUI have to do with its support of the Mac. It doesn’t seem to be as stable on the Mac as it does on watchOS and iOS.

Here’s the thing. The Mac market, while healthy, is much smaller than the iOS market — iPhone and iPad — so I can see them prioritizing iOS over macOS support.

Dog fooding SwiftUI on the Mac should cause Apple to improve SwiftUI support for the Mac but when will it?

I also wonder about the person or persons responsible for development of the System Settings application. I don’t doubt their intelligence or programming skill but SwiftUI is a paradigm shift that could trip up the most seasoned developer.

I’d also love to see Apple put its money where its mouth is and create a new productivity app or rewrite one of the existing ones to use SwiftUI. I’d pick Keynote as the guinea pig.

That’s all for now. I hope you enjoyed your coffee. ☕️

I can already see today is going to be a half day for me.

I’m having a minor setback in my recovery. Over the last couple weeks my knee has never been the issue during the recovery process. Last Friday it was a pulmonary embolism and I got past that.

On Monday I had a really great PT session and it felt amazing.

On Wednesday I had two different doctors appointments and walked a lot, which wiped me out.

Queue up Thursday. My ankle hurts, a lot. I’m not sure if it’s blood clots or I’ve somehow done some real damage to it. For the first time in over a week I had to use my pain meds.

And here we are, it’s Friday. My brain decided it wanted to be awake at 4AM and my ankle is extremely stiff and painful. Walking is a real bear, so of course I’m trying to avoid it, but it’s necessary for the recovery process!

I’ve taken some more pain meds and wrapped my knee and ankle in ice in hopes the ankle will start to feel a bit better because I have my final physical therapy session today and would like to make some decent forward progress.

More later. For now I’m getting some coffee in me. ☕️

Seems like a good fit, right?

At least Priss thinks so. 😃

Two doctors visits today, one for the PE last Friday, and one knee post-op.

The PE has been gone since Friday when it occurred. So I’m good on that front.

The knee is doing really well and I was able to get my staples out. That felt amazing!

All in all I feel really great and I’m excited about where I’ll be in four more weeks, but for now, I’m exhausted. I’ve walked more today than all PT days combined, which is really encouraging, but I am definitely pooped out.

I managed to work on Stream a bit over the weekend and once again I have that ”I wish I could do this full time” desire.

I have a list of things to do a mile long. I checked my checkins — say that five times fast — and I haven’t worked on the Mac version in well over a year. Pathetic.

I did manage to get very close to finishing off a new little feature over the weekend. This feature will allow you to set the number of days Stream will keep posts. It’s a sliding scale from one to 31 that defaults to 30, because 30 is the hard coded value in the version in the wild.

I like the way it’s come together and need to fix an annoying bug that cropped up on iOS 15.5 — possibly other versions — then I’ll get a beta out the door.

For the technically minded. This bug is clearly my fault. I have a layout issue my table view cells, there are two types. It would seem that iOS 15.5 has tightened up, or changed, the auto layout engine in UIKit that exposed my bug. I say it’s iOS 15.5 but it could be all 15.x. 🐞

I’m still digging. Hopefully I don’t wait another eight months to work on it again. 😳

Back to work today! It feels great to be engaged in more than staring at the walls, sleeping, or doing PT on my own.

Speaking of PT, my physical therapist came by and worked with me at 10AM. It felt great. I’m now walking without a walker using the countertop as a guide. Up and back we go. I was a bit apprehensive to try at first, but as I got moving I realized it was going to be ok. After that we did some squats, essentially box squats using a char as the base. Those felt amazingly good.

As for range of motion I can bend my knee to about 75 degrees, which I’m fairly certain is better than my pre-op range. That’ll be at 90 degrees soon enough.

All-in-all I feel good about where things are at the moment. I did overdo it a bit today which leaves me feeling sick to my stomach, but a little rest will take care of that.

More later.

Shhhh-thump, shhhh-thump, shhhh-thump, there’s that sound again. I hear it above me in the attic and always, I mean always, at 5:30AM on the dot.

We moved into our beautiful old home 23 days ago and I’m more than a little freaked out by it but too afraid to go look in the attic. I’ve dragged Mom and Dad in here a couple times and they don’t hear a darned thing. Old ears I guess.

More later.

Well, mystery solved. We have a ghost. No, I’m not kidding, we have a bonafide ghost living in our house. A ghost who likes to wake up at 5:30AM. This time doesn’t work for me, BTW.

When the sounds started this morning I was ready. I grabbed my flashlight, walked to the end of the hall to the door leading to the attic, took a deep breath, and opened the door. I was in the right place, the shhhh-thump sound was growing louder.

I walked up the stairs and peeked over the place where the hand rail meets the attic floor. There he was, sure as shit, an old man making his way to the corner of the room, his walker in front of him, shhhh-thump, shhhh-thump, shhhh-thump.

I took a deep breath and finished off the final few steps, and said “Hello.”

The old man stopped, turned around, smiled at me, and asked if I’d like to join him for his morning coffee. I accepted.

We sat around the old two top we found in the attic the day we arrived. He’s a happy old fart. He talked about his undying love for his wife, Lois, and how they enjoyed each other’s company, over coffee, at 5:30AM every morning, rain or shine.

Eventually I had to politely dismiss myself, school and all that. It’s nice to have a new friend and, at the same time, understand why every morning at 5:30AM I hear shhhh-thump, shhhh-thump, shhhh-thump.

Maybe I can get some earplugs?

Oh, the old man’s name is Julius. I hope to have coffee with him again soon.

It’s early in the Fahrni household as I’m composing this post. I’ve been waking up fairly early since the knee surgery and this morning is no exception.

Overall things have been moving in the right direction. My movement is definitely improving and my pain levels are way, way, down.

Since I’ve become more mobile I was able to make coffee on my own this morning with the aid of my walker. There has to be a good old man with walker joke in there somewhere. 👨🏼‍🦳

CNN: ”The Justice Department removed 11 sets of classified documents from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence while executing a search warrant this week for possible violations of the Espionage Act and other crimes, according to court documents unsealed and released on Friday.”

Of course TFG will get off without so much as a scratch. My faith in our democratic institutions is waning. I fear future historians — if they’re allowed to exist — will struggle to understand how we could piss it all away.

MotorTrend: ”Out of the 8.9 million barrels of gasoline consumed daily in the U.S. on average, only 1.8 million gallons, or approximately 20 percent, actually propel an internal combustion vehicle forward. The other 80 percent is wasted on heat and parasitic auxiliary components that draw away energy. As the world begins its shift to EV proliferation, the good news is electric vehicles are far more energy efficient on the road.”

On a positive note, EV’s are good! YAY! 🥳

Would I like to have one? Yep, I certainly would. I’m very cheap when it comes to cars so I’ll be waiting for the prices to drop dramatically before considering purchase of one.

Eventually we’ll have one.

The Verge: ”Last week, California’s DMV accused Tesla of falsely advertising its Autopilot and FSD features, alleging that the company made ‘untrue or misleading’ claims about its vehicles’ autonomous driving capabilities. The DMV’s action could result in the suspension of Tesla’s licenses to produce and sell cars in California, but the agency may not go that far.”

Speaking of electric vehicles. It seems Tesla is finally receiving the scrutiny they need to make their cars safer.

This curmudgeon believes Full Self Driving care are a pipe dream without full infrastructure support. That means roads should know to support cars with self driving capacity. Two way, active, communication.

Felix Krause: ”The iOS Instagram and Facebook app render all third party links and ads within their app using a custom in-app browser. This causes various risks for the user, with the host app being able to track every single interaction with external websites, from all form inputs like passwords and addresses, to every single tap.”

Meta(Facebook), what a scumbag company.

They need that user data so badly they implemented their own browser code. Of course if you open pages using the external browser, Safari, this scummy practice doesn’t work.

More like this. https://t.co/twq2zcTgL8

— Derek Powazek (@fraying) August 11, 2022

I really hope Beto O’Rourke can pull a rabbit out of a hat and win the Texas Gubernatorial election this year.

I know some folks needed their fainting couches when they heard someone say “motherf*cker”, but don’t say a word when there is a mass murder in their state.

To me this says we have a man, a very serious man, trying to solve serious problems against the backdrop of extremism.

Dropping a curse word in the proper context can drive home a point.

It was perfect.

Variety: ”Disney has set pricing and date for the U.S. launch of the version of Disney+ with ads, while also hiking the monthly price of the Disney+ tier with no ads. It’s also going to raise rates for Hulu — both ad-supported and ad-free versions — and introduce new Disney Bundle options.”

Well it continues to look like all that cheap, awesome, streaming is finally coming to an end. I can’t blame these companies for ratcheting up prices and offering an ad supported tier.

I know we’ve had many discussions about which service(s) to drop and Disney+ seems to be a lock because of the grandkids. 😄

This is a landmark event in 1Password history: The first time we’ve ever shipped both our iOS and Android apps on the same date with complete feature parity between them. It’s been a massive lift by our teams, and I couldn’t be prouder.

— Michael Fey (@MrRooni) August 9, 2022

Congratulations to the entire 1Password team. What a huge milestone!

It’s so satisfying to ship a new product. I haven’t installed it yet, but most certainly will at some point. It is a really spectacular service and worth checking out if you need password management for your family and/or multi platform password management.

Ars Technica: ”With Tesla stock on a rebound, Musk has just sold $6.9 billion worth of shares in his electric car company, a move disclosed in regulatory filings on Tuesday. Musk got an average of $869 for the shares, which is significantly more than the $628 that TSLA shares were trading at in late May.”

Gotta get those billions somewhere to pay that big Twitter $54.20 per share price tag later in the year.

Also, Mr. Musk, I still have the perfect domain for you.

I hope your enjoyed your coffee and the links. ☕️

Got my VAC bandage off today, managed to get a before and after shot. There are 28 staples in the incision.

I’m very emotional this morning thinking about my loved ones who’ve been caring for me. They’ve definitely taken a load off my back so I can focus on healing.

I am forever grateful. 🧡

I must admit I’ve not been good about doing my physical therapy homework. For past surgeries I was very diligent about doing what I was asked because I knew it was my quickest way to healing and feeling normal.

This time around is a different story. I lack the mental strength to cope with the pain involved. Prior to surgery I had times where I could not escape the pain in my knee. It’s wearing both physically and mentally. After surgery even though I feel pain in my comfortable position it’s nowhere near some of my more severe pre-op pain and I just don’t want to be in pain any longer.

The reality is, of course, that I have a long way to go and I am going to have pain. Just finding a way to cope, that mental toughness, has been extremely difficult this time around.

Have I regretted the surgery? Nope. It was absolutely the right thing to do. I know this is part of the healing process and one day I will be better than I was before surgery and that’s very encouraging.

I started watching The Sandman last night and it was amazing. I only watched two episodes because I’ve been watching on my iPhone. After episode two I decided I wouldn’t be watching any more episodes there and I’d be starting over on our TV.

The worlds and characters Neil Gaiman creates are absolutely beautiful. I’m obviously not a writer or critic but I know what I like and The Sandman has it all.

My lovely wife made me a mocha to go with composing this weeks post. That combined with oxycodone, ice, and elevation are doing their job. I can focus well enough to get this done. 🤞🏼

Shelly Rosen: ”The way Google’s two-factor authentication system is designed, sets up poor and elderly people to be locked out of their accounts again and again, and without access to their email, they lose their welfare benefits, their housing, and struggle to find work.”

I’m not sure what Google can do to fix this extremely important problem. Take some time to read Ms. Rosen’s letter it lays everything out for Google. As a developer this is the kind of feedback you hope to get from folks using your software.

TechCrunch: ”Amazon this morning announced plans to acquire Roomba maker iRobot for an all-cash deal valued at $1.7 billion.”

Alexa, don’t vacuum the cat. This seems like a really sweet deal for Amazon. I can’t believe iRobot couldn’t fetch a higher price.

Los Angeles Times: “The California Department of Motor Vehicles has accused Tesla of false advertising in its promotion of the company’s signature Autopilot and Full Self-Driving technologies.”

This shouldn’t surprise anyone. Tesla has been touring Full Self Drive for years and they’re no where near the desired functionality. Is it novel? Yes. Do I trust it? No way.

I can’t wrap my brain around the challenges the developers must be facing. And the icing on the cake would be Musk breathing down your neck to get it done. No thanks.

My idea of a better challenge would be tackling mass transit with electric motors and making it easier to travel long distances on electric trains and busses.

Heck, the eBikes business is really taking off.

Cartoon Brew: ”Dreamworks Animation has unveiled plans to release its proprietary production renderer Moonray as open-source software later this year.”

I’ve had a fascination with rendering pipelines for years and years. As far as I know Pixar’s RenderMan is still the Cadillac of rendering software but having an open source choice from a heavy hitter like Dreamworks is worthy of consideration, and it’ll be open so folks can contribute to it. Amazing!

When the git repo is made public you know I’ll be there poking around. 😃

Makes you wonder if Pixar will follow with RenderMan?

TechCrunch: ”Infowars founder Alex Jones took the stand today in a trial that will determine what he owes to the parents of a child killed in the Sandy Hook mass shooting. Last year, Jones was found liable in a series of defamation cases brought by the parents of Sandy Hook victims.”

Alex Jones is a grifter. He has an unwitting audience of people willing to believe anything because they hate everything and everyone. Jones feeds their animosity with wild stories of the deep state and blood drinking Democrats to drain them of their hard earned cash. Who’s the vampire?

Vulture: ”It’s pretty well known and even darkly joked about across all the visual-effects houses that working on Marvel shows is really hard. When I worked on one movie, it was almost six months of overtime every day. I was working seven days a week, averaging 64 hours a week on a good week. Marvel genuinely works you really hard. I’ve had co-workers sit next to me, break down, and start crying. I’ve had people having anxiety attacks on the phone.”

I don’t think this is a new reality of the VFX business. Rather, a horrible expectation set by major studios.

Deadline: ”Even though Batgirl is in the final stages of post-production, Deadline has confirmed that Warner Bros. and DC Films will not be releasing the movie on any platform, including theatrically.”

This is a real bummer. I was totally ready for it.

As far as release platforms go, I was fully expecting it to appear on HBO Max. It’s the streaming platform I use more than any other. More than Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, and Apple TV. Each of those services has a place in my streaming lineup, but HBO’s ability to release new movies to streaming early is it’s real superpower.

The Washington Post: ”SAN FRANCISCO — Elon Musk’s countersuit to Twitter contains aggressive new claims about the social media site’s methods for tallying bot and spam accounts — as well as which accounts generate ad revenue — cementing the strategy the billionaire is using to attempt to back out of the deal.”

I suspect Musk will be forced to show up and pay $54.20 per share.

The big question is, once he owns it can he make it something better or will he lose an uphill battle?

How do you deal with bot problems and nihilistic American politicians hell bent on turning our democracy into a self serving dictatorship.

I’m sure Mr. Musk has some really great ideas. It’s the bad ideas I’m worried about.

That’s all for today. I hope you enjoyed your coffee or tea with your read. ☕️

“That knee was bad. I’m surprised you could walk.” - Dr. Edwards

The knee has finally been replaced. Tuesday was the big day and I’d hoped to come home that afternoon. Unfortunately my body had a different idea. When I’d stand my blood pressure would drop and I’d feel nauseated. 🤢

So I got to spend the night in the hospital. It was a good experience as far as hospitals go. All of the nursing staff were absolutely wonderful.

I was up early Wednesday morning, didn’t sleep much at all. Dr. Edwards dropped by as well as David, my Physical Therapist. Since I’d been able to use the toilet through the night safely and was able to walk to the end of the hall the Doctor and Physical Therapist signed off on me I was discharged around 10:30AM, Wednesday.

Thank you Sentra Martha Jefferson Hospital , Dr. John Z Edwards , and everyone I interacted with. Y’all are amazing.

Hello new knee!

So happy right now! 🙏🏼