A place to jot down errant notes, thoughts, and ideas throughout my day.
To see the rest of my notebook, click here.
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Might be time to bid bearblog goodbye
I plan on writing a longer post about all of it, but in the past week or so I've rewritten my entire website in Astro and it's been a breeze. I can even update my site directly from my terminal now. You really can't beat that.
As much as I appreciate Bearblog as a platform and the friends I've made here, I'm considering moving my blog to my website. The idea of being able to write up a post and publish it all within Sublime Text and my terminal sounds awesome. I've also felt limited recently by the CSS customization on Bearblog. Being able to throw everything into my pre-made website layouts would be awesome, too.
We'll see. I'm still thinking about it. But I'll probably end up making the switch at some point.
Part of the reason why I haven't been blogging as much is because I'm so busy with my webdev stuff on Nekoweb. Juggling two different platforms is hard.
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on the random saxophone cover album I bought from Goodwill, nearly a decade later
I bought a random saxophone CD from Goodwill when I was like 19. This was at the height of my stoner phase, when me and my friends were all into "irony" and thrifting tons of garbage clothes and knickknacks.
The CD was another one-off gag purchase, but I actually loved it. I recently digitized my CD collection and came across it again. I've been playing it non-stop.
It came in a standard, third-party CD case. The kind you'd put all your burnt CDs in, with a paper slip for handwritten tracklists. So I never knew much about it. After some quick internet sleuthing upon writing this post, I discovered that it's volume two of a three-part series. Maybe one day I'll hunt down the other two CDs.
It's a really great compilation of covers, ranging from golden oldies to cheesy 80s songs. Here's the MusicBrainz info and the Discogs page. It's a real shame it doesn't show up on Last.fm; I've love to see how often I've played it lol.
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Blaugust???
I was reading this post from binarydigit.city and came across this link to something called Blaugust.
I've missed blogging, but I haven't found the right motivation to get back into it. I think this might just be what I need!
In other news, I've started learning how to build my websites through Astro. I've never used an SSG before and I like it a lot. Astro supports Markdown, so I might build a blog on my website, too. Having everything local on my PC and built with one quick command is really appealing. But, I do enjoy Bearblog as a platform still, and I really like the community! (I've also put so much work into my CSS here that it's become something of a sunken cost fallacy...lol.)
Decisions, decisions... I might just do certain blog posts on my site, and leave the bulk here. I've seen a lot of cute "diary" pages that I think I'd like to use for my journal entries. I also want to archive some of my featured posts in a more readable, no-frills format.
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kicking it old school at the library
kicking it old school at the library with my CD player; currently spinning HIT ME HARD AND SOFT by Billie Eillish. It's my go-to productivity soundtrack. Hoping to do some coding and writing.
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my wife and I maybe want kids????
Both my wife and I have been dreaming about having kids recently, and our conversations surrounding the topic are becoming less "haha, isn't that weird?" to something more serious.
Neither of us ever intended on having children, and when we got together we were both up front with that choice. But the more we entertain the idea, the more it weighs on us.
I was grocery shopping today and noticed a father with three little girls; I'm seeing things like that in a whole new light, now. I never wanted to have kids. But I could see myself wanting them with my wife.
Brains are weird. We're both nearly 30. Maybe this is our bodies' way of spurring us on to procreate. Or maybe two years of a very happy and successful marriage have opened our hearts to possibilities we previously denied ourselves.
In any case, we won't make any decisions now. And even if we were to have children, we probably wouldn't have them for another five to ten years. But it's nice to think about sometimes. The idea of raising a child together, seeing my wife become a mother, becoming a father myself, and starting a family together is growing more appealing. But we could do just as well getting a new puppy and traveling the world together.
I know for a fact that my little sister will be trying for a kid within the next year or so. Probably best to wait and see how that plays out.
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The spiritual power of women in dharma
I've had some thoughts about my Buddhist practice percolating in my mind recently. To express them without first explaining what my practice is would be foolhardy; yet finding the time to sit down and write about my faith and my journey toward it has been incredibly difficult! (Especially when considering I've now identified as some form of Buddhist for 10+ years!)
In the meantime, I do want to share one reflection: I have realized that I am more often than not drawn to female teachers and icons. In my own life, the people most influential to me outside of my own family were all women; within Buddhism, some of the most influential dharma teachers I follow are women, in particular Ven. Robina Courtin, whose dharma talk, Let's Get Real, is probably my first recommendation for anyone interested in learning about what Mahayana Buddhism really is on a psychological level.
My main practice is Pure Land Buddhism, which is centered on a male Buddha named Amitabha; the school I follow, Jodo-Shu was dictated by a male Japanese monk named Honen some 800 years ago. But in between my Pure Land studies I gained an affinity for other Mahayana teachings through Ven. Robina et al., which manifested in a practice dedicated to Tara. She's known as a very active, competent, courageous, energetic entity. She is a savior, protector, and destroyer of fear who vowed to always reincarnate as a woman. She also bears close connections to Amitabha.
Another deity associated with Amitabha is Avalokiteśvara, better known by his East Asian, female iteration: Guan Yin. She makes up one third of the Pure Land trio with herself and Mahāsthāmaprāpta as Amitabha Buddha's attendants.
I felt inspired to make this post after watching this video from Sravasti Abbey, an American monastery/abbey lead by the nun Ven. Thubten Chodron.
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looking for a minimalist bearblog theme good for text heavy pages!
I wanna build a new page on my blog for my short stories, poetry, and essays. Looking for a minimalist theme to apply to these specific pages. I've looked around a bit but wanted to see if anyone had any ideas, whether it's a default theme, a theme someone else made, etc. Ty!
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rainbow taskbar
My taskbar is rainbow right now! I couldn't get over it when I noticed lol.
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feeling myself
I was feeling myself yesterday, so here's some selfies I took lol. I might use some of them for my website. Bonus points for anyone who catches my cat yawning.
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today was a good gender day
Today's been a good "gender day". By that I mean I feel like a real man.
I've been on testosterone for 5 years. Imposter syndrome never goes away completely, but I'm having days like this more and more.
I keep catching myself off-guard, staring at my reflection mesmerized by the man looking back at me: the bold latitude of my brow bone, the square corners of my jaw, my beard and mustache growing thicker by the day. I look less like I'm thirteen and more like I'm thirty; I've never been more relieved to be visibly aging.
I remember looking at myself in the mirror as a kid. Just one glance at my reflection would bring immeasurable pain. I avoided looking at myself as often as I could. Nowadays I look at myself and it's like all that pain washes away. No matter how bad of a day I'm having, at least I can spend it as a man.