When I woke up, the hills outside were mostly invisible through the fog. A thick haze – an autumn fog – enveloped the landscape. In these moments, my mind turns to what is immediately in front of me – the trees. The trees are starting to change colour, I thought to myself. Wi...
When the Internet Phone Book was released, it came up in several calls I was in. I had a copy of the book on the table next to me so that I could bring it out. Knowing that some people may not have seen the book – or heard of the project – showing the physical copy had signif...
At last week’s Homebrew Website Club, we had a discussion about making websites collaboratively. The discussion made me think back to the time when several participants all edited the same web page at the same time. The setup was an Etherpad – a web-based collaborative text d...
Interface design is intertwined with real-world metaphors. Computers save information to files. Files are stored in folders. We can open one or more windows to view different applications. We put files we no longer want into the rubbish bin (trash can). While looking for more...
Last night I went to bed thinking "what if I made business cards for my website". So I spent much of today designing them and cutting them out badly.
My printer is actually a bit messed up right now so the black isn't black so much as weird Cyan. But I like the cheap(?) vibe it gives the cards because it fits with what I kind of imagined for my site redesign, as I described it in a post from a few days ago. I printed them in black (blue-ish) and white and then highlighted each one. I actually used multiple colors to highlight them differently.
I put the paper in the wrong way, the paper has this sort of pattern on one side and now the text's on there and it's a little harder to read.
Read more on the site…
A while ago I read a poem that made me reevaluate how I think about the past; or how we in general tend to approach the past as primarily a resource from which we can draw comfort and knowledge. I'll just show you the poem and tell you what I mean, maybe it's a bit strange.
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Reply to this months IndieWeb carnival hosted by Marisabel on Colors
Color—it's more than just the word that I mostly end up spelling in the evil American spelling rather than the proper British spelling that I learned at school.
It's a very interesting topic, especially b...
Based on the feedback I received, many of you enjoyed the newsletter recommendations I shared last time and Eric and Dan even followed up and added their readings. So, I’m doing it again. This time with a few more of the reads that regularly land in my inbox, whether daily, ...
I was featured in Dense Discovery’s Worthy Five series, in which participants are invited to share five things that are worth seeing/doing/watching/asking, et cetera. Dense Discovery is among my favourite weekly newsletters. I recommend subscribing!
When I write for other s...
I have been thinking a lot about tech tips lately. How should I document the tools I use or configurations I have that improve my experience using technology? While I think about this, I wanted to start by publishing a list of browser extensions I use.
I use Firefox every d...
Finished the #Skyline50k #trailRace in 9:34:51 yesterday! My 3rd best 50k, and first 50k in over two years since the Marin Ultra Challenge 50k in 2023.It was quite the journey to get back here, and a lot went well in this race. From training to preparing and planning, the tem...
Inspired by Ben, Zachary and Courtney, I’m going to make an offer: join me for a virtual coffee chat!
For the next two weeks, I’m going to keep 9am - 11am UK time on Wednesdays (excluding August 6th) and 6pm - 7pm UK time on Thursdays open for coffee chats.
We can chat about:
ArtPoetryMaking websitesThe future of the webDesigning technologyInterface designYour favourite Taylor Swift songOr just say hello!
If you’d like to chat, feel free to email me at readers@jamesg.blog with the time that works best. I’ll send over a calendar and Zoom invite in which we can meet. I look forward to saying hi!
I have this list of ideas, but would you believe I am insecure about not having enough ideas? I said to a friend recently. As soon as I said it, I realised how direct I had been about a persistent, deep anxiety I have had about coming up with ideas. Another part of my mind re...
Today I have been thinking about how wonderful links are. With a link, I can send a resource to someone that they can immediately open and read. I can share a blog post I wrote, a blog post I read that is relevant, a Wikipedia article, a news story, a collaborative document, ...
Having a website encourages me to document, and share, my ideas, especially in prose. Whereas some ideas exist as notes in my notepads, having the medium of a blog post available as a means of expression encourages me to develop some ideas. Through this process, I consider my...
When I am using Notion – a notes tool – on my phone, sometimes I accidentally press a button and my text ends up formatted in a way I did not expect. Notion offers an undo button, except I didn’t know it was there until recently.
There is an icon tray of several buttons, bu...
For the last year or so, I have used my static create page to prepare posts for publishing on my blog. The tool generates a file that I can then add to the Git repository from which my site is generated. This workflow works well for posts that are mainly words, but falls shor...
You'll find my attempt at a post with the aforementioned title, as suggested by Zoe Loukia via our post title trade! Read more about the initiative, or contact me if you'd also like to trade!
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This is James' Coffee Blog, a brand new site by James that's just getting started. Things will be up and running here shortly, but you can subscribe in the meantime if you'd like to stay up to date and receive emails when new content is published!
