Human-sized places

Hello hello!

It’s been a delightful long weekend so far. T’s been working, and I’ve been enjoying some quiet time in my own head—mostly puttering away at woodworking projects (including a trip to the shop and a lovely chat with Martin this afternoon!), plus some calls with friends and walks with Arthur. It’s been neat seeing how active and engaged he is when outside in his harness—literally a whole new world for him to explore, one he delights in. Mostly, though, he chews on grass, which seems to cheer him greatly.

Since reading about Simon Collison’s trip to Edale (in the Peak District), which seems a lovely, scenic, human-sized place, I’ve been thinking about places that offer that easy connection to nature and civilization, just a walk away. In North America, it feels like towns are spaced distances from each other that make sense for cars, but not for people—not to mention the lack of good walking routes in between. Not to put down living in town: walking Preston and the Glebe today in the sun was very cheery, and I ran into a friend and his family in the process. But some days, I yearn for easier access to a scenic rural walk.

Anyhow, I’ve got more bumming around to do, so on to the links!

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Systems:

• The elegant title of Anil Dash’s “The Purpose of a System is What It Does” offers a method for systems analysis based on reality, rather than an abstract analysis of how the system is supposed to work. And that change comes only by forcing a sense of urgency in those with power over the system.
• Speaking of systems, Jeremy Keith speaks of his (and many others’) growing distrust of what we see on the web because of AI generation (though it’s simply the latest symptom of a looooong trend of search engine optimization—search engines aren’t people, optimizing for them will have different outcomes!). Jeremy points to RSS and bookmarks as better discovery and curation mechanisms, but they still don’t quite solve the “how do I do X” search use-case (for which I usually append ”reddit” or “stackexchange”).

Changing:

• Sameer’s opening reflection in a recent newsletter has left me thinking about our malleability (and the power of narrative to effect that change).
• Mandy Brown with a vivid telling of thinking through the possibilities of change after a big rupture, like a layoff. Change brings risk, yes, but so does the status quo.
• A lovely reminder from Winnie Lim that “activity breeds energy”, with some tips on managing willpower and exercise, particularly if it’s been a long time since exercising regularly (and, as Mandy Brown so elegantly put it, energy makes time).

Oddball:

• Clever, diving deep into the fictional happy (or is it?) world of Apple demo content (seen most often in screenshots / videos, but also accessible by going to an Apple Store to check out a device). I feel like I learned the ideal-type of email and text from Apple marketing material, and have never lived up to it. Apparently that’s because my emails make chronological and topical sense!
• Delightful impressions of an American university focused on liberal arts teaching. (See also the rest of the series, linked within, for other impressions of America.)
• Neat: tales from Jason Kottke’s childhood with a father who ran a flight logistics company—with planes always nearby.

All the best for the week ahead!

Lucas