Open source software idea: An automated scanner that reports if you've accidentally carved your secret API keys onto your pumpkin.

*fest beer season is the best beer season.

I'm ready to join the 524 star club!

Got fired from my job for saying that 1 AWS region ought to be enough for anybody.

Track or Treat: The next iteration of Trunk or Treat that requires a 100 yard dash between pieces of candy.

The songs in Moana 2 are giving "We have Lin-Manuel Miranda at home".

Kids invented a Pokémon with balls for hands and innocently gave it the powers of Ball Punch, Ball Crush, and Ball Blast.

The "I'm done hiding" melody in KPop Demon Hunters' "Golden" sounds like it was written by an aggrieved ear training professor as the extra credit on the final exam.

Must have mistakenly ordered the extra spicy COVID/Flu shots this year because my shoulder is throbbing like an excorism movie.

Silbelius' 5th Symphony is peak "play in a meadow while sheep gambol" music.

Cerberus' lesser known cousin, the two-headed cat.

When Paul de Rapin first used the phrase "a bitter pill to swallow", he was talking about metronidazole. Not many people know this.

Got fired from my job for saying that the the only ingredients belonging in mac and cheese are the mac and the cheese.

New business idea: Off-season storage for those giant Halloween yard skeletons.

Adding "Amazon Prime Day 2: Big Deal Days" to the list of sequels the world didn't need.

Love that the JPEG format has a grass tax. "Oh you went outside and took a picture of nature? Well, this image file's is gonna cost you an extra 100KB."

At the playground scientifically observing dads who encounter the broken zipline chair and briefly try to fix it themselves.

Dichotomy of a Software Engineer: Inventing whimsical Seuss-like names for our products (Oozie, Sqoop, Flink) while using impenetrably long words to describe what we do (internationalization, reproducibility, authentication and authorization).

Made With New York Water (complimentary) or Made With New York Water (derogatory)?

Pumped that my team who successfully braved Puzzle Boats 6 - 8 have decided to get back together for the upcoming Puzzle Boat 12 even though no one works for the same company anymore.

Nostalgia Spotlight: 12 years ago this month, I was writing Auricle, an open-source music fundamentals and ear training tool intended to be better than MacGamut and Practica Musica. This effort ran out of steam after about 86 hours of development.

Inventing a time machine, going back to 2019, and telling young me to do all of the home renovations.

The decay of societal norms can be traced back to when the cook ate all of that dude's corn.

English Breakfast tea is a delightful flavor when you're in the mood to drink a napkin.

I still get the Quixotic urge to appeal to hearts and minds on Facebook every six months or so.

Got fired from my job for saying that the Moana soundtrack would sound better if Moana didn't shout all of the long notes.

Not gonna be impressed until this Bowl fad goes in the opposite direction. "Try our new Chicken Noodle Sandwich!"

Borderlands 4 first impressions (at lvl 15): - Love the controls and new mobility skills - Love the absence of BL3's awful forced dialogue - Annoyed by constant stutters (don't care about high FPS, just want it steady) - Annoyed by how far apart everything feels in open world B to B- right now?

An hour into Highest 2 Lowest (AppleTV+) and I'm wondering when the prologue will end so the movie can finally do something.

Got fired from my job for saying that the "flash-sideways" in the final season of LOST made everything up to that point irrelevant.

Drizzling narrow arcs of ketchup across this boiled hot dog and calling it fine dining.

Rebranding my leather-bound checkbook as my "Routing & Account Number Reference Manual".

The taxonomy for beds is rather bizarre.

Skill litmus test: whether I can successfully trigger a parry on the first try during a video game tutorial. Most recent failures: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and No Rest for the Wicked.

They should invent dental tools that don't sound like the brakes on a subway car.

New Release! The Gallant, a Wars of Light and Shadow novella, is now available in audiobook format narrated by Zachary Shaye Jennings. The audiobook (and original e-book format) are available exclusively in the Studio Shop: shop.paravia.com/janny-wurts/...

"I'm doing something!!"

14 years ago today, Hurricane Irene gave me a double bingo.

Winning platform stance: A tax on dog owners to pay a stimulus to cat owners.

Missed sponsorship opportunity by not naming the chain "Tac Obama".

While everyone waxes nostalgic about the dangers of quicksand, I'm learning that the true menace in adult life is slowly leaking tires caused by stray screws scattered on Northern Virginian roads.

As parental injuries go, stepping on a Lego is not as bad as picking up a Razor scooter and having the base swing around to hit your bare ankle.

Q: Why do Like Likes tend to follow each other on social media yet they rarely follow Link? A: Link doesn't like Like Like Likes like Like Likes like Like Like Likes.

Unnecessarily irritated that the Aspect Ratio tool in Google Photos says "Square" instead of "1:1".

Henry VI implies the existence of Henry Emacs.

"GPT-5 is the first time that it really feels like talking to an expert in any topic, like a PhD-level expert." - Sam Altman, OpenAI CEO

DMV win: In and out in 13 minutes for a RealID appointment.

They should invent a humidifier that gets quieter as it ages.

If space is a vacuum, why is the moon so dusty?

Celebrating 29 years of having a hand-coded personal website, 24 years of continuous blogging, 10 years of hosting IN THE CLOUD, and 0 years of normalcy: www.urizone.net/blog/250801