Past two months have been a saga of moms illness, holidays, my illness and business travel. Going to start texting my friends to do things and hope they still exist 😅

I got a cold December 19th that lasted until Jan 4 or so. I started another cold today. Fie upon Winter

Raven was a winner this weekend!

Winter is full of clear air turbulence and virus. Cancel it all.

At my mom's house, updating her list of prescription drugs. It is as if her printer has ghosts. 15+ years of software experience but I don't fix printers. This will have to wait until Matt gets here in two days.

Main lesson from driving Seattle to Rochester MN in December - Montanans should be single issue voters on plowing. Drove at 40mph for six hours over thick ice. The MINUTE I go over the Wyoming boarder - BOOM PLOW. And it's not like WY is a blue state that loves public works.

Apparently America is made great through ugly out of date fonts. www.reuters.com/world/us/rub...

There are many pies, but if there is a god she eats only one. Pecan pie. It's God's pie. She's eating it now.

Just booked a corporate dinner at Marlaina's in Burien - great restaurant and the owner personally called to work out the menu. After booking I found this on their website. Some small businesses really deserve your money. Glad I went with this one!

Midwest fear of running out of butter is in full force today

I have spent so much time surrounded by people who have 6 to 15 dogs that I'm now like "maybe I should have like 8 dogs"

For veteran's day, my USAF coworker is calling us and we are learning facts about the nuclear weapons. It will forever be nuclear facts day.

I've seen quite a few articles about declining birth rates and his birth rates are declining even in very family friendly countries lately. I think the answer is simply "people are happier with fewer kids". Not sure if society can accept that.

Youngest kid started wrestling. He also does cross country and swim. None of the rest of the family can figure out how he's normal. Blows our minds.

The most important restaurants to me are those that combine craft cocktails with food from anywhere in Asia. Harder to find than you would expect since it's intrinsically fusion. But I love it.

Pretty sure I already have all the PNW seasonal depression. It's gonna be a long winter.

I quite like Bad Bunny even though I don't understand any Spanish and I'm very very confused by how this is hard for people. Like, I'd probably like his music even more if I did understand Spanish. But its good - anyone can tell.

There's really nowhere better to work than a well funded startup finding traction in a solid market other than developers. "Tier 1" big name tech is frankly exhausting to work for. "Tier 2" is where it's at.

🎃Seattle Area Folks - meet THE GREAT PUMPKIN! My local breed club is auctioning off this 400-pound beast of a pumpkin to raise funds for dog shows and other Aussie events. There has to be a perfect buyer for this delightful giant squash! 💲Bid at www.32auctions.com/AussiePumpkin

Hi Folks! I am hiring a product designer to work on tooling for mechanical and aerospace engineers. It's a SUPER FUN domain. Prefer prior experience in technical products. Send an email to maggie at istaridigital dot com

Nothing in GovCloud is simple

Theres very weird tension to being a progressive working in defense. I spend lots of time wondering "Is this contract in the best interests of America at this tumultuous time?🤔" And then the engineer in me is like "wait... Tell me more about how it goes BOOM."

One thing management makes me think a lot about is how disconnected our organizational fit as employees is from our actual value as humans.

Watched South Park and now I want a Labubu

We have no weekend plans and Matt has a cold. I'm debating whether to go get a flu shot and just call the weekend a wash.

Coming to realize burning man is just RV dry camping - an activity I do all the time. So I have already experienced it. No need to go.

Fully channeling my inner "resort lady" look in LA today

The whole Internet is freaking out about flesh eating screw worms and nobody is pointing out that Ivermectin actually is an effective treatment. Where is the rush on horse dewormer now?

Little girl won stuff!

We stayed at the Arizona Biltmore a couple months ago and now I can't book a hotel to save my life because they are all not the Arizona Biltmore. This is like learning what first class airfare is like but more expensive.

I gotta give SoCal credit - every time I go somewhere not there that's beach I'm like "this is super cool. But also is it really better than SoCal, a two hour flight away with zero time change?" Like, SoCal is not better than everywhere. But it's as good as everywhere.

Last dog show of summer, here we come!

Just went in and used Loki for the first time in months. #vplifestyle What a pile of shit why are we still here?

Really quite cool.

As someone who does not want more kids and certainly hasn't googled anything about it, it's INCREDIBLE how many targeted ads I get about fertility products. Would actually be kinda horrible if I were dealing with infertility...

Possibly the nicest RV spot we have ever had

My team is hiring for a design engineer/front end dev. Anybody looking? Would LOVE Seattle-based candidates, but this is a remote job, we just like to hang out sometimes.

Accidentally building an organization where the engineering leaders are mostly women and the product/design leaders are mostly men and I kinda love it.

I have worked with rocket scientists every day for two years and now every time someone makes a rocket science reference I'm just like "yes this concept would be too hard for them".

The fly swatter has caused great angst

I have never wanted to hunt down a PM more than I want to hunt down the Facebook PM who decided you couldn't make dog rehoming posts. I think they think they are preventing puppy mills but they are actually just completely breaking the system for dog rehoming for reputable breeders and rescues.

Good dog show weekend! Fred and Anders were reserve winners dog (second place but in a good way) twice. Ruby (bred by me, different owner) was winners bitch x2 and best of breed x1

Epic My Chemical Romance show last night!

Far left is the city of La Connor. The remaining four huge displays that all went until Midnight or later are on Swinwomish tribal land. They are committed!

Happy 4th from Fred and Raven!

Last week I had the realization that "rock bands" are simply dying in mainstream music and now I'm sad about it on a regular basis.

I love thia 4th of July parade - it has no fee to walk in and is delightfully non-commercial. Suffragettes, the food bank, Hella tractors, a couple local shops.

One of the most pronounced changes in my life is the one in my desire to talk about the tech industry. 2016 - I never would shut up 2025 - I utterly hate my past self and every tech conversation I hear it fills me with rage

Ever think about how private health insurance has no incentive to keep you healthy past 65? This is why they won't cover glp-1 drugs. All the benefits prevent health issues that mostly happen after 65 anyways. Doesn't save them money. Saves Medicare money.

13 year old has me going to Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow for his birthday. I will truly know what the kids these days listen to 🤣. Three days later we are going to My Chemical Romance. Like a cultural exchange.