Now

This is my now page. It lists, at a macro level, what I’m currently up to.

Home (Updated 2025-07-15)

Still living in the lovely greater Portland, Oregon area, still accompanied by my house panthers Osgood and Basil.

At the moment all of us are in good health, but I’m starting to deal with arthritis in the pointer fingers on each hand. It’s not bad, but is annoying.

The next big home project will probably be either refactoring the garage or the craft room, both of which need a good purge and reorg.

Work (Updated 2025-09-07)

Semios laid me off in April, along with a lot of my colleagues. As a result, I’m job hunting along with the tens of thousands of others in the tech sector who’ve been let go in the past year.

I’m still advising Open Robotics. They’re great people who are working hard to do the right things for their community. I’ve recently realised that a few months ago I dropped the ball on drafting an IP policy for them, so I’m getting back to that ASAP. In October I’ll be attending ROSCon in Singapore.

When I remember, I’m still acquiring books for the open source series at Pragmatic Bookshelf. Do you want to write a book about, say, documentation in open source projects? Contact me!.

I’m now actively working on options for a techxit strategy. I don’t anticipate actually being able to leave tech yet, but I’d like a safety net.

Play (Updated 2025-09-21)

I continue spending too much time in Stardew Valley and I don’t see that changing any time soon. I’m also very slowly working my way through Assassins Creed Shadows and Astro Bot. Some day I’ll do that final battle in Tears of the Kingdom.

I’ve been spending more time using my Squeezeboxen to listen to my onsite music collection instead of streaming from Apple Music. I’m enjoying rediscovering albums.

There’s no vacation on my calendar for the rest of the year. Unemployment will do that. In October I’ll probably attend Oregon Flock & Fiber Festival and pet some sheepies and goaties. I’ll also attend ROSCon in Singapore and commune with my robotics pals.

Make (Updated 2025-10-05)

Spinning currently in progress…

  • Louet S10: Nothing at the moment; merino pending sorting, combing
  • Ashford Traveler Mk2: Nothing at the moment
  • Majacraft Little Gem: Fawn alpaca from a mystery box that I got secondhand.
  • Spindles: Nothing at the moment

I’m knitting a shawl with handspun Gotland. I’m 11 rows in and love the lunar silver colour. I’m looking forward to gifting it to a beloved friend.

I’m nearly done modding the jeans. So far they’re cut shorter, the leg hems are embroidered and cut into scallops, and I’ve taken the waist in by three or four inches. Once I’ve added the welt pocket to the right side for my phone, they’ll be ready to wear!

One ferment in progress: whole sweet peppers.

Watch (Updated 2025-09-21)

The Dark Shadows marathon continues.

Think (Updated 2025-07-15)

Losing the job has given me a lot of opportunity and headspace for high-level “what do I want to be when I grow up”-type thinking and wondering.

The current state of my country, of our climate, of our capitalistic culture, are all rather a lot to take. Figuring out how to manage «waves hands around» all this while remaining productive and (hopefully) not making the situation worse for anyone consumes a fair bit of brain time.

It’s really a shame that modern culture doesn’t appropriately value people’s time and skills. It would be lovely to make a good (let alone any) living from my spinning and other making.