Weeknotes: 2026-01
For the first time in over a year I'm sharing my weeknotes here, on this blog, instead of my personal website. I decided this was the best place for the notes; the original intent of posting them at my other site was so that I could share what I've been working on across my various blogs. For 2026 I think that site is going to be more "static"1, with not so many updates and featuring more of my long-form writing2.
I'd like to re-organize my weeknotes this year from what I was doing last year, but I haven't figured out a template just yet. In any case, I don't have many notes from the last week, because I wasn't as glued to my computers or my phone. Which is good! Holidays are not meant for a lot of screen time. I don't know exactly how to measure screentime in the digital wellbeing app (I should look into that further) but I can certainly tell I used my phone less often in the last two weeks compared to the rest of the year.
Last week was also my first week using a pre-printed planner, as opposed to a usual bullet journal. I went with a Moleskine softcover 2026 planner and mercifully it uses the correct Monday-Sunday layout and started Week 01 on Monday December 29th - as it should be. I've cobbled together some notes from what little I wrote for that week with what I entered into my Obsidian week review file.
- After successfully cooking a turkey dinner the week before, I tried cooking a roast for the first time this week. I think it turned out okay, but there are several tweaks I'd make next time (among them a higher temperature for cook time so that I can get the meat more "done" - my mother-in-law doesn't like any pink in her meat [and neither do I]).
- I'm very disappointed with Amazon's packaging choices. The case for my drone arrived Sunday morning, and it came in a giant paper envelope. The case itself was inside a cardboard box, but this makes sense; where I'm disappointed is that I also ordered a Micro SD Card for the drone, and it arrived in a box more than twice its size! It could have easily fit inside a small paper envelope. I don't understand the logic here.
- tech: Looking into creating a private email address for family and friends only - leading candidates are Proton Mail, Fastmail, or Rebel
- media (games): I learned I'm a sucker for punishment; I kept trying to play NHL 26 via PS Remote Play, and I think I lost every single game because using the PS5 controller over Bluetooth as well as trying to play over two WiFi networks means the controls are very unresponsive and the CPU dominates every time. Frustrating.
- media: January 1st was "public domain day" - several pieces of media, from books to audio recordings, became available in the public domain (in the US). I think they were all from 1930.
Things I made this week
- Monday Thoughts 03
- My year in books (2025) | The Slow Reader
- Drone testing | Photos by Stephen Gower