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I thought I’d posted about the Outdoor Recreation Archive (ORA) before but it looks like I just told everyone I knew about it in person instead. The ORA is “a historical collection of books, catalogs, periodicals, photographs, and manuscripts documenting the history of outdoor gear” and it’s housed at Utah State University.

I’d been following them on Instagram for a while now, just for a hit of nostalgia/some gear sewing inspo. I saw that they were bringing some actual materials to a bookstore in Salt Lake so we went to check it out. It was a vintage catalog WONDERLAND–my catnip.

The exhibit is at Books & Supply in downtown SLC through September 18th; you can just roll up during their open hours and go to the back of the store and spend hours going through everything. Highly recommend!

Now that I’m funemployed, the weekends are the same as the regular days and the key words are “stay busy” (followed by “save money”). So I tried making some cardamom buns–a food item I’ve always been curious about–and pulled out some twill and my patch collection to plan a project from the stash.

As the tiger patch reminds us, EVERYTHING’S FINE!

What a talent, what a good human. Maybe the last thing America could agree on?

I made a lot of pies and sewed with calico this weekend? But I’m rebranding it from “trad wife” to “AI could never.” (Also the calico is actually Liberty of London; I think that makes it better.)

My dad will be 79 tomorrow! It’s hard to remember that that’s pretty old, because he just keeps going. Last weekend he was up on a ladder and bending conduit; he walks at least five miles a day; and he isn’t even all the way gray.

I hope I can still be that strong when I’m 79–literally but of course figuratively too. He’s still learning (cooking, gardening, model railroad computer programming, history). He’s sharing a lifetime of knowledge. He’s making the best of things, and that’s really admirable.

So happy birthday, Dad. I hope tomorrow is a great day! We love you.

I got my orange tool chest a few years ago from Harbor Freight but I only recently learned they make accessories for it. Shown here: A magnetic tray, a magnetic paper towel holder, and a magnetic power strip, and on the other side, a fold-out table and a magnetic hook.

I don’t know why these make me so happy–maybe it’s the idea of Harbor Freight saying, “You know, manly toolbox-owning men really DO want to color-coordinate their manly toolboxes.” I guess the urge to optimize/organize is genderless.

This is a text I sent to Doc after a day of presentations about how AI can do our jobs:

So we went and I put myself in the water and was immediately happier.

The trees don’t care about effective prompting. The lizard we saw has never heard of an AI agent. The long grasses have no idea that the creative industry as we know it is threatened. (Oh to be a long grass…)

I stayed offline Saturday, hanging shelves in the garage (photos tomorrow); Sunday we went to the pool. Sometimes you just have to be reminded that “there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo.” (And it’s worth fighting for.)

I’m watering for my friend again. It’s a magical garden with high walls (which helped his fruit trees escape that late frost we had) but it’s a beast to water when the days are 100 degrees. But it’s certainly photogenic!

I watched this reel because I knew the author but after about 30 seconds I would have watched anyone talk about it.

 

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This is the dog she mentions, so it works with both species:

 

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Yes this is a cool party trick, but Elsie the cat can ask for pain meds when she needs it. That alone is worth trying to train a creature on these buttons.

 

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Extremely long-term readers of the blog will know I was thinking about a dog before I ended up with Toby. Now that Toby’s gone, I just don’t think another cat can compare with him, so I’m back to dog thoughts.

I’m currently in the phase where I try to list out all the cons of dog ownership to see if this is something I really want to do. I hadn’t really considered eating random stuff? This is a thread from 2019 that I found again, and wow is it vivid:

Of course, cats can be gross too: