---
date: "2022-08-01T00:00:00Z"
title: Return of the blog
---

It was fun for a while, 
but it seems like letting a big company host my blog posts wasn't actually a great idea.
So I'm starting the blog back.

I'll probably drop little updates here and there about what I'm up to.
I doubt I'm going to get into the sorts of tirades I used to.
An advantage of being older now:
I rarely feel the need to convince anybody of anything.

I thought it would be fun to pull some of my old blog entries out of the archive,
but it appears I mostly used my homepage to keep lists and record information.
Maybe one day I'll find out what happened to all that stuff I wrote.


## Self-Hosting is cool again

I've also been moving my source code back onto my own site,
removing things from my phone that demand attention,
and just generally reeling stuff back in to self-hosted.

One thing I really am not looking forward to self-hosting again is email:
SMTP is just a nightmare.
You need the SMTP server, 
the IMAP server,
the anti-spam stuff,
domain certificates,
rate limiting,
and just ugh.
I may have to do email if Google really fouls up,
but I really don't want to.


## Pocket Computers: turns out, kind of a pain

The phone app removal has been interesting.
After removing the news aggregator,
I wound up having to remove news updates from the web browser app
and from the search app.
It took a couple of days to get used to not getting constant news updates,
but it seems okay now.
I can still read the news on my laptop, when I want to do that.

My phone/pocket computer has turned back into a bunch of neat tools,
like a great camera, and a way to send and receive messages to people,
and a low-stress low-stakes low-attention game I've been playing.


## Books

I really like electronic books.
$SPOUSE and $CHILD got me a new ebook reader,
to replace the 10-year-old one I've been using.
There was nothing wrong with the 10-year-old one,
but my eyesight has gotten worse, 
and the low contrast screen has become difficult to read.

The new device is a Kobo Clara HD,
with better contrast.
It can also check out ebooks from the local library,
over a wireless connection.
I like it a whole lot,
and I find it amusing that the old one lasted me 10 years.
$SPOUSE has it now, she might pick it up when she finishes her current book.
